In the Official Gazette (Part I) no.261 of 29 March 2023 was published the Order 1235/2023, which increases the daily allowance granted to budget members delegated or seconded to another locality in the country.
According to this order, the amount of the daily subsistence allowance will be increased from 1 April 2023, more than four years after the most recent amendment.
As a result, the non-taxable daily subsistence allowance that private employers may grant to employees seconded or posted in the country is also indirectly increased.
Thus, the current amounts of delegation and secondment allowances, also called per diems, for budget employees working in another location in the country, are set by HG 714/2018 from 1 January 2019. The normative act provides that those amounts may be periodically updated directly by Order of the Ministry of Finance, depending on the evolution of the consumer price index.
Therefore, the amounts of the delegation and secondment allowances for budget employees, as well as the amount of the accommodation allowance, formalized by Order 1235/2023, are:
- the amount of the delegation allowance – is increased from 20 to 23 lei per day;
- the amount of the secondment allowance – increased from 20 to 23 lei per day;
- amount of the accommodation allowance – increased from 230 to 265 lei per day.
We remind you that, according to the Tax Code, in order to be tax-free, the daily allowances granted by private employers for employees delegated or seconded in the country must be a maximum of 2.5 times the legal level established for budget employees. Thus, if the daily allowance granted to budget employees is increased, this means that the non-taxable amount of daily allowances granted in the private sector will also be increased from 1 April.
Specifically, from a non-taxable daily allowance of 50 lei (20 lei x 2.5), the non-taxable daily allowance is 57.5 lei (23 lei x 2.5).
Please note that, from May 2022, non-taxable daily allowances have a second limit, i.e. three basic salaries corresponding to the job occupied. The limit of three basic salaries corresponding to the place of work is calculated, according to the Tax Code, by comparing the three salaries to the number of working days in the month in question, and the result is multiplied by the number of days of the period of delegation or secondment in the country.
Employers must pay to the State, for the part exceeding the limits set by the Tax Code, income tax (rate: 10%) and social contributions for pensions (rate: 25%), health (rate: 10%) and labour (rate: 2.25%).
For budget employees delegated to a locality located between 5 and 50 km from their permanent place of work, from April 2023, a delegation allowance of 23 lei per day has been established.
Also, budget officials who are delegated to a locality more than 50 km away from their permanent place of work and who cannot return at the end of the working day will receive a daily delegation allowance consisting of a delegation allowance of 23 lei per day and an accommodation allowance of 265 lei per day.
As mentioned in the Labour Code, delegation is the temporary performance of work or tasks corresponding to the duties of the job outside the employee’s place of work.
Delegation may be ordered for a maximum of 60 calendar days in 12 months and may be extended for successive periods of up to 60 calendar days only with the employee’s agreement.
The Labour Code also stipulates that secondment is a temporary change of place of work to another employer for the performance of work in the employer’s interest. “Secondment may be ordered for a maximum period of one year. Exceptionally, the period of secondment may be extended for objective reasons requiring the employee to be present at the employer to which the secondment has been ordered, with the agreement of both parties, every 6 months”.