site.btaGeneral Labour Inspectorate Head Assenova: 2,200 Found Working without Employment Contract in 2025

Since the beginning of the year, 2,200 workers have been found to be working without an employment contract, compared to 2,016 cases in the same period of 2024, General Labour Inspectorate Executive Director Ekaterina Assenova said in an interview with BTA. She noted that inspections for violations of labour legislation do not stop in the summer. 

During this season, he General Labour Inspectorate focuses its efforts on seasonal sites at seaside resorts, she specified.

Work is also being done to prevent the occurrence of work accidents. The construction sector remains the most risky in this respect, so  emergency inspections are applied, she told BTA's Borislava Bibinovska.

There are also checks all year round in the restaurant and hotel industry, because it is risky both for undeclared work and for ensuring healthy and safe working conditions. Since the start of 2025, labour inspectors have carried out out 4,100 inspections in this sector, with 18,368 violations found against 19,441 in the same period of 2024, she said.

The introduction of new exemptions for one-day employment contracts in the agriculture sector will not come at the expense of controls by the Labour Inspectorate, the head of the executive agency said further. Since the beginning of the year, 2,410 inspections have been carried out in this sector, during which 8,310 violations have been established, Assenova said. Of these, 5,450 relate to ensuring health and safety conditions at work. The number of violations related to the implementation of labour relations is 2,838. The number of detected cases of work without an employment contract 
is 119, she specified.

Assenova calls on people to work under an employment contract with clearly stated working conditions, because only it guarantees their labour and social security rights. 

She also told BTA that the staff of the Chief Labour Inspectorate is insufficient. With about 250,000 registered enterprises, the number of labour inspectors who carry out control is only 350. "Nevertheless, 30,644 inspections have been carried out and almost 119,000 violations have been detected. We are constantly striving to organise upgrading training as well as induction training for newly appointed inspectors. In this way, we try to improve and upgrade the professional qualifications of labour inspectors so that they are prepared for the challenges that arise from their work," Assenova told BTA.

In 2022, the permanent jobs at the Labour Inspectorate were increased by 180, but due to the specific nature of the work, few of the newly recruited labour inspectors are retained for more than one year. Those who quit say that they cannot withstand the pressure and high demands. There is also the problem of pay, which is not motivating and often leads employees to look for a new job and pursue their career elsewhere, Assenova explained.

At the end of 2024, a project was launched to increase the capacity of the executive agency for the implementation of labour market inspection activities, Assenova recalled. The project is funded under the Human Resources Development Programme (2021-2027), co-financed by the European Union through the European Social Fund Plus. It is planned to purchase drones to assist labour inspectors in carrying out inspections in hard-to-reach places. Professional tablets will also be provided to capture the actual situation during workplace inspections. Where violations involving imminent danger to the life and/or health of workers are found, the footage will be sent immediately to the people in charge of the establishment being inspected and to the officials acting as occupational safety and health authorities, Assenova explained.