From the European Union to Estonia

Last updated: 01.11.2024

The posted employee works temporarily in another EU Member State.
The posted employee has a specific recipient, ie a service recipient in another country.
Employees posted to Estonia must be registered with the Labour Inspectorate.

Posted workers

The definition of a posted worker is regulated by Directive 96/71/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council regarding the posting of employees in connection with the provision of a service (Directive 96/71/EC). For the purposes of Directive 96/71/EC, a posted worker is a worker who, for a limited period, is posted by their employer to another EU Member State to provide a service within the framework of the company’s business activity or as a temporary agency worker or as a temporary employee by an employment agency.

Pursuant to section 3 subsection 1 of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act (WCEPEA), an employee posted to Estonia is a natural person who normally works in a Member State of the European Union, a Member State of the European Economic Area, or the Swiss Confederation on the basis of an employment contract, and whom the employer posts to work in Estonia for a specified period of time for the provision of a service.

We can talk about posted workers if:

1) The undertaking posts the employee to the territory of the Member State on its behalf and under its direction on the basis of a contract concluded between the posting undertaking and the contracting authority operating in Estonia. Under this provision, for example, skilled workers, craftsmen, and other professionals are often posted.

Example: An Estonian undertaking orders the performance of construction works in the Republic of Estonia from a Polish undertaking. In order to provide the service, the Polish company sends its employees to Estonia to fulfil the order. The Polish employer is responsible for fulfilling the order and instructing its employees, while the Estonian company as the contracting authority is responsible for fulfilling the requirements for the working environment in Estonia.

2) The undertaking shall post the employee to an establishment or undertaking belonging to the group and situated in the territory of a Member State. Under this provision, for example, sectoral managers, specialists, and skilled workers are often posted.

Example: An Estonian employee is sent from a parent company operating in Estonia to a subsidiary in Finland to perform work duties. The work of the Estonian employee is organised by the undertaking in Finland. The Finnish company is also responsible for meeting the requirements for the working environment while the Estonian employee is working in Finland.

3) A temporary employment agency shall recruit an employee to an undertaking located or operating within the territory of a Member State. This is temporary agency work, where a tripartite employment relationship arises between the temporary employer, the temporary employee, and the user undertaking. This type of posting primarily involves work in the construction, agricultural, service, or catering sectors.

Example: A Lithuanian employee, through a temporary employment agency operating in Latvia, is sent to work at a user undertaking in Norway. A service contract has been concluded between the Latvian and Norwegian companies for the placement of labour. The employment contract is concluded between the Lithuanian employee and the Latvian temporary employment agency under Norwegian law, and the tasks are performed and their performance is controlled by the Norwegian company, which is also responsible for the Lithuanian’s work environment and safety. In such situations, the Latvian as well as the Norwegian company may be the payer of wages. However, in the event of a delay in the payment of wages, the employee must turn to the employer in Latvia because, in the case of a claim for payment of wages, only the actual employer is liable before the employee and not the third party (Norwegian company) for whom the work is performed.

4) A user undertaking posts a temporary employee to an undertaking located or operating in the territory of a Member State. The employee must be posted to a branch of the user undertaking or to a company belonging to the same group to perform the contract concluded between the user undertaking and the contracting authority providing the service in Estonia, or the user undertaking itself must be, for example, a temporary employment agency. A user undertaking that posts an employee to another Member State is, in that case, required to provide advance notification to the employer regarding the posting within a reasonable period of time.

Example: A Polish temporary employment agency hires the employee to a Latvian user undertaking, which in turn posts the employee to Estonia to provide the service. The employer is responsible for the employee’s working conditions, i.e. the Polish temporary employment agency must comply with the requirements set forth in the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act while the employee is working in Estonia.

In all cases, an employment contract must be concluded between the employer and the employee by the time of the posting, and this employment relationship must be maintained for the duration of the posting. If, during their stay in the host country, the employee’s employment contract with the employer ends and they conclude an employment contract with an undertaking in the host country, they will no longer be a posted worker.

Remember that an employee is a posted worker if:

The place of employment is the territory of a Member State other than that in which the employee normally works.
The work is of a temporary nature, i.e. the employee is not permanently moving to live in another country.
The employee has a specific host in another country, i.e. a recipient of services, a parent or subsidiary belonging to the group or, in the case of temporary agency work, a user undertaking.

In relation to the road transport sector, the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act stipulates differences. Namely, subsections 1¹ and 1² of section 2 of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act do not apply to the road transport sector, ie in the road transport sector, the employee is not a posted employee if the user undertaking sends a temporary agency worker to Estonia to perform duties. Also, clauses 3 and 7 of subsection 1 of section 5 of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act do not apply to employees of the road transport sector, ie employees posted by the road transport sector do not have to be guaranteed compensation for overtime work and costs associated with the business trip. In addition, subsections 6¹ to 6³ of section 5, section 5³ (duration and extension of the posting) and subsection 6 of section 8 of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act do not apply to the road transport sector.

Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act applies to an employee in the road transport sector. If the driver’s posting meets the conditions set forth in clause 1 of subsection 1 of section 2 of this act, this act shall apply to them, if it is provided for in this act. Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act does not apply to a driver who:

performs bilateral carriage of goods or bilateral carriage of passengers;
transits through the territory of a state without loading or unloading freight and without picking up or setting down passengers;
in addition to performing bilateral carriage of goods, performs one activity of loading and unloading in the European Union Member States (hereinafter Member State) or states not in the European Union (hereinafter third country) that the driver crosses, provided that goods are not loaded and unloaded in the same Member State;
in addition to bilateral carriage of goods starting from the Member State of establishment of the transport operator (hereinafter Member State of establishment) during which the driver performs no additional activity of loading or unloading on the way to the country of destination, performs up to two additional activities of loading and unloading in Member States or third countries crossed in bilateral carriage to the Member State of establishment, provided that goods are not loaded and unloaded in the same Member State;
picks up passengers in states crossed in bilateral carriage of passengers and sets them down once in states crossed, provided that the driver does not offer passenger transport service within a Member State crossed.

Subsection 1¹ of section 5 of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act stipulates the difference in wages paid to employees of the road transport sector. The employer must ensure that the minimum wage established in Estonia is applied to the employee of the road transport sector posted to Estonia.

The employer guides the driver posted to Estonia who meets the conditions set forth in clause 1 of subsection 1 of section 2 of this act in taking into account the specifications of the posting of the driver arising from this act.

Temporary agency work

Temporary agency work is a tripartite employment relationship. While two parties participate in a classic employment relationship – the employee and the employer – then in the case of temporary agency work, the user undertaking also participates in the employment relationship as a third party. In the case of temporary agency work relationships, the employer, i.e. the temporary employment agency, enters into an employment contract with the temporary agency worker, on the basis of which they temporarily send the temporary agency worker to work under the direction and supervision of a third party, i.e. a user undertaking. Pursuant to the Employment Contracts Act, a user undertaking is a third party under whose instructions and supervision the employee temporarily works.

The temporary employment agency and the user undertaking enter into a contract under the law of obligations, which regulates cooperation between the two.

For an employee, participating in a tripartite relationship means, first and foremost, understanding who is legally responsible and for what, and which company they should turn to if problems arise. The employee cannot forget that their employer while working for the user undertaking will be a temporary employment agency, i.e. it is this company’s obligation to provide the employee with work and to pay them wages. The only thing that can be demanded from a user undertaking is a suitable working environment. If a user undertaking from a foreign state posts an employee to a company located or operating within the territory of Estonia, then the employer, i.e. the temporary employment agency, is responsible for the performance of the requirements set forth in the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act.

Registration and submitting information

Pursuant to section 5¹ of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act, employees posted to Estonia must be registered with the Labour Inspectorate. The employer of a posted worker must register the employees being posted to Estonia prior to the employee actually starting work in Estonia.
Registration requires the submission of a posting notice in the self-service of the Labour Inspectorate (TEIS) at iseteenindus.ti.ee. Should any data change, the previously submitted posting notice can be changed in the self-service before the changes enter into force.

The following data must be submitted to the Labour Inspectorate:

the name, personal identification code or registry code, area of activity, and details of the residence or location and means of communication of the employer of the posted worker;
the name and details of communication of the contact person representing the employer of the posted worker;
the number of posted workers, their names, personal identification codes or dates of birth, and numbers of identity documents;
the expected duration of the posting and the scheduled start date and end date;
the name, personal identification code or registry code, area of activity, and details of the residence or location and means of communication of the contracting entity or contracting authority and/or person for whom the posted employee works in Estonia;
the name, personal identification or registry code, field of activity, residence or seat and means of communication of the contact person for the contracting authority and/or person for whom the posted employee works in Estonia;
information regarding in which area of activity the posted employee will be working in Estonia, and the address of the place of performance of work of the posted worker.

In the event of failure to comply with the requirement to register employees that have been posted to Estonia, the Labour Inspectorate has the right to assign a penalty of up to 300 fine units to a natural person and up to 32 000 euros to a legal person. The Labour Inspectorate has the right to disclose personal data submitted to the Labour Inspectorate to ensure the performance of tasks assigned to the Tax and Customs Board by tax laws.

Duration and extension of the posting

The employer must apply the working conditions prescribed in section 5 subsection 1 of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act to an employee who has been posted to Estonia for a posting of up to 12 months. If the posting lasts for more than 12 months, the employer is required to guarantee the employee all working conditions in force in Estonia (except for the rights and obligations related to concluding and terminating the employment contract, including the restriction on competition that is valid following the termination of employment and occupational pension schemes). For example, if a posted worker must be guaranteed the duration of annual leave from the beginning of his or her posting in accordance with Estonian law, then after 12 months he or she will also be subject to the Estonian employment law in regards to scheduling annual leave and expiry of annual leave.

If the employer has replaced the posted worker with another posted worker performing the same duty in the same place, the duration of the postings of the employees is added up (e.g. if the first posted worker installed pipes on the site and left after eight months, and another posted worker took their place installing pipes on the same site, it is sensible to add up the durations of the two postings of the posted workers in Estonia. If the other employee works for more than four months, they are considered a long-term posted worker after the completion of four months and the other employee becomes subject to all Estonian employment law from the fifth month of their employment).

A 12-month period can be extended up to 18 months. To extend the period, you need to add a justification in the self-service of the Labour Inspectorate (TEIS) to the corresponding posting notice, which appears automatically if the posting exceeds 12 months. The notice must be justified, ie it must be stated why the posted employee needs to stay in Estonia for more than 12 months.

If the posting lasts for more than 18 months, all working conditions in force in Estonia must be applied to the employee (except for the rights and obligations related to concluding and terminating the employment contract, including the restriction on competition that is valid following the termination of employment and occupational pension schemes).

If the long-term posted worker is a temporary agency worker, the user undertaking must inform the employer which working conditions shall apply to the employee after 12 or 18 months have passed.

It is important to note that the duration of the posting of employees posted to Estonia is not limited in any way. The posted employee may stay longer in the destination country of the posting, but in this case, the employee posted to Estonia must be guaranteed all working conditions valid in Estonia. For example, if the posted employee must have a guaranteed duration of annual holiday from the beginning of their posting according to Estonian law (clause 4 of subsection 1 of section 5 of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act), then after 12 or 18 months, Estonian labour law will also apply to them regarding the preparation of the holiday schedule and the expiration of the holiday.

In the case of posted workers who are in Estonia at the time of the entry into force of the new version of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act (30 July 2020), the aforementioned period will be counted from the day following the entry into force of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act.

Submission of documents necessary for the performance of state or administrative supervision

At the request of the Labour Inspectorate, the employer of a posted worker is required to immediately submit to the Labour Inspectorate the documents necessary for the performance of state or administrative supervision.

The documents in question may be:

an employment contract,
A1 certificate (social insurance certificate),
working schedule,
extract regarding the payment of wages, or
any other document that can be used to prove compliance with the terms and conditions of employment applicable to the posted worker.

We accept documents in Estonian, English and Russian. However, in accordance with the Language Act the Labour Inspectorate preserves the right to require the person who submits the document to submit the translation of the document into Estonian, should it be necessary.

The Labour Inspectorate has the right to request documents for a period of three years after the end of the employee’s posting period. The employer of a posted worker is required to submit to the Labour Inspectorate, at the request of the Labour Inspectorate, the documents necessary for the performance of state or administrative supervision. If the employer fails to submit the required information or documents concerning the employees posted to Estonia, the Labour Inspectorate has the right to issue a precept and, in the event of non-compliance, to impose a penalty payment on the employer.

Applicable law and working conditions

When choosing the law applicable to the contract of employment of the posted worker, the Private International Law Act and the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act (ELTTS) applies. Regardless of the chosen law applicable to the employment contract, the posted worker must, in any case, be guaranteed the working conditions established in Estonia on the basis of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act. If the provisions of foreign law regarding working conditions applicable to the employment contract are more favourable to the posted worker than the Estonian provisions, the more favourable provision shall be applied to the employee.

Compare the law of the country from which the worker is posted to Estonia with the Estonian law, as the law of the more favourable country applies pursuant to Regulation (EC) No. 593/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 June 2008 on the law applicable to contractual obligations (Rome I): http://www.posting-workers.eu/

Amount of wages

According to clause 3 of subsection 1 of section 5 of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act, the employee posted to Estonia must be guaranteed wages and compensation for overtime work valid in Estonia. Wages are the remuneration for work that has been agreed upon in accordance with clause 5 of subsection 1 of section 5 of the Employment Contracts Act (ECA), including remuneration from economic results and transactions. According to subsection 6 of section 29 of the ECA, an employee may not be paid wages lower than the minimum wage established by the Government of the Republic. The minimum wage rate is therefore one of the types of wages, the payment of which must be guaranteed to the posted worker. In addition to the minimum wage, the posted employee must also be guaranteed the payment of other types of wages, which is mandatory according to Estonian laws and extended collective agreements. Such types of wages can be considered, for example, remuneration for working on a public holiday and remuneration for night work, as well as remuneration for the time when the employee is not guaranteed work.

Subsection 1¹ of section 5 of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act stipulates the difference in wages paid to employees of the road transport sector. The employer must ensure that the minimum wage established in Estonia is applied to an employee of the road transport sector posted to Estonia.

When applying for annual holiday, benefits paid in money related to the posting are considered part of the wages, unless they are paid to cover travel, accommodation and catering expenses incurred during the posting.

Applicable working conditions

According to subsection 1 of section 5 of the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act, the employer is obliged to provide the posted employee with the following working conditions valid in Estonia:

working time;
rest time;
wage and compensation for overtime work;
duration of annual holiday;

NOTE! Exception: This condition does not apply in the case of a posting of up to eight days, if the posted employee is a skilled worker whose duty is the initial assembly or installation of the goods necessary for the commissioning of the ordered goods, if such work is an integral part of the order contract. This exception does not apply if the work performed by the posted employee is related to construction work regarding the construction, repair, maintenance, alteration or demolition of buildings, including excavation work, surface removal work, actual construction work, assembling and dismantling finished elements, connection or installation work, modification, renovation, repair, disassembly, demolition, maintenance, painting and cleaning works and repair works. When calculating the duration of the posting period of up to eight days, the periods worked by the employee posted to Estonia by the same employer to perform the same work during the one year preceding the start of the posting are taken into account.

5)   equal treatment and equal opportunities;
  6) conditions of temporary agency work;
  7) compensation for costs related to business trips.

The employee must be compensated for expenses related to business trips (for example, vehicle costs and accommodation costs). If the conditions of employment applicable to the employment relationship do not specify whether the expenses incurred in the performance of duty are to be paid or in the case of payment, what part of it is paid to cover the actual costs of the posting and which part is the salary, all compensation for expenses incurred in the performance of duty are deemed to have been paid to cover actual costs arising from the posting.

In the event of the failure to comply with the conditions governing the payment for working time, rest time, remuneration, and compensation for overtime work of an employee posted to Estonia, the Labour Inspectorate has the right to assign a penalty of up to 300 fine units to a natural person and up to 32 000 euros to a legal person (employer, a member of its management board or other representative, to whom the performance of the corresponding obligation had been delegated).

Working environment and safety at work

The Occupational Health and Safety Act (OHSA) shall be applied in full to all posted workers and also to all posted workers originating from third countries. The Estonian Occupational Health and Safety Act also applies to a posted worker if its provisions are less favourable to them than the provisions of the law of the corresponding foreign country

Compliance with occupational health and safety requirements in force in Estonia is ensured by the contracting authority or the person with whom the posted worker performs work duties in Estonia. This means that the company receiving posted workers in Estonia must take into account that it also has obligations regarding the occupational health and safety of these employees and is subject to the provisions of OHSA regarding liability for violation of occupational health and safety requirements. Arising from the Working Conditions of Employees Posted to Estonia Act, the posted worker’s actual employer and the contracting authority or the person with whom the posted worker is performing their duties has the opportunity to agree upon who is responsible for complying with the requirements of the OHSA or in which cases or in what part. It should be noted here that if no agreement has been concluded, the contracting authority or the person with whom the posted worker is working in Estonia is responsible for compliance with the requirements of OHSA. You should definitely be aware that posted workers must be guaranteed the same conditions as the employees that are already employed with the company.