What is an employment contract?

An employment contract – also called a certificate of employment, letter of employment or an employment agreement – is a written contract between an employer and employee. The primary functions of the contract are to prove the employment relationship between the parties and to describe the most important terms and conditions that apply to the employment relationship. The employment contract thus creates the guidelines for cooperation and reduces the risk of conflicts and misunderstandings.

If you are about to hire a new employee, you can easily create the employment contract with Legal Desk. Simply fill out our form, which allows you to tailor the contract to your specific needs.

Create an employment contract with Legal Desk here

What should be written in an employment contract?

An employment contract can be put together in many different ways. However, there are a number of things which, according to the Employment Certificate Act (ansættelsesbevisloven), must always be stated in the contract:

• Name and address of employer and employee
• The address of the place of work or – if the place of work is not permanent – the address from where the work is mainly performed
• Description of the content of the work or indication of the employees position
• Employment start date
• The end date of the employment relationship in the case of a fixed-term employment
• Holiday rights
• The duration of the employer's and employee's notice of termination
• Salary conditions
• The daily or weekly working hours
• Indication of a collective agreement, if the employment relationship is covered by one
• The duration and terms of any probationary period
• The opportunity for training provided by the employer
• The identity of social security institutions and any social security protection provided by the employer
• The identity of the client company for temporary employees

If you have employees who were already employed before the new Employment Certificate Act came into effect on July 1, 2023, they can request updated employment certificates in accordance with the new rules. We recommend that you update your employment contracts to align with the new regulations for new and existing employees.

When you make your employment contract with Legal Desk, you can also easily add a non-compete clause and/or customer clause for only 199 DKK – the price is the same regardless of whether you choose one or both of these clauses.

Requirement for employment contract

As an employer, you are obliged to draw up an employment contract, regardless of whether you have to hire a monthly paid salaried employee or an hourly paid employee. The only exception to this rule is if the employee only has to work three hours – or less – per week, or if the duration of employment is shorter than one month. Without an employment contract, you risk having to pay compensation to the employee.

In case you are hiring an employee who does not speak Danish, you can also easily add an English-language version of the contract for only 199 DKK. Then you will receive a double-column version of the contract, of which one column is a Danish-language version and the other column is an English language version.

Employment contract for monthly paid salaried employee

If the employee is to be paid a fixed monthly salary, the employee will – regardless of the length of working hours – be paid monthly. A monthly paid employee does not necessarily have to be a full-time employee, as part-time employees can also be monthly paid. This may be the case, for example, if the employee is paid 18.000 DKK per month for 20 hours of work per week. If your employee is to be paid according to the number of working hours, he or she will be paid by the hour (read more about hourly paid employees in the next section).

As an employer, you must apply for an employment contract for monthly paid salaried employees, if your employee:

• is employed in a service position (primarily in the trade and office area), performs work with warehouse operations or deals with either technical or clinical assistance services
• works more than 8 hours a week for a period that lasts longer than one month

Please note that directors are not covered by the Salaried Employees Act (Funktionærloven), even if they meet the above criteria. Therefore, instead of an employment contract, you must draw up a director's employment contract, if the employee is to take up a position as director.

Create an employment contract for a monthly paid salaried employee here

See how Legal Desk works. The article continues below the video.

Employment contract for hourly paid employee

An employee is paid by the hour, when he or she is paid for the number of hours they work during the pay period. Waiters and students are most often among the people who are paid by the hour for their work. However, you must be aware of whether your hourly paid employee is a salaried employee and thus covered by the Salaried Employees Act's rules on termination, illness, etc., as this may have an impact on the design of the contract.

When is an hourly paid employee a salaried employee?

Whether an hourly paid employee is a salaried employee depends on three conditions:

• The employee must work at least 8 hours a week on average
• The employee must be subject to a duty of instruction – this means that there must be a superior, who gives the employee instructions in relation to the execution of the work
• The employee must perform salaried work, which includes office work, sales work, warehouse work and certain types of clinical work

Create an employment contract for an hourly paid employee here

Is the employment covered by a collective agreement?

If your employment is covered by a collective agreement, this agreement will stipulate requirements for the employment relationship, for example regarding working hours, holidays and other allowance, which must therefore also be complied with in the employment relationship. This also means that there are some specific requirements for how the content of the employment contract should be designed in that case.

Before you draw up your employment contract, it is therefore important that you investigate whether your future employee is covered by a collective agreement. If the employment is covered by a collective agreement, you will unfortunately not be able to use Legal Desk’s employment contract.

How do I make the employment contract valid?

When you draw up your employment contract with Legal Desk, you will receive the employment contract immediately after you have filled out the form on our website. Hereafter the contract is ready to be signed by you and your employee, which you can easily and quickly do digitally with MitID (learn more about signing with MitID here).

Once you have both signed the contract, the employment relationship is valid. Afterwards you can always find the employment contract online in your respective Legal Desk archive, where it is securely stored.

Create employment contracts in English for 199 kr. with Legal Desk

When you create your employment contract with Legal Desk, you are not just filling in some standard pdf template with fixed and limited options. Instead you fill out a flexible form that uses your answers to automatically generate an employment contract, that is tailored to your specific needs and desires.

You will receive the employment contract immediately – ready to be signed with MitID. Just click ‘Create employment contract now’ below to get started with the form. It typically takes 10-15 minutes, but you can always save along the way and contact us if you encounter any questions.

Be aware that the form is in Danish, but the final document will be in both English and Danish. If you just want the Danish version, you can create the document for free using the same form.