It will take months before most companies located in the disaster zone can restart production, which means their employees will not be getting paid; however, the government has stepped in, promising to pay, for up to six months, the salaries of workers at companies that have stopped their production activities. Workers employed in flood-affected companies will be paid TL 400 and TL 800 monthly, according to Labor Ministry officials.
Under the current legislation, the short-term budgets allocated for the losses of businesses can be used during times of disaster, such as floods, fire or earthquakes, and general economic crises. In such cases, the government pays workers' salaries until the company can get back on its feet to prevent the dismissal of workers. This budget was used extensively this year because of the ongoing global economic crisis, with the state paying salaries for 200,000 employees. The same system now will be used for flood victims.
A company wishing to benefit from the system needs to have lost one-third of its production volume or have stopped production completely for a minimum of four consecutive weeks. In the latter case, the Turkish Employment Organization (İŞKUR) will pay the total of all employee salaries. In the first case, where partial activity continues, the company can seek the salary of workers during the inactive period. For example, if the given company stops working for 20 days after working the first 10 days in a month, it pays the amount for the first 10 days, while the state covers the remaining 20 days.
