Change of work rules required: psycho-social risks on the work floor
22/10/2014
Since September 1, 2014, all Belgian employers must enhance their current preventive and curative actions against psycho-social risks for their employees on the work floor.
Belgian employers must enhance their current preventive and curative actions against psycho-social[1] risks for their employees on the work floor as follows:
• The scope of the actions that are currently taken or foreseen must be broadened since the statutory definition of the psycho-social risks has been extended from mobbing, violence and sexual harassment to also excessive work stress, burn outs and similar psycho-social risks.
• The employer must perform a general risk analysis related to psycho-social risks on the work floor in collaboration with the employees and the various actors of the prevention and protection policy of the company such as the prevention advisor(s) for psycho-social risks, the person(s) of trust and the committee for prevention and protection at work.
• The employer must foresee a formal and an informal procedure that enables the employees who are victim of a psycho-social harm to file a request for preventing or remedying the psycho-social harm.
• The above novelties must be enacted in the employer’s work rules by inserting the following chapters prior to February 28, 2015:
Preventive measures: the prevention measures which are taken by the employer in order to limit the exposure of the employees to psycho-social risks;
Curative measures: an overview of the specific (formal and an informal) procedures which are available in the company to employees who are victim of a psycho-social harm on the work floor; and
An update of the contact details from the person of trust and/or prevention advisor for psycho-social risks.
K law can, and will be happy to, assist with providing an addendum to the work rules or a modification of the work rules as described above. Please contact our specialists.
[1] The law uses the term psycho-social and not psycho-somatic or psychological.