We remind you that the Law no.165/2018 on the granting of vouchers, with subsequent amendments and additions, regulates how to grant vouchers for the benefit of employees.
Please note that the tax regime of value tickets is provided for in Law no.227/2015 on the Tax Code, as amended and supplemented.
Value tickets are issued exclusively in electronic format.
Nursery vouchers are just one of the ways in which employers can financially support their employees with various expenses – in this case, employee-parents, who are not on parental leave and take their children to daycare or leave them in the care of authorized nannies.
Nursery vouchers – legal provisions
Nursery vouchers are value tickets that are granted, on a monthly basis, to employees who do not benefit from the leave and allowance granted for childcare up to the age of 2 years, respectively up to 3 years in the case of disabled children.
Childcare vouchers can only be used to pay fees at the child’s day-care centre.
Nursery vouchers are granted, on request, to a parent or guardian to whom the child has been entrusted for upbringing and education, on the basis of the family booklet.
The nursery vouchers are not available to professional nursery assistants or to persons with whom the child is placed and for whom the measure of emergency placement has been instituted under Law no.272/2004 on the protection and promotion of the rights of the child, republished, with subsequent amendments and additions.
The nursery vouchers can be used by employees only at nurseries or entities assimilated to them and with which the issuing units have concluded service contracts. Assimilated entities means other public or private pre-school early education establishments, organised in accordance with the law, as well as persons exercising the profession of nanny in accordance with Law no. 167/2014 on the exercise of the profession of nanny.
The individual amount in the form of nursery vouchers is granted, according to article 18 paragraph (1) of the law, to cover part or all of the nursery fees representing the monthly contribution of parents/legal representatives to the expenses for children enrolled in nurseries to other public pre-school early education units, according to the provisions of Government Decision no. 1.252/2012 on the approval of the Methodology for the organization and operation of nurseries and other early childhood education units, or, where appropriate, the cost of services provided by private early childhood education units or nannies and is borne entirely by the employer.
Nursery vouchers are distributed to employees on a monthly basis for each of their natural children, including each adopted child, as well as for those for whom guardianship has been established, on the basis of the following documents:
a) application for the nursery voucher;
b) the document issued by the day nursery/its assimilated institution where the child is enrolled;
c) documents proving the parental status, namely the child’s birth certificate, in the case of natural parents, or the court decision granting the adoption, in the case of adopted children;
d) documents attesting the status of guardian, namely the court decision establishing guardianship or, where applicable, the order of the guardianship authority;
e) a sworn statement that the other parent or, if applicable, the guardian does not benefit from childcare vouchers, leave and monthly allowance for raising a child up to 2 years of age, respectively up to 3 years of age, in the case of a disabled child, provided for by Government Emergency Ordinance no.111/2010 on leave and monthly allowance for raising children, approved with amendments by Law no.132/2011, with subsequent amendments and additions;
f) other documents requested by the employer, as the case may be, according to the internal regulation provided for in Article 7 paragraph (3)
Employers are obliged to inform employees about the day-care centres/institutions similar to day-care centres with which the units issuing the day-care vouchers have concluded service contracts.
The nursery voucher issuing units shall request from employers the identification data of the nurseries/entities similar to them in which the employees have children enrolled, in order to conclude contracts for the provision of services, in compliance with the provisions of Law no.190/2018.
The document issued by the nursery/entity assimilated to it in which the child is enrolled is issued, as a rule, by the nursery/entity assimilated to it, at the request of the parent/guardian who has the child enrolled. In order to obtain this document, employers, together with the legally constituted trade union organisations or employee representatives, as appropriate, may determine that the request is to be made by the employer on the basis of the nominal list of employees who have children enrolled in the crèche/childcare institution.
If the day-care centre/entity has no legal personality, the issuing units shall conclude service contracts with the legal person within whose structure the day-care centre/entity is organised.
It is important to mention that in case the employee to whom the day-care vouchers were granted did not submit to the employer the information regarding the child’s presence at the day-care centre/its assimilated entity, in writing with the confirmation of the day-care centre/its assimilated entity, according to article 14 paragraph (2), the employee is obliged to refund the employer the value of the day-care vouchers granted and not paid.
If the reimbursement is not possible, the employer shall recover from the employee’s salary entitlement the value of the additional nursery vouchers granted, corresponding to the number of days absent during the month in which the child was absent from the nursery/its equivalent.
In order to ensure the proper provision of crèche services, the service contracts concluded between crèches/similar institutions on the one hand and the issuing units on the other hand shall contain an express clause concerning the calendar term for the settlement of the nominal value of the crèche vouchers. In the case of nurseries/entities assimilated to them which do not have legal personality, the legal person shall open a separate bank account through which the amounts corresponding to the nursery vouchers will be paid in the contractual relationship with the issuing unit. The value of the day-care vouchers settled by the issuing units will be fully and effectively allocated to the day-care centre/entity assimilated to it.
The monthly value of the day-care vouchers granted to employees and paid to the day-care centre/entity assimilated to it by the issuing units may not be divided by the day-care centre/entity assimilated to it, by periods of use, depending on the absence of children from day-care during a calendar month or on the amount of fees established for children whose parents pay the day-care fees in cash. Any amounts not used by the crèche/its assimilated entity in the current month, due to the absence of the children, will be used by the crèche/its assimilated entity in the month in which the children in question are present at the crèche/its assimilated entity. In these cases, the monthly amount of the day-care vouchers granted to employees for the month in which the child will be present at the day-care centre/entity assimilated to it shall be reduced accordingly by the employer. The information on the child’s monthly attendance at the day-care centre/its assimilated entity, confirmed by the day-care centre/its assimilated entity, shall be communicated to the employer, in writing, by the employee receiving the day-care voucher.
The amounts settled by the issuing units and not used by the nursery/its assimilated entity until the end of the calendar month shall be carried forward to the following month. At the end of the calendar year, the balance of the bank account opened for nursery vouchers operations will be carried over to the following year.
The day-care centre/its assimilated entity must organize its own monthly record of the child’s monthly attendance at the day-care centre/its assimilated entity, according to the form provided as a model in annex no.13 (Analytical situation of children up to 2 years of age, respectively up to 3 years of age, in the case of disabled children, by day-care centre and its assimilated entities, in the month …… year ……).
Nursery ticket value:
The nursery voucher has a higher value, starting from October 2022, according to MMSS Order 1306/2022. According to the document, from October 2022 until March 2023, the value of a nursery voucher is 570 lei.
Thus, the maximum level of the amounts granted in the form of nursery vouchers cannot exceed the amount of 570 lei for one month, for each child in nursery.
The nominal value of a nursery voucher is 10 lei or a multiple of 10, but not more than 100 lei.
Please note that each nursery ticket is valid only if it has the following information written on the electronic support or otherwise stored in it:
a) the name and address of the issuer;
b) the period of validity of the use of the nursery voucher;
c) the prohibition to be used for the purchase of goods/services other than those referred to in Article 18 (2);
d) the name, surname and personal number code of the employee who is entitled to use the nursery voucher.
Tax treatment – nursery voucher:
From a tax point of view, childcare vouchers are considered as salary advantages. These vouchers are taxed at 10%, but are not included in the basis for calculating compulsory contributions.
According to the rules of application, in the internal regulation/collective agreement, as the case may be, the companies must also include the documentation that the employee must present to the employer in order to grant these nursery vouchers.
“Employers who grant value tickets to employees shall highlight in their own budgets approved according to the law, in a separate expenditure item called “Meal vouchers”, “Gift vouchers”, “Nursery vouchers”, “Cultural vouchers” or “Holiday vouchers”, as the case may be, the amounts intended to cover the nominal value of the value tickets, as agreed with the legally constituted trade union organizations or with the employees’ representatives, as the case may be”, provide the implementing rules of Law no. 165/2018.
Legal basis:
-Law no.165/2018 on the granting of vouchers
-MMSS Order no.1306/2022 on the determination of the indexed monthly amount to be granted in the form of Nursery vouchers for the second semester of 2022
-Fiscal Code (approved by Law no.227/2015, published in MO no.688 of 10.09.2015), as amended and supplemented;
-Methodological Norms for the application of the Tax Code (approved by HG no.1/2016).