As of 1 January 2015, an Act No. 307/2014 Coll. on some measures related to announcing of anti-social activities and on change and supplementation of some acts (hereinafter as the “Act”) is being effective, representing a first complex legal regulation of the so called whistleblowing in the Slovak Republic.

In addition to defining the anti-social activities, stipulating rights of whistle blowers and tasks of respective state authorities, the Act also determines the way employers are to proceed when accepting and handling employees’ incentives. The new legal regulation will mostly affect employers which have 50+ employees and employers which are public authorities (hereinafter as the “Employer”) (other employers, i.e. those which employ less than 50 employees, can introduce such mechanism voluntarily).

As a preliminary matter, each Employer is obliged to appoint a separate organizational unit or responsible person to fulfil the tasks of the Employer arising from the Act; in case it is an employee, he/she must by in a direct subordination to the statutory body of the Employer.

The ways of incentives’ filing must be published and available to all employees (at least one of them at employees’ disposal 24/7). In order to fulfil the aim of the Act, it is therefore recommended to introduce at least two ways of incentives’ filing (e.g. mail box at the designated department and via web service). According to the Act, the Employer is obliged to investigate anonymous as well as non-anonymous incentives of employees basically in a 90-days period as of the day of their acceptation. The Employer is obliged to announce the result of investigation to the person who filed the incentive within ten days as of having it investigated.

The Employer is also obliged to issue an internal policy, stating details of incentives filing and handling, and to keep records of incentives for a designated period; such records are considered as special information system with personal data, falling within the scope of obligations according to the Act on personal data protection.

The Employer is obliged to comply with the obligations resulting from the Act (including appointment of the responsible person and elaboration of the internal policy) within 1 July 2015.