Hotels, restaurants, tourism, construction, construction-related trades, security and event industries: these areas are particularly in the sights of the financial police this year, said its head Wilfried Lehner on Monday at a press conference with the ministers Martin Kocher (Labor, Economy) and Magnus Brunner (Finance).
Last year, the financial police checked 1,402 companies under the wage and social dumping law that had “worked” their headquarters abroad and into Austria. 3,443 seconded or hired-out employees were checked, 233 were affected by underpayment. Lehner reported on a construction site in Lower Austria where employees received 70 percent less pay. A tanker on the Danube was also noticed, where seven employees were working underpaid and the captain employed two employees “through a kind of self-employment”.
4.4 million euros in fines
In total, the financial police filed 399 criminal complaints with the district administrative authorities last year because companies did not provide or keep registration or wage documents. The fines amounted to around 4.4 million euros and were almost at the level of 2022 (4.5).
Brunner stressed that we must fight once morest “every form of fraud”. This year, the number of workers sent to Austria will only increase moderately. Combating wage dumping, however, is increasingly becoming an international challenge. Lehner: “Cooperation at the European level plays a crucial role.”
Author
Martin Roithner
Editor Business
Martin Roithner
