Secure information from “F” states that the Ministry of Labor, since the control of the support given during the pandemic, has identified around 4,500 cases, where companies and the self-employed will have to return money and has already started submitting claims for the their collection. So far, a refund of 4.5 million euros has been demanded and an amount of € 2.5 million has already been returned to the state coffers.
The refund to the Ministry of Labor, which had been given as emergency support, was made mainly through offsets with other benefits to those who intentionally or unintentionally (due to mistakes) took money without meeting the conditions.
For the time being, the Ministry of Labor is checking the applications submitted for the plans that were implemented until March this year and has identified hundreds of problematic cases.
Most of the ministry's claims on companies and self-employed arise due to the non-satisfaction of the condition for the percentage reduction of the turnover of each company. Many applicants did not have the turnover required to receive support.
There were few, but there were, cases of companies that were found to have made redundancies, while a key condition of the support plans was and remains that there should be no dismissals of staff for a certain period. It is noted that the audits of the Ministry of Labor focus on companies that received large sums, but are carried out for all sectors of the economy, after a risk analysis and will continue for some time, even after the end of support plans.
The intention of the ministry is, with the completion of the control that is done for the examination of specific conditions that were set by the plans, to come back for a more detailed examination of the applications, seeing other parameters.
It is worth noting, however, that, after the lifting of the restrictions, the requests for the special plans of the Ministry of Labor have decreased compared to before, but also that the plans themselves have become even more targeted, increasing, among other things, the reduction rate. turnover for participation in them and extending the period when a company is not allowed to proceed with redundancies.
As mentioned, the special support through the plans of the Ministry of Labor ends, after 20 months, at the end of October. The relevant decisions for the last plans of October will be announced at the end of the month. The application process for the 19th period of the projects, which took effect in September, was completed at midnight last Monday.
Philenews
