777 business owners with habitual non-payment, subject to credit sanctions for 1 year... Restrictions on loans and national projects

First application after introduction of the system... Registered as subject to credit management even before conviction

(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Ok Seong-gu = 777 business owners who habitually defrauded their employees' wages will be subject to credit sanctions for one year, which will result in restrictions on loans and government assistance and support projects.

The Ministry of Employment and Labor held the Wage Arrears Information Deliberation Committee on the 3rd and announced that it had decided to impose credit sanctions for one year on 777 business owners who clearly had habitual non-payment even before their convictions were confirmed in court.

This measure is the first case in which a decision to sanction was made under the ‘Habitual Arrears of Payment Business Owner Sanction System’ implemented in October last year.

The existing list disclosure (3 years) or credit sanctions (7 years) required court confirmation of sentence, such as 'confirmation of guilt more than twice within 3 years', so there was a limitation in not being able to timely sanction business owners who repeatedly defaulted on payments during the trial period.

Accordingly, the Ministry of Labor introduced a sanctions system for business owners with habitual non-payment, which imposes credit sanctions for one year on business owners whose non-payment is certain even before they are found guilty.

Those subject to sanctions are those who have delayed wages for more than 3 months (excluding retirement benefits) in the preceding year, or have delayed payments more than 5 times and the total amount of the unpaid wages is 30 million won or more (including retirement benefits).

The 777 business owners who have been subject to credit sanctions this time with habitual non-payment will be registered as subjects of credit management for one year by the Korea Credit Information Center (Korea Credit Information Service) and will be restricted from lending and financial transactions.

In addition, participation in national and local government assistance and support projects is restricted, and disadvantages are imposed in the pre-screening and successful bidder decision processes when bidding for national and local contracts.

Vice Minister of Labor Kwon Chang-joon emphasized, "Under the recognition that non-payment is a crime of theft, the government will impose swift and strong credit sanctions on business owners who have habitual non-payment," and added, "We will do our best to eradicate non-payment through full investigation of workplaces and collaboration with local governments, focusing on industries with frequent non-payment."