On June 19, the Parliament passed an amendment to the labor and civil procedure codes to make it easier to identify and combat undesirable behavior in the workplace.
The amendment was published in the Journal of Laws on August 4, and is to enter into force after three months, on November 5.
From now on, the employer must not only respond to reports, but also systematically prevent violations.
Mobbing: a simpler definition and an example catalog of behaviors
As the National Labor Inspectorate explains on its website, after the changes, mobbing will be understood primarily as persistent harassment of an employee. The legislator indicates that this concerns repetitive, recurrent or permanent behavior. Therefore, as a rule, a one-off incident will not be considered mobbing.
It will not be necessary to prove that the perpetrator acted intentionally or that the behavior caused specific consequences, e.g. a lower assessment of one's professional suitability or health problems. The key is to determine whether the employee has been persistently harassed.
The regulations will cover physical, verbal and non-verbal behavior. The perpetrator may be an employer, a superior, a co-worker in an equivalent position, a subordinate, another employee, or a person employed on a basis other than an employment contract. Mobbing may also include ordering or encouraging other people to take such actions.
The Act lists examples of behavior that may constitute mobbing. They include:
humiliating and insulting an employee,
intimidation,
unjustified criticism,
ridicule,
obstructing the performance of duties,
isolating an employee or eliminating him from the team.
At the same time, the new regulations are intended to protect against unfounded accusations. Holding an employee accountable for his or her duties or criticizing his or her work, expressed in an appropriate form, will not constitute mobbing.
Higher minimum compensation
The amendment increases financial protection for people affected by mobbing. The minimum compensation is to be at least six times the minimum wage.
Obligations for employers: prevention, detection, response
Employers will be obliged to systematically counteract mobbing. The Act indicates three main areas of action:
prevention – i.e. actions to prevent violations,
detection – recognition of mobbing cases,
response and remediation of consequences - appropriate response to reports, support for victims and corrective actions.
Companies employing at least 10 people will have to define the rules, procedures and frequency of such activities.
The rules should be included in the collective labor agreement or work regulations. If they are not there, the employer will have to introduce appropriate regulations.
Discrimination by association and assumption
The new regulations also expand the definition of discrimination. It was indicated that it could be:
discrimination by association – when an employee is treated worse because of a characteristic of the person he is associated with, e.g. a family member;
discrimination by assumption – when unequal treatment results from a characteristic wrongly attributed to the employee.
An example of the first situation may be unfavorable treatment of a person raising a child with a disability. The second may concern a person towards whom co-workers create an unfavorable atmosphere, e.g. assuming a specific sexual orientation or political views.
Other compensation for single and repeated incidents
The Act differentiates the minimum amount of compensation for violation of the principle of equal treatment.
In case of incidental discrimination, the benefit is to be at least equivalent to the minimum wage.
In case of multiple discrimination - at least three times the minimum wage.
Multiple discrimination was considered to be both repeated violations for the same reason and actions taken for different reasons. It may also be a single violation if it is based on several discriminatory grounds at the same time.
The regulations will also cover ongoing cases
The new regulations will also apply to behavior that began before the Act entered into force but continued after that date. This applies to both persistent harassment and repeated violations of the principle of equal treatment.
