Housing third country workers in Bulgaria: what the law requires of employers

Accommodation is not a favour to the worker. It is a file item and an inspection subject. Under Article 28 of Bulgaria's Labour Migration and Labour Mobility Act, a seasonal worker gets suitable housing meeting health and safety requirements until the contract expires. Rent must be proportionate to the wage and the quality, and cannot be deducted automatically from pay.

The same logic reaches the general route. Among the documents in a single permit application to the Migration Directorate sits evidence of arranged accommodation. Without it the file is incomplete, and the seven day period to cure defects starts running.

What "provided" means in practice

Three elements make a dwelling fit for the file and for the inspection.

A document establishing the basis. A title deed, a lease held by the employer, or an accommodation agreement with the worker. A declaration that housing will be provided covers the filing, but it does not cover the site visit three months later.

A separate agreement with the worker where the worker pays. Rent is settled in its own contract, not in a clause of the employment contract, because wages and rent are different legal relationships. Merging them is exactly what turns lawful rent into an unlawful deduction.

Compliance with health and safety requirements. This is checked against objective measures: floor area per person, sanitary facilities, heating, ventilation, fire safety, and fitness for habitation under the Spatial Planning Act.

Who pays for transport and insurance

On the seasonal route the employer bears the cost of transport from the worker's place of origin to the workplace in Bulgaria and back, and the cost of compulsory health insurance. These costs also may not be deducted from pay, including where the contract ends early and regardless of the reason for termination.

On the general route the law does not impose the same transport obligation, but practice on the Nepal, India and Philippines corridors is for the employer to carry it, because the alternative is the worker financing it through an intermediary in the origin country. That is where a saved sum returns as worker paid fee exposure and as an inspection finding. The logistics of arrival, from the ticket to the first working day, are covered in the relocation chain.

What the inspectorate checks, and what the gap costs

The Executive Agency General Labour Inspectorate enforces the obligations under the Labour Migration and Labour Mobility Act. At seasonal sites the housing check is a standard part of the visit, and payroll is compared against the accommodation contract. Rent found deducted from pay produces a compliance order and administrative penalty proceedings, and for unlawful employment the pecuniary sanction on a corporate employer is 2,000 to 20,000 leva under Article 75a(2) of the Act, which is roughly 1,022 to 10,225 euro at the official rate of 1.95583 leva to the euro. The scope of these visits is covered in the labour inspectorate and foreign workers.

Here is the concrete case. A construction company houses 26 workers in a leased building and withholds 150 leva a month from each wage for rent and utilities, with an express clause in the employment contract. The workers have signed and do not object. At inspection the officer finds that rent is deducted from pay and that the building has no commissioning certificate as residential. A compliance order to repay the withheld sums follows, then a penalty, then a deadline to rehouse the workers. The company pays two rents for one month and loses four working days on site.

Separating the two documents takes an afternoon and belongs before the first payday. The employment contract governs work, the accommodation contract governs housing, and payment under the second moves by bank transfer from the worker rather than through payroll. How accommodation fits the seasonal route is set out in seasonal work in Bulgaria. The terms on which Werklist verifies the housing component before a group arrives are set out on the employers page.

Housing is the first thing the worker sees and the last thing the employer plans. That sequence explains most of the compliance orders issued at seasonal sites.