Companies looking to recruit young talent can now apply for support up to €14,000
The Avançar Programme wants to cover 25,000 young people under 35 years of age, with higher education qualifications, and provide them with a permanent employment contract and a basic salary of €1,330 or more per month.
The Government published in the Diário da República the regulation that creates and regulates the Avançar Programme, with a view to creating new support for companies to hire unemployed young people registered with the Institute for Employment and Vocational Training (IEFP).
The aim of this programme is to cover 25,000 young people aged 35 or under, with a higher education qualification, and to provide them with a permanent employment contract and a basic salary equal to or greater than €1,330 per month. In addition, these young people are also awarded a monthly grant of €150 paid by the IEFP for 12 months.
On the company side, all those who choose to hire young workers on an open-ended basis may receive support up to a maximum of around 14 thousand euros.
"The Avançar Programme consists of an incentive to hire qualified young people without a fixed term, based on the combination of financial support for hiring and financial support for the payment of social security contributions, support that can be accumulated with measures to encourage employment of a fiscal or parafiscal nature".
In addition to reinforcing incentives for permanent job creation, the programme also provides for a set of increases in financial support for hiring to be applied in the case of: young people with disabilities; jobs located in inland areas; when the employer is a party to a collective labour regulation instrument; when it is a question of hiring a qualified young person who is in a situation of long-term unemployment; and the hiring of qualified young people of the sex underrepresented in the profession.
To receive this support for hiring young people, companies must publish job offers on the IEFP website, "signalled with the intention of applying for the programme". Companies that have initiated a Special Revitalisation Process (PER) provided for in the Insolvency and Corporate Recovery Code or that are included in the Extrajudicial Business Recovery Regime (RERE) or in the Extrajudicial Business Recovery System may also apply for support.
As for unemployed young people, all those aged 35 or under who have a qualification at level 5, 6, 7 or 8 of the National Qualifications Framework are eligible for employment contracts without terms.
"The granting of financial support to the employer provided for in this ordinance determines the obligation to maintain the supported employment contract and the level of employment achieved through financial support for at least 24 months from the first month of the supported contract", the text also stresses.
For applications submitted during 2023 and 2024, companies are entitled to financial support for hiring in the amount of 18 times the value of the social support index, i.e. 8,647.74 euros, which drops to 5,765.16 euros in 2025 and to 4,804.3 euros in 2026.
In addition to being able to be further increased up to a maximum of 2,017.80 euros (in the case of young people with disabilities), to these values is also added "financial support corresponding to half the value of the social security contribution borne by them, in relation to the supported employment contracts, during the first year of their validity," which may not exceed 3,363 euros.
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