The employer's duties in workers' social security
An employer's duty under the Workers' Retirement and Social Security Law No. 18 of 2023 is not a single step at the first hire. It is a continuing duty: to enrol the workers to whom the Law applies; to present particulars that match the records; to pay the contributions on time; to obtain a clearance certificate when the undertaking is disposed of; and to notify a work injury within a short period. The general framework is on the page about enrolling workers in social security. The contribution rates and the wage base are set out there; this page follows the duties as they appear in the Legislation Database.
Yearly particulars, and matching them to the records
Article 23 requires the employer and the administration to cover the workers to whom the Law applies and to pay the contributions the Law fixes. Early in each year the employer must file an annual statement giving the project's name and place of work, the employer's name and complete address, how many insured workers there are, their names, dates of birth and complete addresses, the amount of their pay, the amount of the contributions they owe and the amount that falls on the body that employs them, on the forms the Department prepares. If a change occurs, further particulars are presented. The Department adopts the contribution calculations after it has approved them. If the employer fails to present the particulars, or is late beyond the time fixed, the Department determines the contributions in the light of its own inquiries, and continues to collect them on that basis until particulars that receive its certification are presented.
Article 22 requires employers to file particulars of the insured persons' names, dates of birth and pay, and of any trainees with them, on the forms provided, and those particulars must correspond to the books and records kept under the Labour Law. They must be accurate and must correspond to the facts; otherwise the Department uses the methods of calculation set out in instructions the Minister issues.
This is a pointer to what the Law requires. The form in force is reviewed at the time of filing.
Time for payment, and the delay fine
Under article 16, contributions due for a given month — whether taken from the insured person's pay or falling on the employer — become payable in the month that follows. If pay is monthly, the employer takes the insured person's share from it each month; otherwise five per cent is taken from each payment made in the month. If the deduction is missed at the time, the body concerned must itself pay the insured person's share for that month.
Under article 17, the employer must pay the Fund both the employer's share and the workers' share within 30 days of the month that follows accrual. If payment is late by more than 120 days, a fine of one per cent of the contribution sum is added for each month of delay, without rising above one hundred per cent of the principal. On a recommendation of the board, the Minister may relieve the employer of those fines where the delay rests on a convincing excuse, and once only.
Under article 19, sums taken by employers from workers' pay towards the contributions due are held as a trust, and may not be applied to any other purpose.
If the employment contract is suspended, or the worker is absent
Article 18 requires the employer to pay the contributions due from the employer and from the workers for the whole of the periods during which insured workers are absent from work, when the employment contract is suspended by reason of sickness, childbirth, detention, or any other legitimate cause. The workers may not be recouped for what was paid as their share, and the periods of absence are treated as insured service. Compulsory military service during the employment contract is insured service and is exempt from the payment of contributions. The rates that apply when military service is added, and the rate deducted from the wage when the contract is suspended, are set out in the same article; they are read from the text in the file, and are not reduced here to a single figure for every case.
If contributions are not paid for a period of service, that period is not counted as insured service, except in cases of injury or death of the insured person, under article 32. The insured person has the right to go to court and bring a claim against the employer for payment of the contributions.
The clearance certificate, and a contractor
As an exception from other legislation in force, article 20 provides that a sale or a transfer of ownership, the grant of a permit or a professional licence, its registration, renewal or lease, or any other legal disposition, may not be completed for a company, workshop, factory or body that employs one worker or more, until a clearance certificate has been obtained from دائرة التقاعد والضمان الاجتماعي للعمال. A sale or distribution of the assets mentioned, or a declaration of bankruptcy or a liquidation, may not be completed until the Department has first been notified.
Under article 21, an employer who hands work to a contractor, an undertaker or an investor must tell the Department the contractor's name and address, the nature of the work and its cost, no later than seven days before the work starts. The contractor is bound by the consequences of that notice for the contractor and for any sub-contractor, and the original and the secondary undertaker answer jointly and severally for performing the duties. State finance departments must withhold any entitlement payable to an employer, an undertaker or an investor unless clearance from the Department appears in an official document; otherwise the department concerned and the official bear the consequences the text attaches.
A work injury
Under article 48, if a worker is injured at work, the employer must move the worker at once to the nearest medical body and give first aid, and must pay the full wage through the end of the working day on which the injury occurred, or through the end of the day on which the worker reached that medical body.
Under article 57, every work injury must be reported to the police and to the Department's inspection section within 24 hours of its occurrence. The report states the injured person's name and address, a short account of the accident and the circumstances, the part of the body injured, and the body to which the person was taken for treatment. The inspection committee in the social-security inspection section conducts the investigation, draws up a record of the steps taken and of its conclusion as to responsibility, and that record is submitted to the Department. If the Department finds that the injury resulted from the employer's default or fault, the effects the text sets out follow; they are read from the article in the file.
What is reviewed in the file?
Before payment, or before a clearance certificate is sought, the file is asked: have all those to whom the Law applies been covered, including trainees if there are any? Do the particulars match the records? Has the wage base been calculated within the limits of article 15? Has the rate in article 14 been observed according to the type of activity, including the rule on a foreign worker? Has notice of a contractor been given in time? These are questions for review.
The office follows a reading of these duties from Baghdad, al-Yarmouk.
Legal basis and sources
Frequently asked questions
When must the contribution for the month be paid?
The contributions are payable during the following month, and what is due from the employer and from the workers is paid within thirty days of the month following accrual, under articles 16 and 17. Delay of more than one hundred and twenty days opens the way to a proportionate fine that the text fixes.
May the company be sold or liquidated without a social-security clearance certificate?
Article 20 bars a series of dispositions — among them a sale, a transfer of ownership, renewal of a professional licence, and liquidation — until a clearance certificate has issued from the Department, or until notice has been given to it in the cases of bankruptcy and liquidation under the second paragraph.
Within what time must a work injury be notified?
Within 24 hours, to the police and to the Department's inspection section, under article 57, with the particulars the text lists.
Related topics and articles
- 01Opening a social-security file at the first hire after a company is formedFirst-hire social-security file after a company is formed: coverage, wage base, particulars and the security document.
- 02Objecting to decisions of the workers' social-security departmentObjecting to a Director General decision before the Fund board (art. 7), and a medical objection within thirty days under article 87.
- 03The first day after a workplace accident: an employer’s checklist hour by hourWhat an Iraqi employer does in the first hours after a work accident: medical care, the day’s wage, the 24-hour report to the police and social security inspection, health notifications, and the file to keep.
- 04The reach of Law No. 18 of 2023: which groups fall under Iraq's workers' social securityThe reach of Workers' Pension and Social Security Law No. 18 of 2023: private, mixed and cooperative sector workers, trainees and probationers, the self-employed and employers, informal work, family members in the business, Iraqis at embassies and organisations, Iraqis abroad, and foreign workers.
- 05Social security clearance when closing a business or liquidating a foreign branchWhy closing, selling or liquidating a business or a foreign company branch in Iraq depends on a clearance certificate from the Workers' Pension and Social Security Department under article 20 of Law No. 18 of 2023, what must be paid first, and what applies to foreign workers leaving.