Expansion of obligations under the Law for Prevention of Sexual Harassment in relation to service contractor employees

At a glance

• The Law for the Prevention of Sexual Harassment has been amended to extend employer obligations to employees of contractors providing services.
• The amendment, published on 25 July 2024, broadens the law’s application to include users of services received through a contractor.
• The prohibition on harm resulting from sexual harassment, part of the Equal Employment Opportunities Law, now also applies to employees of service contractors.
• The amendment will take effect on 25 January 2025, with transitional provisions applying existing rules for manpower contractor employees to service contractor employees.

This article has been reproduced with the permission of the authors at Herzog Fox and Neeman.

A recent amendment to the Law for the Prevention of Sexual Harassment (Law) has recently been announced. This expands the obligations of an employer under the law to cover employees of contractors providing services to the employer.

The Law intends to address, among other issues, occurrences of sexual harassment in the workplace. Towards this goal, various obligations applying to employers were set out, including an obligation to establish effective means of filing a complaint of sexual harassment; an obligation to handle cases of sexual harassment effectively; and other obligations, including an obligation to publish regulations regarding the prevention of sexual harassment and how cases of sexual harassment are handled.

Until recently, the application of the Law was expanded to employees of manpower contractors placed at workplaces. However, this expansion of the Law’s application did not apply to employees of service contractors.

In an amendment to the Law published on 25 July 2024, its application was expanded such that the law will now also apply to the users of services, receiving services through a contractor. The definition of 'service' in this context is broad and applies to any service received from a contractor through employees. At the same time, the scope of the prohibition on harm resulting from sexual harassment, enshrined in the Equal Employment Opportunities Law was expanded to employees of service contractors.

This amendment to the Law expanding the scope of its application to include employees of service contractors, will take effect on 25 January 2025.

The amendment to the Law sets up transitional provisions, under which, until regulations are enacted on this matter, the existing rules for an employer carrying out its obligations as they apply to manpower contractor employees placed at a workplace will also apply to employees of a service contractor.

Please note: Workplaces employing more than 25 employees are obligated to establish regulations regarding the prevention of sexual harassment and the handling of complaints. In light of this Amendment to the Law, these regulations should be amended to include reference to their application to employees of a service contractor.