An employer posting construction workers to Belgium is obliged to obtain a professional identity card for construction and public works employees, ConstruBadge for short, for each of them. This document was created in order to counteract illegal employment in construction industry and public works. It’s also a control tool. Indeed, in the event of an inspection, an employee is obliged to show ConstruBadge to the controlling authorities, and the barcode on the Card helps to quickly indetify the worker.
1. Who is required to hold a Construbadge Card?
The obligation to have ConstruBadge has been imposed on all workers in the construction sector. Declaring the posting of employees through the Limosa portal constitutes the condition for receiving the identifier.
Finished Cards are sent to the address specified by the employer, within Belgium only. In the event that the employees’ accommodation address isn’t yet known, it’s possible to ask for delivery to the workplace or company where the employees will work or to the address of the company or person who will receive the Cards on behalf of the posting employer.
2. What information does the ConstruBadge Card contain?
ConstruBadge should include the following information:
- name of the employer,
- name of the worker,
- worker’s identification number,
- employer’s identification number,
- barcode necessary for reading encrypted data by inspection authorities,
- worker’s photograph,
- number of the issued ConstruBadge card,
- validity period.
It’s very important that employees who have received ConstruBadge wear it in a visible place, pinned to their clothing.
3. Expiry date of ConstruBadge
Regardless of the date of the order, ConstruBadge expires on 31 December of the year in which it was issued. Therefore, it isn’t necessary to order a new Document for each construction project carried out in Belgium in a given calendar year. On the other hand, a new Card shall be ordered in the event of a secondment to Belgium in the following year.
4. How to obtain ConstruBadge?
ConstruBadge is issued at the request of the employer posting workers. The issuance of this document requires registration in the Constructiv website with a special activation code which can be applied for by e-mail to: construbadge@constructiv.be. Moreover, the requesting employer should have a declaration of posting in the Limosa website and a current passport photo of the worker.
5. Fee for issuing ConstruBadge
The fee for issuing a ConstruBadge card is EUR 20.00 per unit. The fee is fixed and doesn’t depend on the applicant’s country of origin, the status of the employer and employee, as well as the number of requests submitted by the employer.
The employer is obliged to make payment.
The fee for the issuance of the aforementioned card should be paid at the time of making a request by means of non-cash forms of payment. However, it should be noted that foreign employers are obliged to pay for the Cards using the payment methods indicated in the online application. At the time of writing this article, it’s only possible to pay by debit card, while payments by bank transfer or credit card are temporarily unavailable.
As the authority issuing ConstruBadge isn’t an entity registered for VAT, it isn’t possible to obtain an invoice for purchased Cards and the notification received by e-mail constitutes the only proof of payment.
6. Waiting for the issuance of ConstruBadge
The employer who has applied for the document in question is obliged to issue a temporary statement to the worker for whom ConstruBadge has been requested. Until the receipt of the Card, the employee must keep this declaration with him/her the whole time and, in the event of an inspection, present it to the controlling authorities.
7. Legal notice
The study is a work within the meaning of the Act of 4 February 1994 on Copyright and Related Rights (OJ 2006, No. 90, item 631, consolidated text, as amended). Publishing or reproducing this study or its part, quoting opinions, as well as disseminating in any other way the information contained therein without the written consent of Crede sp. z o.o. is prohibited.
