Editor’s note: This article was first published in March 2012; its figures, up to March 2011, come from the Fundación Tripartita, and the rules cited were those in force in 2012. Spain’s vocational training system for employment was reformed in 2015, and the Fundación Tripartita now operates as Fundae.
One of the cornerstones of human resources management is keeping employees’ skills up to date by encouraging continuous training.
Because training in the business world is so expensive, for some years now there has been a series of subsidies, promoted by the Fundación Tripartita, that companies can apply for to reduce the cost of training their workforce.
What is the Fundación Tripartita?
Made up of the Ministry of Employment and Social Security, the main national trade unions and the employers’ organisation for small and medium-sized enterprises, its aims include working with workers and companies on training, funded by the vocational training contribution collected by the Social Security system, aid from the European Social Fund and contributions from the State Public Employment Service (Servicio Público de Empleo Estatal).
How can I access these subsidies?
There are two different ways to access this training:
a) Through an organising body: a specialised company whose purpose is to organise, deliver and subsidise the training activities that qualify for the European Social Fund money that governs these subsidies.
b) Self-managed: the company organises the training itself, following the specific rules and requirements for this type of subsidy, until it has used up its allotted credit through rebates on its Social Security contributions.
What obligations does it bring?
Subsidies for training your employees require special administrative handling within the company. The rules state that:
- The accounting for these subsidised activities must be kept separate from the rest of the company’s accounts, under the heading “vocational training for employment”.
- The company must submit to the verification, monitoring and control audits carried out by the competent authorities.
- It must provide the documentation required for this type of activity.
- It must be up to date with its payments to the Tax Agency and the Social Security system.
See also: Spain’s minimum wage will rise by less than inflation
Regulations
This system of rebates on the Social Security contributions of current employees is governed by Ministerial Order TAS 2307/2007 of 27 July, which partly implements Royal Decree 395/2007.
Some figures
These are some of the figures on the use of this kind of training, supplied by the Fundación Tripartita itself:
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Up to 31 March 2011, 2,113,754 workers had used this in-company training, and 454,097 unemployed people had taken part in the training activities it promoted.
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Companies obtained 507.8 million in rebates in 2010, compared with 267.3 million in 2004, an increase of 94%.
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380,548 companies received rebates for training their workers.
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Madrid, Castile and León, Asturias, Catalonia and Galicia are the regions with the highest training coverage of Spain’s 17 autonomous communities.
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Agriculture, at 1.2%, is the sector that makes least use of these training measures, while companies in “Other services” account for 43% of the businesses that use them.
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57.4% of the training was delivered in person, compared with 17% by distance learning.
This has been a brief look at a fundamental pillar of human resources: training your employees.
Source: Fundación Tripartita
Featured image: Marjory Collins, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
