Online employment contracts approved at the level of law in Ukraine

The bill adopted on January 15 opens up the possibility of concluding employment contracts in electronic format using a digital signature. The document is aimed at simplifying the employment procedure and eliminating the need for personal presence to confirm identity.

This is the draft law No. 14141 “On Amendments to the Labor Code of Ukraine on Electronic Document Flow in Employment”. Its purpose is to create legal conditions for concluding electronic employment contracts using an improved or qualified electronic signature. In this case, the employee does not need to physically provide an identity card. The draft law amends Part Four of Article 24 of the Labor Code of Ukraine.

What does the law on an employment contract in electronic form provide

The document provides that when drawing up an employment contract using an electronic document, the parties will be identified using an electronic signature. At the same time, the employer and employee may, by mutual agreement, determine the procedure for transferring, creating and storing personal data and documents related to labor relations. Such actions must comply with the requirements of the laws of Ukraine “On Electronic Documents and Electronic Document Management” and “On Electronic Identification and Electronic Trust Services”.

The explanatory note to the bill emphasizes that the need for changes is due to the war and the associated large-scale changes in the labor market. Millions of citizens are forced to work remotely, a significant part of the economically active population is outside their place of permanent residence or outside the country. In these conditions, the requirement of personal presence to submit a passport upon employment actually limits the implementation of the constitutional right to work.

The authors of the document also note that the adoption of the bill does not require additional expenditures from the state or local budgets. The infrastructure for electronic identification and electronic document management is already operating within the state service “Diya”, which allows for the implementation of new rules without creating additional systems.