Assisted part-time for soon-to-retire personnel has been launched

With the issuing of the official memorandum INPS No. 90 dated 26 May 2016 the so called “assisted part-time” for soon-to-retire employees comes full circle, as introduced by the Stability Law of 2016 and implemented by the Ministry of Labour with Decree dated 7 April 2016.

In particular, the law established the possibility for private sector employees to enjoy a benefit in exchange for a reduction of work hours (to be agreed upon with the employer), as long as they reach the minimum age established to file for old-age pension by 31 December 2018.

Access to the so called “assisted part-time” will be applicable to employees hired under an open-term agreement:

• whose date of birth is no later than May 1952;
• who have accrued seniority contributions to AGO or substitute methods or exclusive of the same of at least 20 years;
• who enter into an agreement with his/her employer for a minimum of 40% and a maximum of 60% reduction of contractually-agreed working hours.

In these cases, the employee shall be entitled to:

• in the monthly payslip and at the employer’s cost, an all-inclusive amount – which does not concur to form part of the employee’s income – equal to the social security contribution for the pension plan,

as well as

• payment of an additional non-cash social security contribution, thus to be borne entirely by the social security agency.

Instead, the aforementioned ministerial decree and the official memorandum INPS No. 90/2016 defined the procedures and the administrative requirements that the parties (in particular the employer) must implement to access the “assisted part-time”.

In particular, while the employee is exclusively required to submit the electronic request to INPS, the employer must meet a series of requirements, among which:

• submitting the agreement signed with the employee to the competent Territorial Labour Office;
• filling out and submitting an electronic request;
• filling out the remuneration/social security contribution returns in compliance with the instructions provided by the social security agency.

The intention of the law was to make the social security agency to act as leverage to give access to the job market to the new generation and to the rejuvenation of the work-force in Italy.

In particular, in compliance with the contractual tools made available by the law, the transformation to part-time of an employee close to old-age retirement could favour the hiring of a young apprentice or intern (according to the extra-curricular scheme), while maintaining for the former a tutoring role in preparation to replacement at the time of retirement.

20 July 2016

Salvatore Vitiello – Labour Consultant

Nunzio Lena – Associate

Labour Consulting Division – HR Capital S.r.l.