Navigating Compliance Challenges: The EU Blue Card Scheme in Bulgaria

Sofia: The EU Blue Card scheme has been widely implemented in Bulgaria as the primary work authorisation for highly skilled migrants. The EU Blue Card comes with few challenges overall and does not require waiving ratio requirements or a labour market test. It also remains valid for five years, making the Bulgarian Blue Card a popular immigration strategy for employers of highly skilled workers.

Since its implementation in 2011, Bulgaria has been working on streamlining the process further, including introducing key changes in 2023, including:

Relaxing the proof of education: EU Blue Card applicants may be able to provide a certificate to prove their experience (such as an official document issued by authorities in the country where the employee worked stating such experience), instead of the previously required three-year university degree requirement.

Reducing minimum employment terms: The minimum employment agreement term to qualify for an EU Blue Card has been reduced from 12 to six months.

Extending the validity: The maximum term of validity of the EU Blue Card was extended to five years, up from three.

Requiring access to local healthcare: EU Blue Card holders must now be covered under the national health insurance system.

However, despite these improvements, there are still many gaps in the legislation that can lead to confusion and potential non-compliance in practice.

The law was amended in 2023, making it possible for Bulgarian EU Blue Card holders to work in any location across the country. However, the employment agreement must clearly indicate the work location and whether it is a remote position.

This change is an improvement as previously, work was only permitted at the premises of the employer. However, the amendment to the law has left a possible loophole since it does not address hybrid arrangements.

Many companies now frequently look to implement a hybrid model for their employees, but EU-Blue Card holders are left with only two choices for the purposes of the work contract used in the immigration application: working entirely remotely or entirely from the office.

Therefore, companies adopting a hybrid model hiring Blue Card holders may face a compliance issue since the application doesn’t account for this employment option.

Another challenge is that while employers can update a work contract from office work to remote work through a simple notification to the migration authorities, there is no such procedure for converting a remote worker to an office work setup, again creating compliance issues for companies that are not aware of the requirements.

Many businesses struggle with the lack of solutions for Blue Card holders when seeking to change their employees’ job title, role or worksite location.

Common scenarios include: If an office address is to be closed, there is no procedure to update the EU Blue Card permits of any Blue Card holder currently employed under said office address.

If an EU Blue Card holder is promoted or received a job title update, this generates another challenge, as the only time when an EU Blue Card permit can be updated is at the time of renewal, which is currently set to five years from the issuance date.

There are no proactive measures that can be taken by organisations to inform the Labour Office of changes to job titles or changes to the worksite.

Despite the relatively low risk involved, changes in office location or job titles for EU Blue Card holders continue to pose compliance challenges. If found in non-compliance, it could trigger potential revocation of work and residence permits for the Blue Card holder as well as a ban on working in Bulgaria for five years.

For companies, it could trigger a ban to hire foreigners for two years. Any changes must be communicated at the time of work permit renewals only – which in practice can take five years, per EU Blue Card validity.

Although impractical, one solution is to temporarily end the employment of the employee and then re-hire them under the updated details. For work site changes, it may be more favourable for the employer to consider the applicant as a remote worker instead. These solutions can be time-sensitive, so planning is crucial.

After one year of employment, EU Blue Card holders are expected to be able to change their employer in Bulgaria under a simple procedure, at least in theory, as there is currently no mechanism by which to do this.

In practice, until further improvements are made, a new EU Blue Card application is required. This is a time-consuming process which also can lead to an employment gap of one to two months or more if not planned sufficiently in advance.

A bill to amend national legislation has been submitted to the Bulgarian Parliament in 2024. As of the publishing of this blog, the bill is still under review.

The most significant amendments for EU Blue Card holders, if adopted, would include:

A simplified change of employer process for EU Blue Card holders with 12 months of employment, which would seek to remedy the 2023 attempt to introduce a simple notification process for such situations.

An authorisation process for a change of job position of the EU Blue Card holder much earlier than the five-year renewal point.

To this date, there is no estimate of when the government intends to address other compliance issues that arise due to lack of regulations, and Fragomen will be providing further updates as and when they are confirmed.