What is the liability for failure to make an entry in the work book?

Responsibility for making entries in the book

Both companies and individual entrepreneurs are required to make entries in the books of their employees. Article 66 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation states that the book is the key document on the basis of which the work experience of a specialist is recorded. On its basis, other information about the employee is also determined. Features of management are approved by these acts:

• The rules established by Government Decree No. 225.
• Instructions established by Resolution of the Ministry of Labor No. 69.

Paragraph 4 of Rules No. 225 indicates exactly what data needs to be entered in the book:

• Information about the employee: position, specialty.
• The work being performed.
• Transfer to other positions.
• Grounds for dismissal of an employee.
• Awards.

A representative of the personnel service cannot either omit information or enter unnecessary data. Article 22 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation states that the employer must comply with all provisions of the law. That is, when filling out the book, he cannot act at his own discretion.

How to make a missed entry in a work book

The legislation of the Russian Federation does not prohibit, if necessary, making changes to the work book. The procedure for restoring missing records is not provided for by law. Therefore, you can use the general approved procedure for making entries in the work record and correcting errors in it.

The employer who made the mistake must correct errors in the labor report. However, this can also be done by the employer who discovered the error and for whom the employee currently works. However, for this, he will need a properly executed certificate as a basis.

The certificate must be provided by the employer who made this mistake. Witness testimony cannot be used as confirmation of this information. That is, the oral testimony of an employee or other persons is not the basis for making a missing entry in the book. Only an official certificate can serve as such a basis.

Important! You cannot make corrections to the book by simply crossing out an incorrect entry. This applies to both the “Job Details” section and the “Awards Details” section.

If we return to our situation, the book does not contain invalid information, but simply the fact that one entry was missed (in our example, this is the transfer of an employee to another department).

Therefore, the missing entry is entered next after the final entry in the book. In this case, the same procedure is applied as provided for in the Rules and Instructions. This will violate the deadline for making entries and the chronological order of all entries. But there is no other procedure for making a missed entry in the labor record (

The most common violations when filling out a book

Responsibility for incorrectly filling out the book is imposed on the basis of Article 419 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation. In order to avoid punishment, you must first check whether existing records comply with the law. Only then should new entries be made.

When filling out, they usually forget to enter this information:

• Education.
• Position and specialty.
• Employee benefits, if any.
• A record of termination of an agreement with an employee indicating the current date.
• Changing the name of the company or department if this occurred during the employee’s employment.
• Serial number of the record.
• Date of entry.
• Information about the assignment of qualifications.

The employer must check whether the information in the book is entered correctly, since it is he who is responsible for errors. However, the employee is recommended to check the information entered, as it may affect further employment and determination of length of service.

IMPORTANT! The employer may not simply forget to enter some information. He may not record at all that the employee worked for the company. This is a very serious offence. It is fraught for the employee.

Let's look at an example. A person has been working in a company for 5 years. Upon his dismissal, no entry was made in his Labor Code. Because of this, the employee will not be able to prove to the new employer that he held a certain position. In addition, the recorded length of service will be less than the actual one.

ATTENTION! There should be no erasures or strikethroughs in the work book.

How to make a missing entry if there is no longer space in the work book

Sometimes there is simply nowhere to make an additional entry in the work book, since it has expired. In this case, you should create an insert for the labor document and enter the necessary information into it properly. After this, the insert will need to be attached to the work book. The work insert is a continuation of it, therefore for convenience it is recommended to attach it at the end of the book. This way, the chronological order of the entries in both the book and the insert will be maintained. The most reliable way is to sew the form into a book. To do this, use a strong thread and make 3-5 punctures.

After this, a stamp is affixed to the first page, and the details of the insert, its series, number and date of issue are also indicated. It should be remembered that without a work book, the insert will not have legal force.

What to do if the entry is not made

What to do if the required entry was not registered in a timely manner? We need to bring it in. To do this, simply fill in the missing entry. It is entered after the last entries, if any. This information is indicated:

• Serial number.
• Date of.
• Basic information.
• Order number and date of issue.

The record contains current information about hiring and dismissal. What to do if a missing entry is discovered after the employee has started a new job? You must contact the HR department of the employer who did not enter the information. If the previous employer went into liquidation, the missing entry can be made in the personnel department of the new employer.

The procedure for action in case of errors is specified in section 3 of Rules No. 225. However, these are general recommendations. The procedure for working in the absence of a record is not established by the Rules. Therefore, in this case, you should be guided by the standard procedure for correcting errors.

Paragraph 27 of Rule No. 225 states that errors in the book must be corrected by the former employer. But sometimes this is not possible. In this case, the corrected entry can be made by the new employer. But this is done on the basis of documents from the previous place of work.

Paragraph 29 of Rules No. 225 states that entries in the book are made on the basis of documents such as an employment contract, an order from the manager on hiring/dismissal. The entries in the work book and the data in the papers must correspond to each other.

General rules for correcting errors made in work books

Important! You cannot make any corrections to the work report at your own discretion. To do this, special requirements must be met. And corrections without complying with these requirements can lead to undesirable consequences.

The general procedure for correcting errors in the work book is as follows:

1. If an erroneous entry is contained on the title page, it must be crossed out.
2. Incorrect information entered in the job information is considered invalid.
3. Not only the employer who made it, but also the one who discovered the error can correct an error in the labor report.
4. A forgotten entry can be added to the book, for example, about service in the army, about the reorganization of a company, about advanced training, about transfer, etc.

Responsibility for missing an entry

Paragraph 45 of Rules No. 225 states that it is the employer who is responsible for filling out the books. Subparagraph “b” of paragraph 10 of the Regulation on Labor Supervision No. 875 of September 1, 2012 states that if an employer receives a complaint regarding violations in filling out the book, an unscheduled inspection awaits him. The result of control measures may be administrative liability on the basis of Part 1 of Article 5.27 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation.

In particular, this is either a warning or a fine:

• 1,000-5,000 rubles for officials and individual entrepreneurs.
• 30,000-50,000 rubles for legal entities.

If a repeated violation is detected, the fine will be increased.

Work records and employer obligations

Legal entities and individual entrepreneurs are required by labor law to fill out work books for all hired employees. This form is a document that systematizes data on a person’s labor activity for all years.

Legislative regulation of the nuances of registration of work books is expressed through:

• Labor Code of the Russian Federation;
• Rules issued by the Government of the Russian Federation as part of Resolution No. 225 dated April 16, 2003;
• Instructional collections prepared by the Ministry of Labor and systematized in Decree No. 69 dated October 10, 2003.

In the work book, the employer must reflect the following set of information about the work activities of the owner of the form:

• information identifying the employee;
• information about the assigned work (the name of the position for which the person was hired, indicating the period of stay in it);
• facts of internal and external transfers;
• reasons for dismissals;
• non-material types of incentives.

Also see “Rules for filling out work books in 2022.”

The employer is not authorized to decide in whose books information about employment is entered and whose forms are ignored.

If an error was made while filling out the form, the entry must be invalidated, after which the correct data is entered. Responsibility for failure to make an entry in the work book is provided for by the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation in Art. 5.27 (fine - up to 50,000 rubles).

Labor control and supervision bodies receive information from complaints and statements from employers affected by negligence about the infringement of their rights regarding the reflection of their accumulated experience in work books.

The norms of Regulation No. 875 dated September 1, 2012 provide for the initiation of an unscheduled inspection of the employer upon receipt of a signal of an offense. If suspicions are confirmed that an enterprise or individual entrepreneur has failed to fulfill the full range of obligations as an employer, administrative measures are applied to them.

Also see “Gratitude in the work book: sample and what it gives.”

How to recover a missed entry

Missing information is identified under various circumstances. The method for restoring missed moments of work comes down to one thing: a line is added with the following serial number and the current date in column 2 . Each situation has its own nuances of supplementing information.

Let’s say that information about a transfer to another position has not been entered. The omission was noticed on the last working day when receiving the main labor document. Information about the dismissal has already been entered.

The fix here is simple:

• once again put the full name of the organization in the title;
• a line about the transfer is entered with the date of dismissal (the day the line was written) in column 2, and the date of transfer is entered in column 3;
• the line is endorsed by the responsible specialist (employer) with a transcript of the signature and an indication of the position, sealed;
• The employee confirms in writing that the form is filled out correctly, signs and dates it.

An example of making a missing entry:

If the work book does not contain a record of dismissal from a previous place of work, a record of admission cannot be made in the new organization. In this case, there may be 3 options:

1. The dismissal record must be made by the responsible specialist from the former place of work. If there is no record of hiring a new job, then the record of dismissal is added with the current date, and the day of dismissal is written in column 3. Column 4 contains the name of the document (order) and its details (date and number). The signature of the employer (specialist) with a transcript and indication of the position is certified by the main seal of the organization. If an appointment has already been made, then before adding the entry you need to put a stamp with the name of the organization or write the title by hand in column 3.
2. If for some reason it is impossible to restore the line about dismissal at the old job, but there is a supporting document (order), then the new employer has the right to add the missing information. The important point is that oral evidence is not grounds for reinstatement of a record.
3. If the organization is liquidated and there are no archives, then you will have to go to court to establish the fact of termination of the employment contract. The court decision must be included in the employment form as a replacement for the dismissal record.