The decree establishing 2011 conventional remuneration for individuals working abroad was published in the Italian Official Gazette no. 300 of 24 December 2010. These values must be used to calculate the contributions for the obligatory social security for workers working in no-EU countries with which
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On 1 January of this year some new features introduced in recent years with Italian Law no. 247/2007 (Protocollo del Welfare – Welfare Protocol) and Italian Legislative Decree no. 78/2010 (Manovra Anticrisi – Anti-crisis legislation passed last May) will become effective:
– new system for calculating the waiting period between the date when pension requirements are achieved and the time when the pension starts to be paid; therefore the waiting period is being changed into a period calculated for each worker, starting from the date the requirements are met, namely 12 months for employees and 18 months for self-employed and contract workers;
– increase in the amount, i.e. increase in the requirements necessary for obtaining old age pension; achievement of the right to pension will depend on reaching a certain age and a minimum number of contributions (so-called quota), which will increase annually until stabilising in 2013. For the year 2011, the value of this quota is fixed at 96, with a minimum age not under 60 years;
– increase of the minimum pension amount by 7 euro (equal to 460.97 euro).
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In its Notice No. 32661/2010, INPS has announced that hiring workers included on availability lists for defined-term contracts, including for contracts of longer than one year, for one of the reasons set forth under article 1 of Legislative Decree No. 368/2001 gives the employer the right to use the special terms for contributions described in Law No. 223/1991. These special contribution terms cannot exceed a period of 12 months.
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By issuing Memo No. 162/2010, INPS has provided instructions for employers to use in making the reports for December 2010 or January and February 2011. One of the most important aspects is the importance placed on compensation variables. In other words, if events or facts take place during the month that imply changes to the taxable compensation (i.e., compensation for overtime hours worked), employers are allowed to consider these changes when fulfilling the obligation and paying the contributions in the month following the month affected by these factors, without prejudice to the need to assign the contributions to the period in which they have accrued (the “accrual basis").
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With Italian Ministerial Decree of 29 October 2010, published in Italian Gazette no. 300 the 15% solidarity contribution on maximum TFR amounts has been regulated – enacting article 1, paragraph 222, of Italian Law no. 296/2006. TFR paid out in the period 2007-2009 for an amount greater than 1.5 million euro, will be subject to the above contribution. It will be possible to pay this debt in 18 monthly instalments.
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The definitive CUD and 730 tax return forms have been published. In particular, the certification that employers will have to issue to workers by next 28 February 2011 contains important new features. The area dedicated to sums paid for production bonuses has been completely revised. Given that the CUD is a condition per se sufficient for proving the existence of the reasons for a production bonus required by law, the section dedicated to notes (BX and BY) contains the explicit certification of the employer in this regard, as set forth by the Agenzia delle Entrate (Italian Tax Authority) resolution no. 130/E/2010. Another new feature involves the application of the additional rate of 10% on remuneration paid in the form of bonuses and stock options which exceed triple of the fixed part of remuneration. It is also necessary to certify in the notes for Abruzzo workers affected by the 6 April 2009 earthquake the suspended amounts for which taxation has resumed, but which have not been paid by the substitute tax.
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A combined reading of the various laws regarding tax abatements for overtime and incentive pay, shows that verification of the income possessed by an employee in 2009, for the purposes of recognising a tax abatement for the year 2010, must be performed by adding the amounts of tax abatement during 2008, or to a maximum of 3,000 euro to the taxable income contained in box 1 of the CUD form.
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The Agenzia delle Entrate, with its resolution 130/E issued yesterday, stated that if the employer states in the Cud the requirement of production or organisational efficiency motives for the sums paid (overtime, nighttime work or shift work), the tax abatement of 10% cannot be disputed by inspection bodies. Therefore, the employer is not required to provide any additional documentation as proof. At this point it becomes indispensable to issue a Cud to the employee which must occur also for employment terminated during 2008 and 2009 (in addition to 2010).
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Starting on 1 January 2010 all companies of all sizes – public and private – must perform, in accordance with Italian Legislative Decree no. 81/08, an assessment of all company risks, including the risk related to connected work stress. The assessment takes place in two phases: the first mandatory phase, entails a survey of statistical data, early warning events, contents and work context; the possible second phase, is characterised by the adoption of corrective measures for the case if significant stress elements emerge.
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INPS with its message no. 31002/2010, stated that the same Institute as of 1 January 2005 had automatically registered with the office managing freelance INPS contributions all individuals who declared income on form RE of the PF tax return for 2006 and who appear not to have paid contributions to this office. This registration is part of an auditing operation related to contribution positions, called PoseidOne, started in 2009. From this group INPS has excluded anyone who declared income from freelance work who is required to pay contributions to a professional pension fund.
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The derogation of the redundancy benefits, since its introduction with the “anti-crisis” decree (Italian Legislative Decree no. 185/08, converted into Italian Law no. 2/09) has been the only instrument enterprises can use which are normally excluded from applying the redundancy benefits due to the type of employment contract, company sector or company size. The 2011 economic manoeuvre, approved last week, establishes an extension of this benefit for 2011 as well: based on specific government agreements the Ministry of Labour can grant redundancy benefits, by means of derogation, for a maximum period of 12 months. This is while waiting for an overall reform of the fund, recently pushed by the Collegato Lavoro (Labour Law) delegating this task to the government to enact it in the next 24 months.
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INPS, with its message no. 28997/2010, reiterates that, in the event of an assessment, if a company which is a going concern, has expressly refused to advance indemnity for sick leave, maternity leave, time off and extraordinary time off the employer will be formally warned (by registered and certified e-mail) to pay the benefit due, and notify INPS of such payment at the same time within 30 days from receiving the warning. If such deadline is not met, INPS shall pay with “maximum promptness”.
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The director of the Agenzia delle Entrate (Italian Tax Authority) Attilio Befera, in declaring the currently available forms inadequate, has speculated on extending the requirement for the monthly 770 return. This experiment – which should start in January 2011 – may be postponed until 2012. This postponement will be contained in the Italian “Milleproroghe” Legislative Decree (legislative decree granting extensions for various legal deadlines).
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INPS, with its circular letter no. 142 of 5 November 2010, provided new instructions for obtaining unification of contributions explaining, in particular, that as of 1 July 2010 this operation is no longer free.
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INPS, with its message no. 28706/2010, has clarified that, following the enactment of the new Regulation 883/04/EC the country of last employment continues to pay unemployment benefits to a worker who moves to another
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The appreciation rate for severance indemnities (T.F.R.) contributions, accrued at 31 December 2009, amounted to 2.354566%.
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The amendment to the stability law (currently up for approval in the House of Deputies), includes, among other changes, the extension for all of 2011 of the possibility for companies to use workers earmarked for redundancy schemes (Cigo and Cigs) in professional requalification or training programmes which can include production activities connected with their learning. Therefore, for next year as well workers can be involved in company training projects. The employer will pay the difference between the government benefits and the worker’s wages.
In addition to the above, the same text requires for 2011:
– the extension of redundancy, unemployment and special unemployment schemes, including without interruption, as long as there are government agreements and the duration is not longer than 12 months; in this situation the progressive reduction of benefits has been confirmed (10% in the event of first extension, 30% for second extension and 40% for subsequent extensions);
– confirmation of authorisation to INPS regarding advance of redundancy benefits by means of exemption;
– requirement of extraordinary redundancy and unemployment benefits for employees of commercial enterprises with more than 50 employees;
– possibility of registering workers of companies with fewer than 15 employees on the unemployment lists, who have been dismissed for justified objective reason, connected with the reduction, transformation or sale of the activity or work;
– extension of the increase of the amount of the benefit for defensive solidarity contracts, equal to 80% rather than 60%;
– the confirmation of the maximum extraordinary redundancy benefits by means of exemption, equal to 24 months.
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INAIL, with its note no. 6464/2010, concerning ancillary occasional professional services, explained that the value of a work voucher does not necessarily refer to an hour of service. This is due to the fact that there is no specific legal reference that links the work voucher to a minimum hourly wage. Therefore, the determination of the remuneration is left up to the autonomy of the customer and service provider, who shall be free to contract the remuneration in relation to both a unit of time and achievement of a result. The Institute also explained that the communication indicating start of the service needs to be performed only once even if the service is performed on a weekly, monthly or annual basis and even if there are days within the period when the service is not provided. Therefore, the need to send a communication for each work episode is excluded and the customer needs to make the appropriate variations only if the previously communicated period changes.
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INAIL, with its note no. 7918/2010 underlines the new features introduced by the so-called “Collegato Lavoro” (Law 183, new labour laws) and, in particular, underlines that an Emens electronic report prevents the employer from receiving a fine from 1,500 to 12,000 euro for each irregular employee (more than 150 euro for each day). Since the fines are not applicable if previous contribution requirements were complied with showing the willingness of the employer not to hide the employment, even in the case of a lack of correspondence between the job duties and the worker’s qualification. Therefore, all employment situations for which there is no contribution requirement, such as casual work or apprenticeships, risk being excluded from this opportunity.
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As an annex to its circular letter no. 132/2010 INPS published the EU forms U1 and U2 (competence of INPS) as well as form U3 (competence of the Centro per l’Impiego – Italian Employment Office) for unemployment benefits. This is the result of the application of new provisions in force as of 1 May 2010 regarding unemployment benefits and reimbursements between institutes.
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