New salary bonus regulations for Government

People working in Georgian Government structures will no longer be able to enjoy unlimited salary bonuses.

The Government has almost finished working on a unified system to cap salary bonuses for Government employees after information leaked claiming some officials had received extremely high cash bonuses.

A maximum upper limit for bonuses, also the frequency of granting them and the eligible people who would be able to decide to give bonuses, has been defined in the new plan.

The project will be presented to the Government of Georgia on June 26 at a Governmental meeting, said head of the Government’s Administration Nino Kobakhidze and head of the Public Service Bureau Ekaterine Kardava at today’s press conference.

Under the new regulations which are set to come into force in near future, high ranking public figures will be deprived the right of prescribing bonuses to themselves.

All bonuses will be required to be allocated by an agency’s head only after an employee’s direct supervisor provides an augmented explanation why the person deserves a bonus. If there is no person who ranks higher in a governmental institution, the Prime Minister will be given the right to decide if a bonus is necessary.

Cash bonuses cannot be higher than the person’s salary and bonuses will be offered a maximum of one per quarter.

At the press conference, Kobakhidze and Kardava said the Government had been working on the project for the past twelve months. Foreign experts were also involved in the process.

These regulations will only be valid for Governmental structures. The Prime Minister asked local self-government bodies to create the same kind of system for themselves in order to guarantee a fair way of allocating bonuses.