Privacy Policy

1.1 In the following Agreement the abbreviation “ABA” refers to the Austrian Business Agency Österreichische Industrieansiedlungs- und WirtschaftswerbungsgmbH. This GmbH is a non-profit organization for the promotion of Austria as a business location. Within the framework of its promotion activities, ABA also serves as a competence centre and service point for legal matters with regard to hiring international skilled workers in Austria.

1.2 The term “international skilled worker” refers to any person intended to be employed in Austria without having Austrian citizenship.  

1.3 The following provisions apply to legal matters concerning a company with a registered office and/or place/s of business in Austria that has come to an understanding with an international skilled worker (Section 1.2) with regard to his/her employment in Austria, whose employment has not yet been approved, if necessary, by the competent authorities. 

1.4 The abbreviation “AuslBG” refers to Ausländerbeschäftigungsgesetz (Act Governing the Employment of Foreign Nationals), “NAG” for Niederlassungs- und Aufenthaltsgesetz (Settlement and Residence Act) as amended. 

1.5 “GDPR” stands for Regulation (EUR) 2016/679 – General Data Protection Regulation. 

2.1 Employers and employees (Section 1.3) are informed of the Austrian legal position that international skilled workers (with exceptions, such as individuals from EU Member States) may not be employed in Austria or begin and keep up employment or any other gainful occupation in Austria, unless they  

2.1.1 obtain a work or posting permit

2.1.2 or obtain a notification confirmation

2.1.3 or hold a valid residence title for this employment or any other gainful occupation, namely

• either a “Red-White-Red Card” or a “Red-White-Red Card plus”
• or a “Blue Card EU”,
• or a residence permit as an intra-corporate transferee (“ICT”)
• or a residence permit as a mobile intra-corporate transferee (“mobile ICT”)
• or a “settlement permit”
• or a “settlement permit – artist”
• or a “settlement permit – researcher”
• or a “settlement permit – special cases of dependent gainful occupation”
• or a “settlement permit – dependant”
• or an exemption certification or a residence title “family member”
• or a residence title “long-term resident – EU” 

2.1.4 and/or hold another permit provided by law (residence permits and such like). 

2.2 These permits or residence titles are usually granted for a limited period of time.

2.3 Any of these permits must be granted prior to the commencement of employment, keeping in mind not only the criteria under the Act Governing the Employment of Foreign Nationals but also the provisions under the Settlement and Residence Act. 

 2.4 With regard to documents that are made available in the course of obtaining advice and support from the ABA (point 4), legal information is provided to the effect that ‘anyone who produces a false document/certificate (Urkunde) with the intention of falsifying a genuine document/certificate (Urkunde) with the intention of using it in legal transactions as proof of a right, a legal relationship or a fact’ is liable to prosecution pursuant to Section 223 Austrian Criminal Code (Strafgesetzbuch, StGB). According to the law, anyone who uses a false or falsified document/certificate (Urkunde) in legal transactions to prove a right, a legal relationship or a fact’ is also to be prosecuted. If there are reasons for suspicion, the ABA expressly reserves the right to inform the competent authorities of the reasons for suspicion in order to prevent any damage to Austria as a business location and also to take company interests (employers) into account.

3.1 In legal matters as described above in Section 1.3, when a company makes an offer of employment to an international skilled worker, ABA provides the company and/or the skilled worker upon request with basic information on key legislation and the corresponding process to obtain the permits required to work in Austria. For the benefit of the company and/or the international skilled worker, ABA also offers consulting and support to any business promotion agency of Austria’s federal provinces and/or any recruitment agency that may be involved in the individual recruitment (offer of employment).

3.2 The application is filed by the company and/or the international skilled worker (namely the parties in the process); under the supervision of ABA upon request.

3.3 After submission of the application, ABA supports the applicant party/parties, meaning the company and/or the international skilled worker, by accompanying them through the individual stages of the process. Until revoked at any time, the party/parties authorise ABA to obtain access to the process file as well as information from the competent authorities on the status of the relevant process, any documents that might still need to be submitted, and the estimated duration of the process. 

3.4 If the permits and/or residence titles mentioned above are granted for a limited period (point 2.2), the party/parties affected by the time limit will keep a record of the time limit for any application for extension on their own responsibility. If ABA offers a reminder service in the form of a reminder email in individual cases and the party/parties concerned make use of this offer, the reminder service shall be provided by sending an email to the email address last notified to ABA. The risk of receipt, for example in the event of a change of address, but also in all other cases, shall be borne by the party/parties concerned. The ABA shall in no case be liable for any failure of the party/parties concerned to meet the deadline.

3.5 ABA shall use the personal data provided to ABA exclusively for the fulfilment of the respective processing purpose, in particular for advice and support (point 3.1), and shall store this data for as long as this is necessary according to the agreed purpose or otherwise or in accordance with consent. The storage period is also subject to statutory periods, including statutory limitation periods, such as those in accordance with the provisions of Sections 1478 et seq. Austrian Civil Code (Allgemein bürgerliches Gesetzbuch, ABGB). According to these, the short limitation period is 3 years, whereas the long limitation period is 30 years.

4.1    ABA is only able to provide the requested consulting and support in legal matters as described above in Section 1.3, if it is granted access to the personal data of the international skilled worker (hereinafter referred to in short as employee data) as well as the data of the company and the necessary documents for the application (Section 3.2). 

4.2 This data and the documents mentioned above include in particular:

4.2.1 a completed and signed application form, in which all relevant personal data must be entered, 

4.2.2 information and documents from the company’s side, namely

• job description, 
• employer’s declaration,
• if applicable, additional explanation/s,

4.2.3 employee data and corresponding documents of the skilled worker, namely

• birth certificate (including if applicable those of family members),
• curriculum vitae of the international skilled worker,
• police clearance certificate,
• if applicable, wedding certificate, partner certificate or any other civil status certificate/s,
• passport,
• passport photo with bill,
• if applicable, any already granted residence titles,
• if applicable, any already granted visa,

4.2.4 job-related data and/or documents, namely

• offer of employment (signed by both sides),
• proof of qualifications and/or training (school certificate/s, university diploma/s, certificate/s of participation etc.), 
• proof of professional experience and/or previous employments (work confirmation letter/s, confirmation of social insurance periods, other documents, e.g. on previous self-employed work etc.),
• language certificate/s,
• if applicable, further “skills certificates” and such like.

4.3 This data and documents, which the company and/or the international skilled worker (or acting on their behalf and in their interest either a business promotion agency of a federal province or a recruitment agency) voluntarily provides to ABA, is exclusively saved, used (including transfer) and processed by ABA for the purpose of consulting and support as described in Section 3 in legal matters as described above in Section 1.3. 

4.4 ABA places great value in the protection of personal data. ABA therefore observes the applicable legal provisions regarding the protection, lawful handling and confidentiality of personal data, as well as on data security, in particular the Austrian Data Protection Act (“DSG”), the EU General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”) and the Telecommunications Act (“TKG”).

Registered users can share documents with ABA and submit inquiries via our portal "Customer Portal WORK in AUSTRIA". In turn, ABA employees are available to provide advice and support. We use SharePoint Online for our portal. This comprises a collaboration and data exchange platform from Microsoft Ireland Operations Ltd, One Microsoft Place, South County Business Park Leopoldstown Dublin 18, D18 P521 Ireland, which ensures the efficient and fast retrieval of documents from any location. When using SharePoint, personal data about you will be processed. Please note that this data protection notice only informs you about the processing of your personal data by us if you use Microsoft applications together with us. Further information about the processing by Microsoft can be found here: Microsoft Privacy Statement - Microsoft Privacy.

Various types of data are processed when you use our portal; the scope of the data depends on the information you provide as a user. However, certain information is already processed automatically as soon as you use the SharePoint application, i.e:

• Your IP address,
• Your user name (access data for the SharePoint application),
• Identification features: Personal information that identifies you as a user, sender, recipient of data within the SharePoint application (surname, first name, telephone number, e-mail address, other data (such as a profile picture you have stored),
• Your user activities, such as time of access, date, type of access, information on the data/files/documents which were accessed and all activities in connection with use, such as creating, changing or deleting a document, setting up a team (and channels in teams), making notes in the notebook, starting a chat, replying in the chat.
• Diagnostic data so that the services can be provided (error-free). The processing of diagnostic data serves the purpose of improving and updating the software, ensuring the security of the services and rapid troubleshooting by Microsoft.

The processing of the user's personal data is based on the user's consent (Art. 6 para. 1 lit. a GDPR).