Change of Employer under Czech Republic Employee Card

Change of employer under Czech Republic’s employee card has changed a lot during the last couple years. Some things got better (i.e. faster processing), some got worse (i.e. no chance to correct any mistakes). In this article we look at the change of employer under Czech employee card in details. Read on!

What is a Czech Republic’s employee card

We kind of expect you to know what is an employee card if you are looking for information about change of employer under the employee card but to make this article as useful as possible, we want to mention a few basics about the employee card first. (If you want to read more about the employee card itself, check this “Employee Card – everything you need to know” article).

An employee card is a type of Czech residence permit which allows you to stay in the Czech Republic and work here. There are generally two types of a Czech employee card:

1. Standard (dual) employee card – “dual” means that your employee card has to functions. First function is permission to work on one specific position for one specific employer. Second function is permission to stay in the Czech Republic for a specific period of time. This is the most common type of employee card in the Czech Republic and there are many rules for changing employer under this employee card (see below).
2. Non-dual employee card – this employee card is issued to foreigners who (for some reason) have free access to Czech labour market. The most common example is if you studied in the Czech Republic and you got a Czech diploma from an accredited program. In this case, the employee card only has one function – permission to stay in the Czech Republic. Thanks to having free access to the Czech labour market, you do not need the permission to work on one specific position for one specific employer. There are still some rules you have to follow if you want to change employers under this employee card in the Czech Republic.

Change of employer under Czech Republic’s Employee Card

As mentioned above, there are two different types of employee card in the Czech Republic and hence there are also different rules if you want to change employer under each of the employee card types in the Czech Republic. We will go through all the rules together now.

Change of employer under standard Czech Republic’s Employee Card

If you hold the standard (dual) employee card in the Czech Republic, there are many rules you have to follow if you want to change your employer. Good thing is that the process was generally simplified and it takes way shorter than it used to take couple years ago. On the other hand, how the process is set now, there is no space for mistake. There is no approval process, the MOI just checks that you fulfilled all the conditions. If you did, they approve the change of employer, if you did not, they deny it. There is no way of submitting additional documents, fixing any errors, no option for an appeal.

So, if you do not have any experience with changing employer under yet, we strongly recommend getting in touch with us using the form below and let us guide you through the process. We make sure that your first time goes well and you can then take care of any future changes of employer yourself if you want. Since there are many rules you have to stick to, allowing us to help you the first time is for sure a wise thing to do – just get in touch 🙂 The article continues under the form. 

Important rules for changing employers under the Czech Employee Card

As mentioned before, there are many rules to follow when changing employer under the Czech Employee Card. We are listing all of them below.

1. You can only change employer after 6 months from when your first employee card was issued. There are some exceptions from this rules but they generally concern health problems related to the job.
2. Your new employer can not be an agency. This applies not only to “agency workers” but also to their own employees. What we mean by that is that your new employer can not be an agency even if you work for them directly (as a director, HR or any other position), if you are not a deployed employee.
3. The new position must have a vacancy number. The same system as when you were applying for the first employee card. The job must be advertised at the Labour Office for 10 or 30 days depending on the position and only if Czech/EU citizens are not interested in the job, you can use the vacancy number for the change of employer.
4. You only have 60 days to report the change of employer after leaving you current job. If you miss the deadline, your employee card will be canceled.
5. You have to report the change of employer at least 30 days before the expected starting date. This means, all the required documents (see below) must be delivered to the MOI latest 30 days in advance. For example, if you want to start your job on 1.11., you must deliver the documents latest on 1.10.
6. The MOI officially has 30 days to let your employer know if you fulfilled the conditions or not. This means you personally do not get notified at all, only you new employer. Even if they let you know sooner (which happens), you can not start working before the 30 days run out.

 Documents needed for change of employer under Czech Employee Card

We mentioned that all the documents must be delivered to the MOI in time. What are “the documents” then? Generally speaking, you need to provide filled in application form, documents proving your current employment status (i.e. your employment contract + termination letter), new employment contract and a confirmation of the new employer that you meet all the requirements for the position.

Combination of so many rules + specific documents you need to submit makes applying for the change of employer for the first time pretty complicated. The main problem there generally is that you might need to wait for 30 days to get the vacancy number. That means you only have 30 days to report the change of employer to the MOI (since you have to report it within 60 days). Then the MOI has 30 days to let your new employer know their decision. And since there is no way to fix any mistakes in the documents, if the MOI says that you can not change the employer and you are already past your 60 days mark, your employee card will be canceled and you will have to leave.

So, be very careful with the process and ideally get in touch with us if it is your first time.The article continues under the form. 

Change of employer under non-dual Czech Republic’s Employee Card

As described above, the non-dual employee card is a simplified version of the standard (dual) employee card. Also the process to change employers under the non-dual employee card is simplified.

You generally just have to report that you quit a job within 3 days to the MOI and you also need to report that you started a new job within 3 days to the MOI. If you smoothly transition from one job to another, you can report both at the same time. There is a special form for that which you can either deliver to the MOI in person or mail it to them In case of mailing it though, you need to make sure it is delivered within the 3 days.

We hope this article about changing employer in the Czech Republic was helpful and you understand the process well now. If you need any help or just have any questions, get in touch, we’ll be happy to make sure your change of employer goes smoothly 🙂

Yours, Move To Prague relocation experts