Equal benefits for all funds
Labor Ministry drafting single regulation for distribution of social security handouts
The Labor Ministry is drafting a new and particularly painful reform that will lead to the practical merging of the entire social security system; it will introduce single terms and conditions for a worker’s inclusion in the Single Social Security Entity (EFKA), for the calculation of the amount and the determination of the means of concession for the benefits one is due, in money or otherwise.
Time is putting pressure on the leadership of the ministry, as the signing of the presidential decree for the Single Regulation for Social Security and Benefits of EFKA, following the necessary revision, will have to be completed by February 2022.
This is a reform that is long overdue, since the creation of EFKA in January 1, 2017, which serves to illustrate the difficulty of the decisions required that are set to affect hundreds of thousands of workers and pensioners. This is because, until today, there have been separate terms and conditions for the collection of handouts and benefits at each social security fund, with the differences often being chaotic.
The project is even more difficult given the pending status of the Single Regulation of Benefits for the Disabled.
Until the drafting of the new regulation, its signature by the Labor Ministry and its application by EFKA, an effort is being made to reduce the necessary procedures. Therefore the recent social security legislation has included the application of a single procedure for the certification of those incapable of working or of the possible date of a worker giving birth, for all funds under EFKA. A circular issued by EFKA determines the same process for the handing out of maternity and disease benefits, regardless of which professionals’ social security fund they originated from.
Now the special task forces that have been set up are focusing on benefits such as the coverage of funeral or cremation costs, those for disease, birth, labor accident and disability, which constitute handouts that should have become universal since EFKA was launched.
