The Flexible Amendment to the Labour Code in Practice: What Employers Should Actually Change in Their Documents

20. 03. 2026

The flexible amendment to the Labour Code, effective from 1 June 2025, did not merely introduce several partial changes to employment law. It brought changes that, in business practice, affect employee recruitment, termination of employment relationships, the setting of probationary periods, work performed by parents on parental leave, and internal HR processes.

From the employer’s perspective, it is particularly important that some existing templates of employment contracts, notices of termination, agreements on termination of employment, or internal policies may no longer correspond to the new legal framework. This is not merely a formal issue. In practice, an incorrectly drafted document may lead to a dispute over the validity of a termination notice, an incorrectly calculated end date of employment, an improperly agreed probationary period, or uncertainty regarding an employee’s return from parental leave.

One of the most practical changes is the new rule concerning the running of the notice period. The notice period now begins on the day the notice of termination is delivered to the other party, rather than on the first day of the following calendar month. For employers, this means that they must work much more precisely with the date of delivery, the planning of organisational changes, and the calculation of the moment when the employment relationship ends. Particular attention must be paid especially to terminations due to redundancy, where the link between the organisational change and the termination of employment must be preserved.

A significant change also concerns the probationary period. For regular employees, it may now be agreed for up to four months; for managerial employees, up to eight months. At the same time, its extension by written agreement is permitted, but only if the probationary period is still ongoing and the statutory maximum is not exceeded. Employers should therefore review not only employment contracts, but also the onboarding process for new employees and the manner in which probationary periods are recorded.

The amendment also affects parents on parental leave. They may now perform the same work for their employer under an agreement to complete a job or an agreement to perform work. At the same time, the guarantee of returning to the original position and workplace is strengthened for employees returning from parental leave before the child reaches two years of age. This may have a significant impact on planning substitutions, organisational structure, and employment contracts of persons hired as replacements.

Employers should also not overlook changes concerning the termination of employment for health reasons, especially in cases related to occupational injuries or occupational diseases. The new regulation introduces special compensation amounting to twelve times the employee’s average earnings, paid from the employer’s statutory insurance. In practice, it will therefore be necessary to carefully distinguish between individual health-related reasons for termination and to properly formulate the notice of termination or termination agreement.

In conclusion, the flexible amendment is not merely an HR department issue. It is a change that has a direct impact on employers’ legal certainty, employee-related costs, and the risk of employment disputes. Every employer should therefore review employment contracts, templates for notices of termination, agreements, internal regulations, and HR processes. In employment law, it is often not the dispute itself that is decisive, but whether the employer had properly prepared documents before the problem arose.

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