An employee has received a call-up notice

What is happening

A call-up notice reaches a company in several ways. Sometimes the employee brings it to HR, sometimes the military commissariat sends papers to the company's address and asks that they be served against signature, and sometimes the company only learns of the summons after the person fails to turn up for work.

From that point the employer has a set of duties that are easy to confuse: notify the employee, make it possible for them to attend at the stated time, release them from work for that period, record the absence correctly and report to the military commissariat whatever has to be reported. Mistakes here are rarely deliberate — usually it is the wrong document, the wrong date or the wrong wording in the order.

A separate question is what kind of notice it actually is. A summons to update registration data, a medical examination, military training or a mobilisation assignment each call for different company actions and different HR consequences. We separate these scenarios before your HR officer signs the first order.

What the law says

• Federal Law 53-FZ on military duty and military service obliges employers to notify employees of summonses from the military commissariat and to make timely attendance possible.
• The Labour Code requires that an employee be released from work while performing state duties, including attendance on a commissariat summons, and that their position be retained.
• Federal Law 31-FZ on mobilisation preparation sets out the duties of organisations during mobilisation, including those arising from employees' mobilisation assignments.
• The Code of Administrative Offences provides for liability of the company's officers for failing to notify employees of a summons and for failing to submit information to the military commissariat.
• Guarantees and payment for the time of attendance differ depending on the grounds of the summons, which determines the wording of the order and the time-sheet entry.
• If the employee is conscripted or mobilised as a result of the summons, separate rules on suspension of the employment contract apply — not dismissal.

What we do

• We read the notice and establish its type, the grounds and the deadline, and which duties fall on the company and which only on the employee.
• We prepare the notification documents: the receipt of service, the notification register or schedule, and the internal notice to the employee.
• We draft the order releasing the employee from work for the period of attendance, with correct wording of the grounds, and set out how the absence is recorded in the time sheet.
• We prepare the reply or the information for the military commissariat where the situation calls for it, and record the fact of sending.
• We work through the scenario in which the employee does not attend or disputes the summons, and explain where the employer's responsibility ends.
• We give your HR team a written sequence of steps for similar cases, so that you do not need to come back to us for every notice.

What we need from the company

• The document itself — the call-up notice, mobilisation assignment or commissariat letter — with all enclosures and the envelope, if it has been kept.
• Details of the employee: position, unit, working pattern and the military registration data from their personal card.
• Whether the employee holds a reservation or appears on any lists previously submitted to the military commissariat.
• The company's current HR documents on military registration: orders, the internal policy and notification registers, if these are already kept.
• Contacts for the person responsible for military registration and for the HR officer who will sign the documents.
• The dates: when the document reached the company and the date of attendance stated in the notice.