Will the employer check the authenticity of the diploma? The Sejm made a decision

What diplomas do the regulations apply to?

The amendment to the Law on Higher Education and Science was prepared by the Ministry of Science as part of the deregulatory package. 423 MPs were in favor of adopting the amendment, one person was against and 21 MPs abstained from voting. The bill will now go to the Senate. The amended regulations are to enter into force 30 days from the date of announcement.

This amendment will apply to paper diplomas, i.e. all those issued before January 1, 2027, because from January 1 we are entering the era of electronic diplomas, where this verification will take place automatically through the system we provide, said Maria Mrówczyńska, deputy head of the Ministry of Science.

What are the changes?

According to the provisions of the amendment, universities - at the request of an employer with a legal interest - will provide information about the data contained in a study completion diploma issued in paper form, based on the data of the holder of this diploma included in the application, in particular the name and surname and the number of the study completion diploma.

"It is assumed that a fee will be introduced for each time the university confirms the data contained in the diploma of completion of studies, in an amount equal to 1% of the minimum remuneration for work applicable on the day of submitting the application, which would cover the unit cost of handling the inquiry," it was emphasized in the Regulatory Impact Assessment.

According to the amendment, the condition for submitting an application will be "reasonable doubts as to the authenticity of the data contained in the diploma of completion of studies - including after verification of the security features against forgery specified in the regulations issued on the basis of the Act of November 22, 2018 on public documents, in relation to documents with such security features."

“Is PLN 44 really a lot?”

According to the Ministry of Science, the act is deregulatory in nature. Reduces formalities. The employer does not have to ask the job candidate for consent to gain access to verification of his diploma - explained Deputy Minister Mrówczyńska.

Parliamentarians had doubts about the fees that employers would pay to universities for verifying diplomas.

Obtaining information that confirms the correctness of diplomas requires not only access to digital databases, because not all universities have digitized databases of all their graduates, but also the ordinary work of an archivist or (...) an academic administration employee who must go to the archive, find a folder, extract appropriate documents from it and verify the diploma on this basis. Is PLN 44 really a lot? I think not necessarily. This is not a big burden for employers, who will be sure that the candidate has the appropriate diploma, concluded Deputy Minister Maria Mrówczyńska.

Are universities ready for new regulations?

The Ministry pointed out that the introduction of the proposed solutions will result in the imposition of additional burdens on universities, which will be significant: according to information from the Integrated Information System on Higher Education and Science POL-on, on average 299,236 diplomas of completion of studies are issued nationwide every year, additionally, the regulation may apply to diplomas issued over the last 50 years.

However, as Deputy Minister Mrówczyńska said, universities are prepared to verify diplomas. They already issue certificates for graduates confirming completion of studies at the appropriate profile, level and field, she noted.

The new regulations result from demands from the social side

As the deputy head of the Ministry of Science, Maria Mrówczyńska, pointed out during the first reading of the project, the amendment results from the demands of the social side. She reported the problem of employers who have doubts about the authenticity of university diplomas and the information they contain.

In the current situation, an employer employing a person with appropriate qualifications is not able to verify at the university whether the data contained in the diploma he submitted is true, because in accordance with the position of the President of the Office for Personal Data Protection, the employer cannot submit such inquiries to the university - explained the deputy head of the Ministry of Science.