Updates and Clarifications Regarding Vulnerable Workers

Subject: Updates and Clarifications Regarding Vulnerable Workers, Mandatory Quarantines with Active Monitoring, Voluntary Home Isolation with Active Monitoring, and Special Leave for Working Parents Who Are Employees

Updates on this matter are provided below, based on regulatory developments and in light of recent clarifications from INPS.

1) The protections afforded to employees in the private and public sectors who are in particularly vulnerable circumstances

Article 26 of Decree No. 18/2020 (the so-called “Cura Italia” Decree) provides that individuals with a recognized severe disability (Article 3, paragraph 3, of Law No. 104/1992) or who are at risk due to immunosuppression, the aftereffects of cancer, or the administration of related life-saving therapies—duly certified through a disability designation (Article 3, paragraph 1, of Law No. 104/1992)— the entire period of absence shall be treated as equivalent to a hospital stay upon presentation of a medical certificate.

In the absence of the disability certification referred to in Article 3, paragraph 1, of Law No. 104/1992, the condition of risk may also be certified by the medical-legal bodies operating within the local health authorities with territorial jurisdiction. This protection has been granted to workers considered vulnerable for periods of absence from work between March 17, 2020, and October 15, 2020. An amendment to Decree No. 104/2020 (the so-called “August Decree”), inserted during the process of converting the text into law, modified the aforementioned Article 26 regarding vulnerable workers, providing for these categories of workers, effective from October 16, 2020, through December 31, 2020, the standard performance of their work remotely, including “through assignment to a different position within the same category or job classification, as defined by the

"current collective bargaining agreements, or the provision of specific vocational training, including remotely."

Law No. 178/2020 (the so-called 2021 Budget Law) extended the protections provided for vulnerable workers for the period from January 1, 2021, to February 28, 2021, reaffirming that work is generally to be performed remotely, including through reassignment to a different position within the same category or job classification, as defined by applicable collective bargaining agreements, or through the completion of specific professional training activities, including remotely. The treatment of documented absences by workers considered “vulnerable” as equivalent to a hospital stay now applies in all cases to those workers who cannot work remotely, not even by being assigned to a different position within the same category or job classification. This provision applies to all employees in the public and private sectors who are in a vulnerable condition, with the exception of those enrolled in the Separate Pension Fund.

2) New provisions effective January 1, 2021, for workers in quarantine under active surveillance or under voluntary home isolation

With regard to private-sector workers in general who are in quarantine under active surveillance or under self-quarantine at home with active surveillance, for the purposes of INPS recognition of sick leave benefits, the Budget Law has

Effective January 1, 2021, the requirement for the attending physician to indicate on the medical certificate “the details of the order that gave rise to the quarantine with active surveillance or to home isolation with active surveillance” has been eliminated,

previously scheduled for 2020.

3) Special Parental Leave for Employees

Article 22-bis of Decree-Law No. 137/2020 (the so-called “Ristori Decree”), which was incorporated when the decree was converted into law, provided (for parents who are employees) for paid leave to be used to take time off work during the period of suspension of in-person instruction, limited solely to second- and third-year classes in lower secondary schools located in the so-called “red zones.”

A similar leave provision has been established, throughout the country, for parents of children with disabilities of a verified severe nature (e.g., Article 4 of Law No. 104/1992), during the period of suspension of in-person instruction in schools of all levels for which such suspension has been ordered, or who are enrolled in day care centers providing assistance for which closure has been ordered by a measure adopted at the national or local level or by individual schools.

To receive this benefit, you must submit a specific online application to INPS, which may also cover periods of leave taken prior to the date of submission, provided that such periods do not predate November 9, 2020.

Special leave is available only to parents who are employees.

Therefore, self-employed parents and parents enrolled in the Separate Pension Fund are excluded.

The leave may be taken by only one parent or by both, but never simultaneously on the same days when in-person activities are suspended; the parent does not need to live with the child.

In any case, the leave may be taken only if it is not possible to work remotely.

Duration of Leave and Amount of Compensation

Would you like to learn more?

Sign up at studiopiceci.it to continue reading these exclusive posts.

Sign up now