Has the national media outlet RTV allowed itself to mindlessly spend taxpayers’ money once again? All employees who decide to retire will receive as many as ten monthly salaries. According to Article 132 of the Employment Relationship Act (Official Gazette of the Republic of Slovenia, No. 21/2013 et seq.), an employee is entitled to two average monthly salaries, but all indications are that the only Slovenian national media outlet used the opportunity to let the employer determine how many monthly wages the people retiring will receive. Nothing new – RTV Slovenia has proved that it is more than capable of spending more than 100 million euros of taxpayers’ money in an imaginative way every year.
Director-General of RTV Slovenia, Andrej Grah Whatmough, shared the news that he has concluded an agreement with the representatives of the representative unions of RTV Slovenia on the gradual retirement of employees who plan to retire in the upcoming years while meeting all the necessary conditions. We need to point out that RTV Slovenia has more than 2,200 employees. Their salaries amount to 75 percent of RTV’s annual budget.
Thus, up to ten average monthly salaries will be paid to everyone who qualifies for retirement. Most of these employees could have retired a long time ago, as they all already qualify for it. We can only imagine how generous the current Director-General must have been to ensure that some RTV Slovenia employees would finally decide to retire and thus free up the budget to create a better programme for the national media outlet.
In the construction industry, the metal industry, and the tourism industry, employees receive a maximum of three average monthly salaries upon retirement
The question of severance pay for retirement for an employee is regulated by Article 132 of the Employment Relationship Act (Official Gazette of the Republic of Slovenia, No. 21/2013 et seq.). Thus, an employee can receive the amount of two average monthly salaries in the Republic of Slovenia for the past three months (the current amount of an average salary is 3.615,30 euros gross), or the amount of two average salaries of the employee in question for the previous three months.
Individual industries pay different numbers of monthly salaries upon retirement. Workers in tourism with a working period of five to ten years are entitled to one monthly salary, with a period of ten to twenty years to two monthly salaries, and with over twenty years of service, they receive three monthly salaries upon retirement.
In the construction sector, a worker must have been employed for at least five years in order to be entitled to one monthly salary when retiring. In most cases, workers in the construction sector receive two monthly salaries when retiring.
Workers in the metal industry receive one monthly salary for five years of service, two for ten years, and three average monthly salaries upon retirement for having worked for 20 years.
These cases alone prove that future retirees at RTV Slovenia will receive at least seven salaries more than most other employees who retire.
It is up to you to decide whether that is fair or not. But we believe that the Director-General did not want to deal with the trade unionists of RTV (among whom is also Primož Cirman’s wife, Petra Bezjak Cirman), and so he offered them a generous contract, which they could not refuse. This is also proof that the trade union headquarters in the public media outlet have great political power over the decisions of the management of RTV Slovenia.
When is a worker entitled to severance pay, and what conditions must be met?
If an employee retires, he or she is entitled to severance pay upon termination of the employment contract, but only if the employee has been employed by the employer for at least five years. The amount of severance pay upon retirement is two average monthly salaries in the Republic of Slovenia for the past three months, or the amount of two average salaries of the employee in question for the previous three months if this is more favourable for the employee. Regarding the right to severance pay, the Employment Relationship Act allows the collective agreement to regulate activities in a different way (i.e. it can also be less favourable than the legal regulation, but, of course, it can also be regulated more favourably, according to the law).
A part-time employee is also entitled to severance pay upon retirement (provided, of course, that he has been employed by the employer for at least five years) in an amount proportional to the working time for which the employment contract was concluded. This does not apply in cases where the employee works part-time in accordance with the regulations on pension and disability insurance, regulations on health insurance or regulations on maternity, paternity and parental leave; in these cases, the employee is entitled to the full amount of severance pay.
If the employee partially retires (and has been employed by the employer for at least five years), he has the right to proportionate severance pay upon retirement, with the employer whose contract had been terminated and the employee then concluded a new one for part-time work.
If a worker is re-employed after retirement and then retires again after a while, he or she is not entitled to severance pay upon termination of this employment contract (regardless of whether he or she was re-employed full-time or part-time after retirement or if he later retired partially or full-time). This is an expression of the principle that everyone is entitled to a maximum of one severance pay upon retirement.
An employee is not entitled to severance pay upon retirement if he is entitled to severance pay under Article 108 under the Employment Relationships Act and if the employer financed the purchase of a pension period for him. An employee is entitled to the payment of the difference if the amount of severance pay under Article 108 or the amount for the additional pension period is lower than the amount of severance pay upon retirement.
Luka Perš
