At a glance

• The Labour Code 'flexi-amendment' has been approved by the Chamber of Deputies and is expected to complete the legislative process smoothly.
• The 'flexi-amendment' makes significant changes to Czech labour law, which may now take effect as early as June 2025.
• Reforms include changes to probationary periods, fixed-term employment, remuneration, termination of employment, and family-friendly rights.

On 7 March 2025, the Chamber of Deputies of the Parliament of the Czech Republic approved a long-awaited, and much discussed, proposal for a major amendment to the Labour Code, which aims to increase flexibility in employment relations.

In the end, the 'flexi-amendment' passed relatively smoothly and was supported by a significant number of the opposition. Compared to the original proposal, however, the amendment has undergone significant change.

The 'flexi-amendment' will now be discussed in the Senate of the Czech Republic and the remaining legislative process is expected to run smoothly.

The amendment is set to take effect on the first day of the second calendar month after its publication, which means that it could now come into force as early as 1 June 2025.

The main significant changes introduced by the 'flexi-amendment' are as follows:

Probationary period

• The maximum length of the probationary period will be extended from three months to four months for regular employees, and from six months to eight months for managerial employees. 
• It will also now be possible to extend the probationary period (within the overall maximum limit of the probationary period).

Fixed-term employment

• There will be a new exception to the general limit on the number of times a fixed-term employment relationship can be entered into where it is to provide a substitute for a temporarily absent employee (typically on maternity or parental leave). 
• In these circumstances, there will be no limit on the number of times the fixed-term contract can be renewed, but there will be an overall limit of nine years of fixed-term employment, which cannot be exceeded.

Working parents

• Employees returning from parental leave before their child is 2 years old will now be guaranteed by law the right to return to the same job position and occupation that the employee held before going on maternity / parental leave. 
• The employee's status will therefore be the same as for employees returning from maternity leave.
• There will now also be an ability to have concurrent employment with agreements for work outside the employment relationship during parental leave. This means that employees will not be forced to return to part-time work, or to request an adjustment of working hours, if they want to help their employer by undertaking work during parental leave.

Juvenile work

• There will be a new ability for juveniles to work from the age of 14 years old ie before the completion of primary schooling. 
• Permitted work will be limited to the summer holidays and juveniles can only be assigned light work that does not endanger their health, education or moral development.
• Shorter working hours (seven hours per day and 35 hours per week); longer rest periods (14 hours between shifts); and a ban on working after 8pm will apply. 
• The consent of the employee's legal representative will be required to enter into an employment relationship with a juvenile employee.

Remuneration

• It will be clarified that salary assessment (ie the unilateral determination of the amount of pay) must always be unconditionally delivered to the employee before the actual performance of the work for which the pay is to be provided.
• Electronic delivery of the salary assessment will be allowed. However, electronic delivery is subject to a number of specific conditions and, therefore, is not actually likely to be feasible, in practice.
• There will be a minor technical change in the calculation of average monthly earnings in cases where, during the reference period for which the average earnings are calculated, the employee's weekly working time has changed. This change will be reflected proportionately in the calculation of average monthly earnings.
• In contrast to the current legislation, the cashless payment of wages will be established as the primary method of payment. Employers do not, therefore, have to agree this with employees. However, an employee will still be allowed to refuse a non-cash payment.
• The ability for employers to pay wages to employees in a foreign currency will be expanded. In addition to cases where the employee performs work abroad, premitted foreign currency payments will include cases of employment of foreigners or Czech citizens living abroad.

Termination of employment

• There are fundamental changes relating to termination of employment. 
• The reasons for termination will be modified where the termination relates to an employee's health (ie long-term loss of the employee's health capacity to perform work). There will no longer be any distinction between a loss of health capacity caused by a work accident, occupational disease or general illness of the employee. 
• A separate termination ground has been created to cover the situation where an employee reaches the maximum permissible exposure to eg radioactive material. This reform will also simplify the wording of the termination notice. Severance pay (equal to 12 months of the employee's earnings) will only be payable to an employee if the employment relationship is terminated due to exceeding the permissible exposure limit. 
• In cases of long-term disability due to work-related accidents or occupational diseases, lump sum compensation (equal to 12 months of the employee's average monthly earnings) will be provided instead of severance pay. However, the provision of this compensation will be covered by the statutory insurance scheme and therefore employers will not have to pay it from their own resources.
• There will be a reduction in the notice period from two months to one month in the case of terminations for failure to meet the prerequisites or requirements for the performance of work; unsatisfactory work results; violation of the employee's work duties; or violation of the treatment regime of a temporarily incapacitated employee. An exception to the general rule, that the notice period must be of equal length for both the employee and the employer, is therefore introduced for these circumstances.
• Notice periods will start immediately after the notice is delivered; not from the beginning of the following calendar month, as was the case before. Therefore, the notice period will end on the day of the relevant month that coincides numerically with the day of delivery of the notice (if there is no such day, it will end on the last day of the calendar month).
• The length and duration of a notice period may be adjusted by written agreement with the employee. 
• There will be a change to the period within which employers must terminate the employment of an employee for breach of their employment obligations. This will now be a maximum of three months from the time the employer became aware of the breach, but no longer than 15 months from the date on which the breach actually occurred.
• On termination, employees will no longer be required to declare without undue delay whether they wish to insist on continued employment, but will be able to do so at any time until the court decides whether or not the termination was invalid. However, it is still the case that employees will only be entitled to salary compensation as an indemnity in the event they are successful in their challenge from the time when they make their declaration of intent to continue employment. 
• In response to European Court of Justice case law, there will be an explicit provision confirming that an employee is entitled to claim compensation for untaken leave where they successfully challenge the validity of the termination of their employment. On the other hand, it will now be possible for the court (at an employer's request) to reduce the wage compensation awarded if the employee has undertaken other gainful activity during the litigation period.

Occupational health checks and health promotion programmes

• A new provision covering initial medical examinations of employees will be introduced. As a result, employees performing light work without health risks, will no longer be required to undergo an initial medical examination, unless the employee or employer insists on an initial medical examination.
• There will be a new option for employers to set up a special health promotion programme to help employees maintain and improve their health, increase control over factors affecting their health, and contribute to improving the prevention of disease. The details of the operation of these programmes are not yet clear, as they will be captured in a decree of the Ministry of Health, which is still being developed. The key issue in relation to these programmes is understanding what tax treatment will be associated with them.

New unemployment benefit system

• The unemployment benefit system will be comprehensively revised. 
• The main change is an increase to the support provided in the first months of the provision of unemployment benefit (from 65% to 80%) and a reduction in the last months (from 45% to 40%). 
• The age limit at which the support is provided is extended for a longer period of time to 52 years (it is currently 50 years). 
• These adjustments are accompanied by an increase in the overall limit on the maximum amount of support, up to 0.8 times the average wage. 
• Reduced support for cases of termination of employment without a 'serious reason' will be abolished (ie support will be provided at the standard rate in these cases as well).
• There will be a tightening of the ability to repeatedly access unemployment benefit.

Other changes

• There will be explicit regulation of holiday entitlement in the event of a transfer from an employment relationship to an 'agreement on work performed outside the employment relationship'. 
• The moment of effectiveness of the delivery of immediate termination of employment will be specified. 
• There will be an explicit prohibition on restricting an employee's handling of information about their salary; a confidentiality clause prohibiting disclosure of salary information will no longer be allowed.