The new Royal Decree-Law 8/2019, on urgent social protection measures and the fight against job insecurity  is giving a lot to talk about.

Among other things it says that “any system or medium, in paper or telematic support, will be valid, provided that it provides reliable, unmodifiable and non-manipulable information a posteriori, guaranteeing the traceability and reliable and invariable tracking of the day once it is registered”

To begin with, it is not my intention to enter to assess the merits of this law from a legal or labor point of view. I have always felt that it is necessary to control effective work, but not from the quantitative point of view of the hours, but from the qualitative work done and the results obtained. And this law clearly focuses on the first and not the second, which in my view is against excellence, meritocracy and the very labor flexibility and family conciliation that is supposedly sought also with that law. In short, as they say: “doctors have the Church” …

 

 

But aside from this, I want to focus on analyzing how this law will be implemented and sustained. And with that “how” I mean systems, both telematic and on paper. Something that has to implement ALL types of companies and for ALL types of workers (with a few exceptions). And when something is wanted to apply to EVERYONE, quickly (a period of 2 months has elapsed that has already expired) and without causing them to incur an important expense, they usually screw up …

Neither the “paper systems” nor almost any of the current “telematic systems” guarantee all that the law requires. And this can not be guaranteed since in all cases it is systems managed and controlled by the company itself, which could therefore manipulate the recorded information, a posteriori and at will. The law should have added the figure of a third certification and registration entity that is the one that has a copy of those records, certify them and their faith, thus ensuring that from the moment they occurred, they have not suffered any type of manipulation or subsequent modification. In addition, it should be required that telematic systems (and eliminate the possibility of paper, because it has not the slightest guarantee of anything that the law requires) go through a process of certification that certifies that they actually meet the requirements demanded by the law. But of course, all this means costs for the administration and for the companies, which would bring even more controversy to a law that already has it ….

Returning to the technical deficiencies of current systems, these can be resolved in different ways, but there is one in particular that would introduce innovation, transparency and decentralization to companies and especially to Public Administration: Blockchain.

Blockchain is something that IF could guarantee everything that the law requires: immutability, reliability and non-modifiability by NO ONE a posteriori, since it would act as an independent certifying entity and thanks to cryptography would give the immutability and reliability required. A public network that would provide the Administration, where companies would record all the time records of their employees, with full transparency and accessibility for all parties and with all the guarantees required by law.

And we are not talking about science fiction: there are already solutions of this type. iCommunity Labs already has a solution that precisely does this: it certifies and registers in a Blockchain any type of information (as in this case can be a time record), at the same time that can give traceability of that record and guarantee that it does not suffer manipulations . And who is responsible for all this? Blockchain technology itself, with which companies are “released” from that responsibility and are no longer suspected of possible manipulations, while giving employees full access to their records. And for companies it would be as simple as adding that layer of Blockchain technology to existing telematics systems that they already have, through integrations with the API of the product.

If you are interested in trying our demo, write to hello@icommunity.io, and we will inform you of everything.

By: Miguel Ángel Perez CEO-iCommunity