29January2016

Changes in Law Number 6661 for Military Service Obligation And Other Regulations

The Law No: 6661 on Military Service and Amendment of Certain Laws has been published in the Official Gazette dated 27 January 2016, No: 29606 and entered into force. With Article 17 of the said Law and Provisional Article 68 added to the Law No: 5510 on Social Security and General Health Insurance, the SGK (Social Security Institution) incentive granted to employers for 2016 has been declared. According to this article, regarding the total number of premium payment days of insured declared in the monthly premium and service declaration (APHB) to be approved in 2016, for insured declared with a daily income of 85 TL as basis for premium and below declared in APHB submitted to the Institution in the same month of 2015, in other words, the insured whose monthly SGK base is declared as 2550 TL and below, on condition to not exceed the total number of days of premium, daily 3.33 TL will be deducted from the total employer’s premium to be paid to the Institution and this amount will be covered for the whole year 2016 by the Treasury. Thus, additional treasury incentive will be provided, which will not exceed 99.90 TL monthly, per person.

For instance, in case of 3 insured having 30 days SGK premium days in January 2015 and whose SGK base is below 2550 TL, a supplementary Treasury incentive of 3.33 TL will be granted for each day in 2016, up to maximum 90 days of premium. If in the declaration to be made in the January 2016 period, there are 110 social security premium days, it will be possible to benefit from the incentive as 299.70 TL for 90 days maximum.

For establishments starting their activities for the first time in 2016, the said daily 3.33 TL on the total number of premium days related to the insured declared by these establishments will be deducted from the total employer’s premium to be paid to the Institution and this amount will be covered by the Treasury.

The announcement above is in line with the information published in the Official Gazette. Detailed information will be provided after publication of the Implementation Regulation by the SGK Directorate.

The full text of the Provisional Article 68 added is provided hereunder.

“PROVISIONAL ARTICLE 68-

Employers employing insured persons to which long term social security branch provisions apply in the scope of subparagraph (a) of the first paragraph of Article 4 of this Law;
1. ) On condition to not exceed the total number of premium payment days of insured declared in monthly premium and service documents submitted to the Institution for the same month of 2015 and whose daily income base for premium is 85 TL and below, total number of premium payment days of insured declared in monthly premium and service documents submitted for the current month of 2016,
2. Total number of premium payment days of insured declared by establishments in the scope of this Law for the first time in 2016,
The amount found by multiplying by daily 3.33 TL for the months/periods of 2016 January and December will be deducted from the social security premiums to be paid by these establishments to the Institution and this amount will be covered by the Treasury
In case an existing establishment is closed and opened under a different name, tradename or work unit or employment shifts between companies having direct or indirect partnership relationship so as to hold the management and control, the ownership of the establishment under sole proprietorship changes, i.e. prearranged operations aimed at benefitting from the Treasury contribution, or in case of establishments which declare the insured’s income base for premium deficiently for 2016, the amount covered by the Treasury will be taken back, together with the penalty and the delay interest and the provisions of this article will not apply for such establishments.
In case it is observed during inquiries and inspections performed by officials in charge of inspection and control that employers failed to submit the monthly premium and service declarations related to the insured persons they employ, regarding 2016, within the legal required deadlines, to pay the social security premiums within the legal deadlines, to declare the persons they employ or the persons declared do not work effectively, and that they owe premium, administrative fine and related delay interest to the Institution, the provisions of subparagraph (b) of the first paragraph of this article will not apply. However, establishments which have their premium, administrative fine and related delay penalty and interest debts to the Institution postponed or split in installments, by virtue of Article 48 of the Law No: 6183 on the Procedure for the Collection of Public Receivables,dated 21/7/1953, will continue to benefit from the provision of this paragraph, during the period of postponement and installments.
In the application of subparagraph (a) of the first paragraph, in case monthly premium and service documents related to the same month of the previous year has not been submitted, the declaration in the monthly premium and service document submitted related to the first subsequent month will be considered. For establishments which are covered by this Law prior to 2015 but which did not employ insured persons, the provisions of subparagraph (b) of the first paragraph will apply.
In cases where the social security premiums of the insured and the employer are covered by the State, if the social security premium to be paid by the employer is lower than the amount to be covered by the Treasury, deduction will be made only at the amount of the social security premium debt.
For insured persons working underground in establishments extracting “brown coal” and “pit coal” where wages cannot be lower than double the minimum wage, by virtue of additional article 9 of the Mining Law dated 4/6/1985, no: 3213, the 85 TL daily income indicated in subparagraph (a) in the application of the first paragraph, will apply as double and on condition to not exceed 50 per cent of the premium payment days declared in the monthly premium and service documents submitted to the Institution for the same month of 2015, the total number of premium days related to the insured persons declared in the monthly premium and service documents submitted for the current month of 2016 will be taken into consideration.
The provisions of this article will not apply for insured persons working in the scope of subparagraph (a) of the first paragraph of article 4, in positions of public administrations indicated in list (I) enclosed to the Law No: 5018.
In case of purchase of services by administrations indicated in subparagraphs (a), (b), (c) and (d) of the first paragraph of article 2 of the Law No: 4734 realized according to the related legislation and where contracts include the payment of price difference, for employees the number of which is determined in tender documents and whose total weekly working hours are foreseen to be spent in the administration, the amounts to be covered by the Treasury according to the first paragraph will be deducted from the employers’ progress payments by these administrations.
The provisions of this article will not apply for registered insured persons indicated in monthly premium and service documents submitted to the Institution, within the legal deadlines, for the 2016 January-December months/periods.
Procedures and principles related to the application of this article will be determined by the Institution, after seeking the views of the Ministry of Labor and Social Security, the Ministry of Finance and the Undersecretariat of Treasury.”