20. June 2022 At the beginning of 2019, a system was introduced in Austria in which social benefits for families are no longer paid out uniformly. Instead, the child’s place of residence is taken into account and the family allowance and are adjusted according to the purchasing power in the respective state. As a result, Austrian employees whose children live in eastern member states, for example, receive lower benefits than those whose children actually reside in Austria. Reductions of up to 50% were thus possible!
This discriminates mainly against migrant workers from other Member States, which constitutes unequal treatment of EU citizens. With a judgment of June 16, 2022, the ECJ has now determined that this procedure violated Union law!
The Republic of Austria must therefore refund the difference to these people. In addition, the question of the child’s place of residence will no longer arise in future.
In a first statement, the Minister of Finance confirmed that the corresponding financial resources had already been made available. How the reimbursement will work from a technical point of view (automated or via application) has not yet been clarified.
Are you also affected by this? We would be happy to support you (info@artus.at)!
PS: Please note, that we are no native speakers and that our blogposts were translated with the help of google translate.Â
