General terms and conditions (GTC)

1. Scope of application

These General terms and conditions apply to all services, contracts, understandings and agreements that are concluded with Orizon in relation to employee leasing, personnel consulting and placement as well as consulting services. Orizon objects to and excludes deviating General terms and conditions, unless expressly agreed otherwise in writing. Every contractual relationship between Orizon and the client (client company/hirer) is subject to the written form requirement. Verbal collateral agreements are excluded. Pursuant to § 126a of the German Civil Code (BGB), the written form requirement may be replaced by electronic form with a qualified electronic signature. 

2. Official authorisation

Orizon, with the exception of Orizon Holding, has unlimited permission for employee leasing. Orizon therefore temporarily assigns its employees (temporary workers/loaned workers) to clients on the basis of the German Employee Leasing Act (Arbeitnehmerüberlassungsgesetz).

3. Assignment conditions

Orizon is the employer of its employees in accordance with the German Employee Leasing Act (Arbeitnehmerüberlassungsgesetz) with all associated rights and obligations.

Orizon provides the client with carefully selected Orizon employees who have been checked for the necessary professional qualifications.

The conclusion of an employee leasing contract does not establish any employment relationship between the client and Orizon employees.

Orizon employees on client assignments are not authorised to accept payments – e.g. wages, meal expenses or travel advances – from the client. Payments to the Orizon employee on client assignment have no fulfilment effect.

In the case of a demonstrable, insufficient work performance by an Orizon employee, which the client reports within the first 4 hours after starting work, these 4 hours will not be charged.

During an ongoing assignment, Orizon can delegate the performance of the order to another equally qualified Orizon employee.

During the assignment, the client is primarily responsible for issuing the work instructions, supervising and instructing the Orizon employees, checking the performance of the work and observing the accident prevention regulations.

The client uses the Orizon employee exclusively at locations and for activities that can be assigned to his or her job profile and have been agreed in the employee leasing contract. The client only allows the Orizon employees to use or operate the work equipment, tools and machines necessary for the performance of the activity.

Changes to the duration of deployment, type of activity, working hours or location require the prior consent of Orizon and can only be agreed between the client and Orizon.

The client is responsible for the necessary official approvals for overtime, Sunday and holiday work for Orizon employees on client assignments. In addition, the client shall inform Orizon immediately about assignments requiring a permit and, without being asked, shall send Orizon a copy of the official permit before the Orizon employee starts work that requires a permit.

The client shall inform Orizon immediately if an Orizon employee fails to appear on a client assignment. Orizon is not obliged to provide a replacement in the event of the absence of Orizon employees on client assignment. Claims for damages for this are excluded.

If the customer is directly affected by lawful industrial action or becomes aware of planned industrial action, the customer shall inform Orizon immediately and ensure that no Orizon employee is deployed in its company during the industrial action. 

4. Occupational health and safety

According to § 11 paragraph 6 Temporary Employment Act (AÜG), the activity of the Orizon employee is subject to the public-law regulations of the occupational safety law applicable to Orizon. The resulting occupational health and safety obligations for Orizon are the responsibility of the client without prejudice to Orizon’s obligations. The client shall instruct the Orizon employee before the start of work in health and safety protection in relation to the workplace and the area of responsibility. This also includes instruction and practice in the use of personal protective equipment (PPE), available first aid facilities, fire safety equipment and regulations. The client shall document the instruction. In addition, the client carries out a risk assessment for the workplaces of Orizon employees. The results shall be documented by the client and made available to Orizon for inspection upon request. First aid facilities and measures shall be ensured by the client. The client includes the Orizon employee in its safety controls and grants Orizon or Orizon representatives free access to the workplace of the Orizon employee. The client is obliged to report an accident at work to Orizon immediately. A reportable work accident must be investigated jointly.

The hours worked by Orizon employees is recorded via electronic time logging by the contractor or the client. Where the use of electronic time logging is not possible, the recording of working hours shall be done manually via the activity records recorded by the Orizon employee. The daily start and end times as well as the hours worked with breaks must be evident from the activity records and time recording logs. The client undertakes to confirm the hours worked and the entitlement to allowances weekly by an authorised representative electronically or by signature and company stamp. If a signature by an authorised representative of the client is not possible, Orizon is entitled to invoice the client for the working hours and additional hours recorded by the Orizon employee. Working hours are invoiced on the basis of the hours actually worked, whereby at least the contractually agreed company working hours shall be billed. If the Orizon employee has to pay travel expenses, Orizon is entitled to invoice them to the client. Business trips shall be charged to the client based on the actual expenses. 

6. Tariff structure

Orizon employees are paid in accordance with the industry collective agreements concluded between the Interessenverband Deutscher Zeitarbeitsunternehmen e.V. and the DGB collective agreement for temporary work as well as the collective agreements on industry surcharges for temporary workers applicable in certain industries and applicable company agreements. In order to comply with the regulations in the German Employee Leasing Act (Arbeitnehmerüberlassungsgesetz), the client undertakes to check and immediately notify Orizon in writing before the employee leasing begins, whether an Orizon employee has been directly employed by the client or an affiliated group company  within the meaning of § 18 German Companies Act (AktG) in the last 6 months or within the last 3 months as a temporary worker. In the aforementioned cases, the client undertakes to pay the resulting additional costs for the affected Orizon employees to Orizon. The client informs Orizon in writing before the start of the assignment completely and truthfully about all collective agreements applicable in the client company, favourable company agreements and their content and which industry the client company belongs to. In order to implement the provisions of § 8 Temporary Employment Act (AÜG) as well as the collective agreements of the sector and company agreements applicable in the company of assignment, the client shall inform Orizon in writing of the regular hourly wage paid and the relevant salary components of a comparable employee required for implementation before the start of the assignment. If the client does not provide truthful information, or if it is incomplete or no information is provided and it does not notify changes in writing immediately after they become known, Orizon is entitled to recalculate the employee remuneration and the hourly rate based on the actual employee remuneration and adjust it retrospectively. The recalculation is based on the original calculation in relation to the employee wages and the hourly rate. This does not affect the right to extraordinary termination without notice of the employee leasing contracts concluded and the assertion of claims for damages. Orizon is entitled to increase the hourly rates at its reasonable discretion. This applies in particular to changes in wagerelevant obligations, company agreements, legal or collective bargaining changes, adjustments to comparative wages as part of industry supplements, equal pay or minimum wage regulations. Orizon shall inform the client of any necessary increases in hourly rates. An increase notified by Orizon shall take effect on the first of the next month, at the latest 10 working days after receipt by the client.

7. Periods of notice

The employee leasing contract concluded between the client and Orizon can be terminated within the first 5 days of the leasing with a notice period of 2 working days to the end of a working day. Thereafter, with a notice period of 10 working days to the Friday of the week. If the number of temporary employees is more than 20, a maximum of 20%, but no more than 10 temporary employees per week may be deregistered in compliance with the deregistration periods. The notice of termination can only be effectively given to Orizon and not to the employee on client assignment. As part of a tariff adjustment by Orizon, the client is entitled to terminate the employee leasing contract within 10 working days after notification of the tariff adjustment with a notice period of 10 working days to the end of a calendar month. Orizon has a special right of termination with a notice period of 10 working days to the end of a calendar month if the tariff adjustment is not paid by the client. Orizon has the right to terminate the contract extraordinarily with immediate effect for good cause; good cause exists in particular if the client is in arrears with regard to payment of the agreed remuneration by an amount of at least € 10,000. The early termination right of the client/Orizon remains unaffected by a limitation of the leasing period.

8. Indirect recruitment

In the event of the establishment of an employment relationship between the client or a company affiliated with the client within the meaning of § 15 of the German Companies Act (AktG) and an Orizon employee hired out during the employee leasing period or a candidate proposed by Orizon for employee leasing without prior leasing, a recruitment commission shall be due. This is based on the previous leasing period. This also applies if the employment relationship is established within a period of 6 months after the end of the leasing or the proposal of the candidate. The recruitment commission is 32% of the gross annual target salary, including all supplements in accordance with § 14 German Social Code (SGB) IV, additional benefits such as special annual payments, Christmas and holiday bonuses, royalties, company cars plus the applicable statutory VAT. The variable remuneration is based on a target achievement of 100%. The recruitment commission is reduced by 1/12 of the total amount for each full month of leasing and is free of charge after a leasing period of 12 months. The client also owes the recruitment commission according to the above scale if the client or a company affiliated with it within the meaning of § 15 German Companies Act (AktG) concludes a work, service or employee leasing contract with the Orizon employee or a third party without an interruption of at least 3 months.

9. Direct recruitment

Orizon looks for suitable candidates for the client to establish a contractual relationship between the client and the candidate. This type of placement can take place as a recruitment order, in which the description of the job to be filled and the qualification requirements are previously determined within the framework of a specific recruitment order. The same applies to a service placement in which Orizon presents a candidate to the client on its own initiative and offers him or her for employment without a prior recruitment order having been issued. Orizon provides the client with proposals on pre-selected candidates and arranges appointments between the client and the candidates. Unless otherwise requested, Orizon will attend the interview dates. If the candidate proposed by Orizon has demonstrably already applied directly to the client or has already been offered a job placement, the client undertakes to inform Orizon in writing immediately, at least before the candidate is personally introduced to the client for the first time. If this information is not provided, the candidate is deemed to have been recruited by Orizon. The details of a candidate are based on statements and information from the candidate or third parties and are checked by Orizon exclusively with regard to compliance with the job and candidate profile or other specifications of the client. Orizon cannot guarantee the correctness and completeness. It is the client’s responsibility to check the candidate’s suitability and qualifications before establishing a contractual relationship. Unless otherwise agreed, the client shall bear proven travel expenses of the candidates, expenses for the implementation of test procedures and competence assessments by Orizon or external service providers commissioned separately by the client as well as special advertising. If an employment relationship is established between the client or a company affiliated with it within the meaning of § 15 German Companies Act (AktG) and a candidate proposed by Orizon, a recruitment commission shall be due.This also applies if the candidate is rejected by the client but is hired within a period of 12 months after Orizon has provided the first information about this candidate. The above provisions also apply if the client passes on information and/or personnel documents about a candidate provided to it by Orizon to a third party and an employment relationship, work, service or employee leasing contract is subsequently established between the third party and the candidate. In this case, the remuneration shall be owed by the client. Any claims of Orizon against the third party remain unaffected by this. The recruitment commission is 32% of the gross annual target salary, including all supplements in accordance with § 14 German Social Code (SGB) IV, additional benefits such as special annual payments, Christmas and holiday bonuses, royalties, company cars plus the applicable statutory VAT. The variable remuneration is based on a target achievement of 100%. If the annual gross target salary increases within the first six months after the establishment of an employment relationship, Orizon has the right to request a recalculation of the recruitment commission on the basis of the increased annual gross salary.

The client is obliged to notify Orizon in writing immediately, at the latest within three working days, of the conclusion of the contract and the agreed gross annual target salary, including all salary components in accordance with § 14 German Social Code (SGB) IV for the calculation of the recruitment commission. Upon request and within a period of 10 working days, the customer shall allow Orizon to inspect the respective contract including all additional agreements. If the customer does not meet its obligation, Orizon is entitled to charge a recruitment commission based on a comparable annual fee according to the provisions. The recruitment commission is due for payment without deduction upon receipt of the invoice.

11. Invoicing and payment term

Invoicing takes place weekly on the basis of the contractual agreements with the client. The invoice amount is due for payment without deduction within 7 days of the invoice date. In the event of an invoice complaint, the hirer only has a right of retention until the complaint is resolved if the complaint regarding the amount of the invoice is not disputed by Orizon and/or the invoice was not sent to the correct addressee (which cannot be determined by interpretation). Apart from that, the client shall only have a claim for invoice correction, which shall not affect the due date of the (partial) claim from the invoice complained about. If the client has a right of retention, it will receive an invoice correction created by Orizon, which is to be paid within the agreed payment period of the original invoice, if the payment period is reached or exceeded, at the latest within 7 days after receipt of the invoice correction.

12. Liability

a) Orizon shall only be liable for the breach of an obligation arising from the contract or the law if the breach of obligation was committed intentionally or through gross negligence; strict liability is excluded. Orizon shall only be liable for damages caused by other negligence in the event of a breach of a material obligation with regard to the damages foreseeable at the time of the conclusion of the contract and typical for the contract. The amount of liability pursuant to Clause a for all resulting property damage and personal injury is further limited to a maximum amount of € 2,000,000 in total per calendar year.
 

b) Orizon is not liable for further claims. The foregoing limitations of liability do not apply to personal injury/death.
 

c) Orizon guarantees the proper selection of its employees in client assignments with regard to the contractually agreed activity. Liability is limited to damage caused by intentional or grossly negligent breach of the above selection obligation. Further claims are excluded. The amount of liability for all resulting damages is further limited to a maximum amount of € 1,500,000 in total per calendar year.
 

d) Due to the instruction and control function of the client, Orizon is not liable for damage caused by the Orizon employee in the performance of his or her function. Likewise, Orizon is not liable for any particular success of the activities of its employees. The client releases Orizon against claims for damages by third parties with regard to the Orizon employee on client assignments.
 

e) The liability of Orizon is excluded if the employee is entrusted with activities related to money matters, such as safekeeping and administration of money, securities and other valuables.
 

f) Unless a written notification of the claim for damages is made within three calendar months after the occurrence of the damage and, in the event of rejection by Orizon, a judicial assertion is not made within one calendar month, the liability of Orizon is excluded.

13. Non-disclosure and data protection

The contracting parties undertake to treat as confidential all business transactions and processes that become known to them during the cooperation, in particular contract content and conditions, personal data, as well as matters and documents marked as confidential, and to keep them secret from third parties. Third parties in this sense are not companies of the respective group of companies. Excluded from this are all data and information that are obvious or generally known. The contracting parties also undertake to comply with the requirements of data protection laws and ensure compliance with them. The respective employees are committed to data secrecy. The client assures to process all data of Orizon employees only within the framework of the data protection regulations and exclusively for the purpose of order processing. Pursuant to Article 25 of the GDPR, the technical and organisational measures for the protection of data shall be taken and ensured by the client. The contracting parties undertake to inform each other immediately about complaints, damage or loss of personal data on which the processing is based. Within the scope of the cooperation, the data necessary for electronic data processing shall be stored by Orizon. For the purpose of credit and creditworthiness checks, data are exchanged with credit agencies within the framework of the statutory regulations. The client hereby expressly agrees to this. The stipulated obligations continue to apply even after the termination of the cooperation between the parties. The client undertakes to delete the information and data that have become known to it immediately after the end of the cooperation, provided that this does not conflict with the statutory storage obligations.

14. Reference naming

The client agrees that Orizon may name its company name and logo in electronic form as a reference client. The client can revoke the consent with a simple email and demand immediate removal of the reference. 

15. Place of performance and place of jurisdiction

The place of performance and jurisdiction is Augsburg.

16. Final provisions / Miscellaneous

a) In the event of extraordinary circumstances or force majeure, Orizon is entitled to postpone the order placed or to withdraw from the order in whole or in part without replacement. This includes all circumstances, such as fire, strikes, lockouts, acts of war, State intervention, natural di-sasters, sabotage, etc., which temporarily or permanently make the ag-reed service difficult or impossible. This also applies in the event of a pandemic that has a significant economic or legal impact on the feasibility of order fulfilment by Orizon, for example official orders, quarantine, inability to work, etc. Upon occurrence and knowledge of the aforementioned events, the contracting parties undertake to inform each other. 

b) Orizon and the client shall attempt to ensure the fulfilment of the order taking into account all reasonable technical and economic means. Claims for damages for the fulfilment of the contract against Orizon are excluded. If the extraordinary circumstances or force majeure persist for more than 6 months, the client and Orizon have the right to terminate the contract in compliance with the contractually agreed notice periods.

c) The customer shall inform Orizon immediately of all complaints. If the client does not report defects within five days of the circumstances giving rise to the complaint, all claims arising from this are excluded. The contracting parties can only offset claims with undisputed or legally established claims or exercise a right of retention. Waiting or deferring the assertion of claims or the non-exercise of rights does not constitute a waiver or effect on the existence of the rights or a waiver of the exercise of claims for future cases. All claims addressed to the client are exclusive of the applicable statutory VAT.

d) The Orizon Code of Conduct adopted by the Orizon group of companies is an integral part of all contractual agreements between the client and Orizon, and the client undertakes to comply with it.

e) The client assures that any bodies, employees, group companies and participations owned by it, controlled by it or controlling it are not subject to trade and economic sanctions or are or have been the subject of claims, proceedings or investigations relating to sanctions. Appropriate measures shall be taken by the client to ensure that any sanctions impo-sed are complied with or that Orizon does not violate trade and economic sanctions in the context of its activities. The client assures Orizon that no cash flows made to Orizon result from business or transactions with parties subject to sanctions or based on actions that are in conflict with sanctions.

f) Should individual provisions of these General terms and conditions be or become invalid or unenforceable, or should these General terms and conditions contain a loophole, the validity of the remaining provisions shall remain unaffected. In this case, the contracting parties must re-place the invalid or unenforceable provision with a provision that corresponds as closely as possible to the economic purpose of the original provision.