New WorkinRomania Governance Rules: What HG 602/2026 Changes for Employer Accounts and Job Offers

Romanian employers hiring non-EU workers now operate under a formal rulebook for the WorkinRomania.gov.ro platform itself, not just the labour market access conditions in Government Emergency Ordinance No. 32/2026. Government Decision HG No. 602/2026, published in Official Gazette No. 658 of 7 August 2026, sets out the data categories, account structures and technical security measures that govern how employers, recruitment agencies and foreign nationals interact with the platform. For HR and mobility teams that treat WorkinRomania as a procedural formality, the decision is a reminder that the portal is now a regulated system with its own compliance obligations, separate from the underlying work permit rules.

What HG 602/2026 actually regulates

The decision implements the technical and organisational side of OUG 32/2026, the ordinance that overhauled non-EU labour market access earlier in 2026. Rather than changing who qualifies for a work permit, HG 602/2026 fixes how the WorkinRomania system must be built and operated. It describes two components:

• A public-facing component, accessible over the internet, through which employers, recruitment agencies and individual applicants submit information and use e-services.
• An internal component, used only by staff of the competent authorities, for processing, verification and analysis of applications.

The decision also lists the categories of personal and corporate data the platform is authorised to collect and cross-check, including identity and citizenship details, passport, visa and residence permit data, employment and financial support information, family composition, and fiscal debt status. These records are interconnected with several other government systems: the national population register, immigration records held by the General Inspectorate for Immigration, ANOFM's employment records, the Trade Registry, the eViza portal, and the REGES-ONLINE employee register used for labour contract reporting.

Employer accounts and designated persons

For companies that sponsor non-EU hires, the most operationally relevant part of HG 602/2026 concerns who is allowed to act on the platform on the employer's behalf. Under the new rules, an employer or agency that holds a validated account may designate one or more individuals, based on an employment or legal relationship with the company, to upload documents, submit applications and track case status.

There is an important carve-out. Certain steps must be carried out exclusively by the external user itself, meaning the legal representative or the person who registered the account, and cannot be delegated to a designated person. These include:

• Initial registration of the employer on the platform
• Authorisation of the employer as a registered user entitled to hire foreign workers
• Authorisation or renewal of a recruitment or placement agency's status

Designated persons must confirm their designation through the platform's own functionality before they can act, but the decision is explicit that the applicant entity, not the designated individual, remains liable for the accuracy and legal compliance of the data submitted. In practice, this means a company cannot treat a delegated HR administrator or outside consultant as a liability shield; responsibility for what goes into the system sits with the employer of record.

Automatic screening against the shortage occupations list

HG 602/2026 confirms that the shortage occupations list is now enforced at the point of submission rather than reviewed later by a caseworker. Firm job offers that name an occupation not included on the current shortage occupations list, as maintained under OUG 32/2026, are subject to automatic rejection once the platform runs its technical verification. This closes off a practical workaround some employers had used, submitting a job offer under a broadly worded occupation title and expecting a human reviewer to interpret it favourably. Employers now need to classify roles precisely against the current list before a firm job offer is drafted, since an occupation mismatch is caught by the system itself, not flagged for discretionary review.

A direct complaints channel for foreign workers

The decision also formalises a multilingual electronic complaints channel built into the platform. Foreign workers, and other interested parties, can use a standardised form to report abuse or irregularities connected to their recruitment or employment. Submissions are routed automatically, in real time, through secure channels to the competent authorities, which include at minimum the Labour Inspectorate, the General Inspectorate for Immigration and ANOFM. The identifying data of the person who filed the complaint is accessible only to the receiving authority, and the system supports two-way communication so that authority staff can request clarifications and later record the verification conclusions and measures taken.

For employers, this is not a theoretical detail. A confidential, government-run reporting channel embedded directly in the platform where the company's own hiring records live means that recruitment practices, contract terms and treatment of foreign staff are now one form submission away from triggering a joint review by three separate enforcement bodies.

What employers should do before their next WorkinRomania submission

Given the account structure and automatic checks now in force, employers with active or planned non-EU hiring through WorkinRomania should:

• Confirm who currently holds the validated employer account and whether that person is still the correct legal representative for registration-level actions.
• Formally designate, through the platform, any HR staff or external advisors who will handle day-to-day document uploads and case tracking, rather than sharing login credentials informally.
• Cross-check every planned firm job offer against the current shortage occupations list before submission, to avoid an automatic rejection that delays a start date.
• Review internal recruitment and onboarding practices for foreign hires in light of the new complaints channel, since worker-facing communication and contract accuracy are now more directly exposed to regulatory scrutiny.
• Keep records of which interconnected data points (fiscal status, prior residence permits, financial support declarations) were submitted, since these are now cross-checked automatically against other government registers.

How Nestlers Group supports employers on WorkinRomania compliance

Nestlers Group's immigration team manages the practical side of these obligations for employers hiring or moving foreign staff into Romania. This includes Single Permit management and work visa assistance from the initial route assessment through firm job offer drafting on WorkinRomania, verified against the current shortage occupations list before submission to avoid automatic rejection. For companies unsure whether an account, a designated person structure, or a specific hiring route fits their situation, the team carries out an immigration route assessment before any application is filed. Where non-EU staff are already in the country, Nestlers also handles non-EU first residence permit applications, residence permit renewal, and diploma recognition, alongside ITM notification for secondment and A1 certificate support for employers whose foreign hires move between Romania, Bulgaria and Serbia. Employers weighing whether to hire directly, second staff, or engage locally through an Employer of Record Romania, Bulgaria or Serbia structure can also draw on Nestlers' Consultancy tiers for a one-time review of how the new platform rules affect their specific hiring plans.

Sources: BirișGoran legal and tax alert on HG 602/2026 and the WorkinRomania.gov.ro platform, published August 2026; Official Gazette of Romania No. 658, 7 August 2026; Ministry of Internal Affairs (MAI) published text of the government decision on the WorkinRomania platform; teaha.ro coverage of new WorkinRomania.gov.ro employer rules, 18 August 2026.