Workers suffer because businesses delay paying insurance

Currently, the number of enterprises (DN) that are late in paying social insurance (SI), health insurance (HI), and unemployment insurance (UI) tends to increase. This directly affects the rights of workers and negatively impacts the social security policy in general in the province.

The provincial Social Insurance Department coordinated with relevant units to inspect the payment of social insurance and health insurance for employees at a business - Photo: ML

According to the report of the provincial Social Insurance (SI), as of December 31, 2023, the total amount of late payment of social insurance, health insurance, and unemployment insurance in the province was 33.7 billion VND, of which, late payment: social insurance 28.4 billion VND, unemployment insurance 0.8 billion VND, health insurance 4.5 billion VND.

Faced with this situation, the province has taken strict measures against enterprises that deliberately delay or delay paying social insurance for employees. In 2023, the provincial Social Insurance coordinated with relevant units to inspect and examine 130 employers. Thereby, 2 billion VND in late payment of social insurance, unemployment insurance, health insurance, occupational accident and disease insurance was recovered at 63 employers; administrative violation records were drawn up at 6 employers that were late in paying social insurance, unemployment insurance, and health insurance for a long time, with a total late payment of 6.8 billion VND. The provincial Social Insurance also issued and advised the Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee to issue a decision to impose administrative penalties on 5 employers, with a total fine of 364.4 million VND; Require 13 employers to register to participate, pay social insurance, unemployment insurance, and health insurance for 33 employees, with a total amount of over 97 million VND.

Typically, at the end of July 2023, the Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee issued a decision to administratively sanction Construction Joint Stock Company 793, located in Dong Le Ward, Dong Ha City, for late payment of social insurance, unemployment insurance, and health insurance for employees. Accordingly, as of June 30, 2023, this company was late in paying social insurance, unemployment insurance with an amount of over 3.62 billion VND, late in paying health insurance for 58 employees with an amount of nearly 36 million VND (excluding interest due to late payment). As of the time of drawing up the administrative violation record (July 10, 2023), the amount of late payment of social insurance, unemployment insurance as of June 30, 2023 was nearly 3.56 billion VND (excluding interest due to late payment).

At the same time, the company has paid the full amount of late health insurance payments as of June 30, 2023 for the 58 employees mentioned above. Based on the administrative violations and aggravating and mitigating circumstances, the Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee decided to fine Construction Joint Stock Company 793 VND 165 million.

In addition, this company is required to pay the full amount of social insurance to the social insurance agency up to June 30, 2023, which is nearly 3.56 billion VND, and pay interest equal to twice the average social insurance fund investment interest rate of the previous year up to June 30, 2023, with an amount of nearly 700 million VND.

According to information from the provincial Social Insurance, the company has paid the administrative fine, but the amount of late payment of social insurance and health insurance has not been paid yet. The provincial Social Insurance has carried out enforcement procedures, but the company's bank accounts do not have any money, so the unit is having difficulty in recovering the above amount.

In November 2023, the monitoring delegation chaired by the Provincial Federation of Labor, in coordination with the Department of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs, and the Provincial Social Insurance Department, organized a monitoring of the implementation of the plan to implement the targets for developing social insurance and unemployment insurance participants in the period of 2022 - 2025 of the Provincial People's Committee in Hai Lang and Trieu Phong districts.

According to the reports of localities to the monitoring team, Hai Lang district has 89/154 operating enterprises paying social insurance, health insurance, and unemployment insurance for 2,729/4,200 employees; Trieu Phong district has 75/209 enterprises participating in social insurance, health insurance, and unemployment insurance for 1,684/1,882 employees.

The main reason for the low rate of social insurance participation for employees is that most businesses are small and micro-sized, employing few workers (businesses with less than 10 employees account for 77%-88%). Many businesses are facing difficulties in production and business, which has affected the lives, jobs and implementation of policies and regimes for employees.

This is also the common situation of enterprises in the province. These enterprises have in common that they have few employees and labor relations have not been established in accordance with the provisions of the Labor Code. There are cases where enterprises sign labor contracts that are not in accordance with regulations, or even do not sign labor contracts with employees as prescribed.

In addition, some businesses are directly run by family members, so they are not fully aware of their long-term benefits; many businesses are registered but do not operate or complete dissolution procedures.

Enterprises that are late in paying social insurance often have the reason that business is not favorable, many types of costs have increased, so they have difficulty paying social insurance and health insurance for employees...

In addition, there are also some enterprises that deliberately misappropriate social insurance money, delay social insurance payment while employees' awareness of social insurance is not high; employees are afraid of losing their jobs and for immediate benefits, so they do not dare to fight, even compromise, agree with enterprises not to pay social insurance as prescribed.

The delay in paying social insurance, health insurance, and unemployment insurance by the employer directly affects the implementation of policies and regimes for employees, especially in case of illness, maternity, work-related accidents, or some employees do not have their social insurance books closed to resolve the regime when needed.

To overcome the situation of late payment of social insurance, health insurance, and unemployment insurance by employers, including enterprises, is the task of the entire political system at all levels.

The provincial Social Insurance needs to coordinate with relevant sectors to continue to strengthen the propaganda and dissemination of legal policies on social insurance and health insurance to further enhance the awareness of law compliance of employers and employees about social insurance and health insurance; establish interdisciplinary inspection teams to urge and remind enterprises, especially enterprises that are late in paying social insurance and health insurance for 3 months or more, enterprises that have not paid or have not fully paid social insurance, and at the same time have strict handling measures for units that are late in paying social insurance and health insurance for a long time.

Mai Lam

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