Details Regarding the Declaration of Remote Workdays

Social Security Institution has published a General Letter on 05.07.2021 to explain the details regarding the declaration of remote workdays.

The rules below are stated in the General Letter:

• A written agreement or contract would need to be done for the remote works. The remote work period and the working time would need to be included in this written contract.
• The working schedule can be either fully remote work or partially remote & partially in the workplace. The contracts can be hybrid.
• If an employee works fully remotely, the holidays, weekends, national holidays, annual leaves would need to be included on the remote workday declaration. If the employee works partially remotely and partially in the workplace under a hybrid contract, only actively remote workdays would need to be declared (except holidays).
• There is no difference in the Labor Law rights perspective between the employees work remotely and in the workplace.

As per the rules above, the remote workday declarations would need to be done on the merged Income Tax and Social Security Premium Declaration file as below:

• For an employee who works fully remotely in a month, the weekend holidays would also need to be declared, and the number of remote workdays to be declared would be 30 days on the declaration file.

Example 1 – For an employee who has 4 weekends on a month and works fully remotely on all workdays during the month, the number of the remote workday on the declaration file would need to be 30.

• For an employee who works fully remotely on all workdays during the month and does not work on the public holidays/bank holidays, the related payments for the non-worked public holidays would need to be done to the employee, and the number of remote workdays would need to be 30 on the declaration file.

Example 2 – For an employee who has 4 days weekend and works fully remotely on all workdays during the month, the public holidays/bank holidays would need to be included on the remote workday declaration, and the number of remote workdays to be declared would be 30 days on the declaration file.

• If the workplaces have hybrid employment contracts that include both working in the workplace and working remotely (if the employees work partially in the workplace and partially remotely during the month), only actively remote workdays would need to be declared except the holidays. The holidays would need to be declared under the social security premium days (social security retirement days) column, however, would not need to be included under the remote workdays column on the declaration file.

Example 3 – For an employee who has 4 weekends during the month and works in the workplace for 5 days and works remotely for the rest during a month, the remote workdays would be 21 days (4 days weekend + 5 days in the workplace and 31-9=21 days remote workdays). However, the social security premium days (retirement days would be 30).

• For the employees who work partially in the workplace and partially remotely under a hybrid contract, only actively remote workdays would need to be declared (except holidays).

Example 4 – For an employee who has 8 days weekend days and works in the workplace on half of the month and works remotely on the other half of the month; the total workday would be 22, and since the employee works half of it as remotely, the remote workdays to be declared would be 11 days on the declaration file. The total social security premium days (retirement days) under the social security premium days on the declaration file would still be 30 days.

• For the one-off/temporary works that are not considered as permanent works (for instance, the office visits for equipment delivery or document delivery, etc.); since these would not change the nature of the working format of the employee, there would be no requirement to make a change on the employment contract. The remote workdays would need to be declared as the statements on the existing contract.

Example 5 – For an employee works fully remotely during a month and has some visits the office for a few hours temporarily, there would be no need to make a change on remote workdays and employment contract. The number of remote workdays and social security premium days would be 30 days on the declaration file.

You can reach the SSI General Letter dated 05.07.2021 via the link.

You can reach the details of the Remote Work Regulation via that link.

You can reach the details of the Technical Measures to Consider During Remote Working via that link.

Should you have any queries or need further details, please contact your customer representative.