Employment law
Employee Administrative Files: the Complete List of Documents to Hold, Worker by Worker
It is 9.40 a.m. in the drying workshop. The labour inspector does not ask for the registers: he picks three names at random from the staff list and asks for their files. The first contains a contract signed but never endorsed. The second, an undated warning letter and no medical visit slip. The third is an empty folder. In three files, the company has just lost the proof of everything it claims to have done over six years.
1. What an employee file is actually for
Awa Sangaré is the administrative manager of Sahel Mangue, a mango-drying plant in Sikasso employing thirty-four permanent staff and around twenty seasonal workers during the campaign. She looks in the Labour Code for the chapter on employee files. There is none, and that is exactly what makes the subject difficult.
Sahel Mangue and the people named in this article are fictitious: their names serve only as examples.
No Malian text requires an “employee file” to be kept under that name. What the law requires is documents scattered across the Labour Code, the Social Welfare Code and their implementing decrees and orders. The individual file is where a well-organised company brings them together, worker by worker, and human resources practice groups them into four sections: the contract, marital and social status, performance and discipline, and medical status.
That file serves three purposes, and those three purposes govern its content.
First, it proves. Where a dismissal is challenged, it is for the employer to prove the existence of a legitimate ground. In economic dismissals, the burden of proving the ground and of showing that the order of dismissals was respected also lies with him. And a worker's signature on a document, even with the words “in full and final settlement”, never amounts to a waiver on his part.
Second, it answers. The labour inspector may require the production of any register or document whose keeping is prescribed by the law and its implementing texts. The National Social Welfare Institute's officers check declarations, affiliations and the documents supporting benefits on their side.
Third, it manages: calculating length of service, a bonus, a leave allowance or a severance payment, without having to reconstruct six years of history under pressure.
The one place where the Code mentions individual cards
One provision is an exception. A company that keeps individual cards containing all the particulars of the second booklet of the employer's register is exempt from keeping that booklet, provided each card is initialled by the worker concerned or, if he is illiterate, by his literate representative. In other words, a well-built individual file can lighten a collective obligation, but only if the card is initialled.
The most common mistake
Believing that a well-ordered individual file removes the need for registers. The individual file and the employer's register are two distinct obligations, based on different texts and penalised separately, as section 9 of this article recalls.
The file is not for filing. It is for proving, answering and calculating.
2. Section i: the original contract, signed and endorsed by all parties
The first document in the file is the original contract, signed by all parties and, where the law requires it, bearing the administration's endorsement. It is the original that stays with the employer, a copy being given to the worker: contracts subject to endorsement are moreover drawn up in four copies and written in French (Labour Code, article L.27).
When writing is mandatory
An employment contract is freely concluded and may be proved by any means. But writing becomes mandatory for the fixed-term contract, the probationary engagement, the apprenticeship contract, part-time work, labour-only subcontracting, temporary agency work, a contract requiring the worker to settle outside the locality where he lives, and the contract of any foreign worker. Without a written contract, a fixed-term contract is presumed to have been concluded for an indefinite term. See also our article on the fixed-term contract.
Filing and endorsement, which are not the same thing
Filing means lodging a copy with the labour inspectorate. It applies to fixed-term contracts of more than three months, before any performance begins; to apprenticeship contracts, on pain of reclassification as an open-ended contract; to training agreements; and to labour-only subcontracting contracts, sent without delay in two copies.
Endorsement is something else: it is the compliance check carried out by the labour administration before the contract produces its full effects. It applies to the contract of any foreign worker, submitted to the National Labour Directorate together with a work permit. The application falls on the employer, within fifteen days of the start of performance for contracts of six months or less, and thirty days beyond that. If the authority has not decided within fifteen days of receiving the application, endorsement is deemed granted; a refusal must give reasons.
In both cases, the proof (receipt, acknowledgement, endorsed copy) goes in the same sub-folder as the contract. Without it, you hold a contract, not a compliant contract.
| Document | When it is required | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| Original contract signed by all parties | Whenever writing is mandatory | Labour Code, articles L.21, L.30, L.7, L.133, L.26, L.91 and L.313 |
| Endorsed copy | Contract of a foreign worker | Articles L.26, L.28 and L.29 |
| Work permit | Foreign worker | Article L.26 |
| Proof of filing with the inspectorate | Fixed-term contract over 3 months, apprenticeship, training agreement, subcontracting | Articles L.21, L.7, L.12 and L.91 |
| Probationary engagement letter | Every probationary period, expressly stipulated in writing | Article L.30 |
| Signed amendments | Every substantial modification accepted | Article L.58 |
| Non-competition clause | Where stipulated: 6 months and 15 km at most | Article L.17 |
| Training reimbursement agreement | Training funded by the employer, minimum service of 4 years at most | Article L.12 |
| Certificate of deposit of the security | Where a security is required from the worker | Articles L.126 and L.127 |
The most common mistake
Giving the original to the worker and keeping a photocopy. The original signed by all parties is the document you will have to produce before the labour court; that is the one that must stay in the file. The other mistake is to file the contract without its proof of filing or endorsement: the contract then exists, but the company cannot show it completed the formality, and it is the formality that is penalised.
A contract with no proof of filing is a contract you cannot defend.
What you need to do
|
|---|
3. Section ii: marital and social status
Awa photocopied every worker's NINA card and stopped there. Yet each document in this section serves a precise purpose: establishing identity, justifying a classification, opening a social right, or protecting the company against an irregular recruitment.
The documents that establish identity and background
The worker's birth certificate and a copy of his valid identity document underpin the entries the employer's register requires: date of birth, identity card or NINA biometric card number with its place and country of issue, and nationality.
The curriculum vitae given at recruitment and certified copies of diplomas and completed training justify the worker's classification in the occupational hierarchy and his category, which must appear in the contract. They also protect the employer: distinctions, exclusions or preferences based on the qualifications required for a given job are not discrimination. A classification decision backed by a verified diploma can be defended; one with no supporting document cannot.
Certificates of employment from previous employers have a use many companies underestimate. The new employer is jointly liable for the loss caused to the previous employer where he hired a worker he knew to be already bound by an employment contract, or where he continued to employ him after learning of it. Asking for the last employer's certificate of employment means checking that the previous post was lawfully closed.
The documents concerning the family
The payment of benefits is subject to the prior formalities of affiliation and registration. Registration requires an application by the worker, made on a form issued by the Institute and accompanied by the supporting documents needed to verify the civil status of the beneficiary, his spouse and his children (Social Welfare Code, article 164). That process produces two numbers that must not be confused: the worker's registration number, which must appear in the first booklet of the employer's register, and the beneficiary number, which is used for paying family allowances.
A marriage certificate registered with the civil registry conditions the payment of family allowances for children born of the marriage. It is also one of the two documents required for suspension of the contract on grounds of widowhood, together with the spouse's death certificate.
Birth certificates of dependent children open three separate rights: family allowances, for each child in effective and permanent care aged over one and under fourteen; the additional working day of leave per year for each child registered with the civil registry who has not reached fifteen, granted to mothers; and the three days of birth leave for the salaried head of family.
Two further documents complete the family file because the Institute asks for them to check that the conditions for benefits are still met: the collective life certificate for the children, attesting that they are alive and dependent, and the school attendance certificate, since the child must be enrolled in a school and attend classes regularly. These documents expire: a file holding the 2021 certificate proves nothing in 2026.
The document with no legal basis that you must hold anyway
The address and telephone number of the person to contact in an emergency are required by no Malian text. But the employer must, as soon as an accident occurs, arrange first-aid care, notify the physician and, where appropriate, direct the victim to a medical centre. Looking for a family contact while an ambulance waits is not a management situation: it is an emergency. That line belongs in the file and must be updated every year.
| Document | What it establishes or opens | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| Worker's birth certificate | Date of birth entered in the register | Order no. 2024-4363 of 27 December 2024, article A.130.1 new |
| Copy of the valid identity document | Identity card or NINA number, place and country of issue, nationality | Same order |
| Curriculum vitae at recruitment | The background on which the classification rests | Labour Code, articles L.4 and L.27 |
| Certified copies of diplomas and training | The qualification justifying the occupational category | Articles L.4 and L.27 |
| Certificates of employment from previous employers | That the worker is no longer bound by an earlier contract | Articles L.56 and L.61 |
| INPS registration application and civil-status documents | Registration number and beneficiary number | Social Welfare Code, article 164 |
| Marriage certificate registered with the civil registry | Family allowances; widowhood leave | Social Welfare Code, article 23; Labour Code, article L.34 |
| Birth certificates of dependent children | Family allowances; mothers' additional leave; birth leave | Social Welfare Code, articles 23, 24 and 33; Labour Code, article L.155 |
| Collective life certificate for the children | That the children are alive and effectively dependent | Social Welfare Code, articles 24 and 164 |
| School attendance certificate | The schooling condition for dependent children | Social Welfare Code, article 24 |
| Father's written authorisation for a minor | Validity of the contract | Labour Code, article L.14 |
| Duplicate of the “young worker” work card | Lawfulness of employing a child | Decree no. 2022-0125 of 4 March 2022, article D.189-33 new |
| Work permit and endorsement | Lawfulness of employing a foreign worker | Labour Code, article L.26 |
| Emergency contact address | No legal obligation; indispensable in practice | Social Welfare Code, article 72 |
What you must not collect
The Code prohibits any distinction, exclusion or preference based on race, colour, sex, religion, political opinion, national extraction or social origin, and expressly covers invalidity, disability, HIV and AIDS. It also forbids the employer from taking union membership or trade union activity into account in his decisions on hiring, promotion, pay or discipline.
Information you may not lawfully take into account has no reason to be in the file. Holding it means handing the worker written proof that you knew of it on the day a decision concerning him is challenged.
Each civil-status document opens a specific right. If it opens none, it does not belong in the file.
What you need to do
|
|---|
4. Section iii: the worker's performance and discipline
This is the least well understood section, because it mixes what the law requires with what good management recommends. Malian law organises neither an annual appraisal interview nor a rating system: no text requires them. But occupational aptitude is one of the statutory criteria establishing the order of economic dismissals, and the burden of proving the ground of any dismissal lies with the employer. A career that has left no written trace is a career you will not be able to rely on.
What documents performance
Periodic appraisal records, promotions and regradings obtained, and honorary distinctions form the written memory of the career. None of these documents is required by the Code, and that is precisely why they must be regular: a single appraisal produced in the month of a dismissal has no probative force. A series of annual appraisals does.
Promotions and regradings have a direct legal consequence: the worker's classification in the occupational hierarchy appears in the contract and in the second booklet of the employer's register, and every change of category is recorded by a signed amendment. The seniority bonus requires proof of continuous presence: three years to qualify, at 3% after three years, 5% after five years, then one further point per additional year up to 15%.
What documents training
Where the employer funds training or further training, he may stipulate that the worker will stay in his service for a minimum period commensurate with the cost, never exceeding four years. That agreement must be in writing and filed immediately with the labour inspectorate. A worker who fails to honour it reimburses the costs in proportion to the period not worked. Without writing and without filing, the undertaking is worth nothing.
Discipline, and its two absolute prohibitions
Internal rules set out the disciplinary rules; their content is limited to the technical organisation of work, discipline, health and safety requirements and the arrangements for paying wages. Disciplinary sanction records go in the file, dated and notified. Two limits apply to any sanction.
The first: the employer is forbidden to impose fines. The prohibition appears twice in the Code, in the chapter on internal rules and in the chapter on deductions from wages. A disciplinary deduction is therefore unlawful, whatever its amount and whatever the misconduct.
The second: a disciplinary lay-off may not exceed eight days. It is a case of suspension of the contract, and it is unpaid.
Dismissal, and the documents that make it defensible
Every employer who wishes to dismiss a worker must inform the district labour inspector by registered letter setting out the particulars of the worker, of the employer and of the ground for dismissal; the inspector has fifteen days to give an opinion (Labour Code, article L.40). Termination itself requires notice given in writing, and the notification must state the ground.
If the dismissal is well founded on the merits but is given without written notification or without stating the ground, the court must award the worker compensation for the procedural defect, which may not exceed one month of his gross salary. The penalty on the merits is far heavier, but the penalty on form is automatic. See also our article on dismissal.
Staff delegates are a case apart: the labour inspector's authorisation is required before any dismissal of a delegate, whether a full member or a substitute. Failure to reply within fifteen days of the application amounts to authorisation, unless the inspector considers an expert opinion necessary, in which case the period rises to thirty days and the employer must be told in writing before the first fifteen days expire. Any dismissal without that authorisation is void as of right and the delegate is reinstated.
| Document | What it allows | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| Periodic appraisal records | Establishing occupational aptitude, a criterion in the order of economic dismissals | Labour Code, articles L.48 and L.51 |
| Promotions and regradings obtained | Justifying the category and salary applied | Articles L.27 and L.58 |
| Honorary distinctions obtained | No legal obligation; documenting the career | Management practice |
| Evidence of continuous presence | Calculating the seniority bonus | Article L.97 |
| Training agreement in writing and filed | Relying on the service undertaking of 4 years at most | Article L.12 |
| Certificate of occupational qualification | Evidencing the end of an apprenticeship | Article L.8 |
| Dated disciplinary sanction records | Establishing the disciplinary record; never a fine | Articles L.64, L.69 and L.121 |
| Lay-off decision | Suspending the contract, 8 days at most, unpaid | Articles L.34 and L.38 |
| Registration and beneficiary numbers | Linking the worker to his social rights | Social Welfare Code, article 164 |
| Copy of the letter to the labour inspector | Proving the prior notification before dismissal | Labour Code, article L.40 |
| Notice letter stating the ground | Avoiding compensation for procedural defect | Articles L.41, L.43 and L.52 |
| Labour inspector's authorisation | Dismissing a staff delegate without nullity | Article L.277 |
The most common mistake
Sanctioning by a deduction from wages. That is the fine the Code prohibits twice, and it turns the worker's misconduct into the employer's offence. The other classic mistake is to rely on a French-style intermediate fault: that notion does not exist in Malian law. The Code knows only gross misconduct, left to the assessment of the competent court, and it alone allows termination without notice.
Fines are forbidden. Lay-off stops at eight days. And there is no intermediate fault in Malian law.
What you need to do
|
|---|
5. Section iv: medical status
This is where companies most often go wrong, and in both directions: too many documents, or none at all. Every worker must undergo a medical examination before being hired or, at the latest, before the end of the probationary period. After that examination, the occupational physician draws up three documents (Social Welfare Code, article 43).
Only one comes back to the employer: the medical visit slip, which must be kept so that it can be shown to the labour inspector or the medical labour inspector. The medical record stays with the physician, under medical confidentiality and with the file held inviolable. The third slip is given to the worker, at his request or when he leaves the company.
The visits that follow hiring
All workers must undergo a medical examination at least once a year; those under eighteen every three months. Special monitoring applies to workers exposed to any dangerous work, to pregnant women, to mothers of a child under two, and to the disabled and the invalid, the physician remaining the judge of how often they are examined.
A return-to-work examination is mandatory after an absence for occupational disease, after an absence of more than three weeks for non-occupational sickness, or where repeated absences total more than fifteen days in a half-year. Each of those visits produces a slip, and each slip goes into the file.
Medical rest certificates
Rest certificates issued by the physician justify absences and govern compensation. Absence for non-occupational sickness or accident certified by a medical certificate suspends the contract for a period limited to six months, extended until the worker is replaced, and compensation falls on the employer according to the worker's length of service.
Those certificates evidence the length of the absence: that length is what you file, and nothing else. A certificate stating a diagnosis is not to be copied, summarised or commented on in the file.
Industrial accidents and occupational diseases
Here the rule is reversed: the employer lawfully holds precise information about the accident, because he is the one who declares it. The declaration states the place, the cause, the circumstances and the probable consequences of the accident, as well as the victim's identity and occupational category.
The employer must declare immediately, and at the latest within forty-eight hours, every industrial accident or occupational disease found in the company. The declaration is made in four copies on the Institute's official forms: one copy to INPS, two to the regional labour inspectorate or to the head of the administrative district, and the fourth filed in the employer's own records, available on request.
If the victim has not returned to work within three days, the employer requests a medical certificate stating his condition, the consequences of the accident and the probable length of incapacity; one copy comes to him. A final descriptive certificate is issued on recovery or consolidation, with the same distribution. The employer also gives the victim, his beneficiaries or the physician an accident booklet containing the documents to be completed.
On the full regime of industrial accidents, the benefits paid and the protection of the victim's job, see our article Industrial accidents: regime, benefits and job protection.
| Document | When | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| Pre-employment medical visit slip | Before hiring or before the end of probation | Social Welfare Code, article 43 |
| Periodic medical visit slips | Once a year, every 3 months under 18 | Article 44 |
| Return-to-work visit slip | After occupational disease, absence over 3 weeks, or repeated absences over 15 days per half-year | Article 45 |
| Medical rest certificates issued by the physician | At every period of sick leave | Labour Code, article L.34; compensation, article L.37 |
| Accident declaration, 4th copy | Within 48 hours: place, cause, circumstances, probable consequences | Social Welfare Code, article 71; Labour Code, article L.176 |
| Accident medical certificate, 4th copy | If the victim has not returned within 3 days: condition and probable length of incapacity | Article 73 |
| Final descriptive certificate | On recovery or consolidation | Article 74 |
| Accident booklet | Issued by the employer to the victim or the physician | Article 75 |
| Medical record | Never in the administrative file | Article 43: it is held by the physician |
The most common mistake
Asking the occupational physician for the worker's medical record, or building an internal sheet summarising a worker's illnesses. What you must be able to produce is fitness for the job, the dates of absence and, for industrial accidents and occupational diseases only, the particulars the official declaration requires. Everything else is covered by medical confidentiality.
Of ordinary sickness you keep only the dates. Of an industrial accident you keep the declaration.
What you need to do
|
|---|
6. Section v: pay, working time and absences
The four sections above cover the person. One is missing, which practice tends to leave with the accountant and which the inspector nonetheless asks to see in the file: the one that documents money and time.
The employer gives the worker, at the time of payment, an individual payslip. That payslip carries, among other things, the worker's serial number in the employer's register: it is the thread linking the individual file to the collective register. Keeping a duplicate of every payslip is not expressly required, but a company that keeps none deprives itself of the simplest way of reconstructing twelve months of remuneration, and it is on that remuneration that the leave allowance and the severance payment are calculated.
Deductions deserve particular attention. No deduction may be made other than those provided for by the Code: compulsory tax and social levies, reimbursements for benefits in kind, payments provided for by collective agreements, and deductions arising from an attachment order or from a voluntary assignment made in the lawful form. Each requires a supporting document in the file: the attachment order, the assignment deed, the worker's written request for a union subscription.
On working time, part-time workers' contracts must be in writing and operating individualised working hours requires prior notification to the competent labour inspector. Overtime records justify the increases shown on the payslip. Leave requests, dates taken and the allowance calculation make it possible to reconstruct a balance the worker may claim for three years.
| Document | What it evidences | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| Duplicate payslips | The remuneration paid and the register serial number | Labour Code, articles L.104 and L.105 |
| Attachment orders or assignment deeds | Any deduction other than tax or social | Articles L.121 to L.124 |
| Written part-time contract | The reduced hours and proportionate pay | Article L.133 |
| Overtime records | The increases shown on the payslip | Article L.137 |
| Leave requests, dates and allowance calculation | The leave balance and the allowance paid | Articles L.157 and L.161 |
| Evidence of family events | Exceptional permissions, up to 10 days | Article L.146 |
| Travel and transport tickets issued | Costs borne, claimable for 2 years | Articles L.164 and L.169 |
The most common mistake
Treating the payroll software as the archive. A computerised file or listing may indeed replace the payment register, but on three conditions: reproducing all the mandatory particulars without risk of alteration, being presented in the same conditions and kept for the same period, and being validated by the competent authority, INSTAT. An unvalidated office export meets none of them.
Software calculates. It only proves once it has been validated.
What you need to do
|
|---|
7. Section vi: the departure documents
The file does not close on the day of departure: that is precisely when it is most needed, because most disputes arise from termination.
A worker who resigns must notify his decision to the employer in writing, and the employer may not presume a worker's resignation. A worker who stops coming has therefore not resigned: treating his absence as a resignation exposes the company to having the termination reclassified as a dismissal, with all that follows.
Where the termination is by mutual agreement, it takes the form of a protocol freely signed by both parties, a copy of which is sent to the district labour inspectorate, and the departure payment may in no case be lower than the statutory severance payment.
Where it is economic, the file must contain the list of workers communicated in writing to the staff delegates with the criteria used, the minutes of the meeting held within eight days, and proof that both documents were communicated to the labour inspector. A worker dismissed on economic grounds receives, in addition to notice and any severance payment, a special non-taxable payment equal to one month of gross salary, and enjoys priority for re-employment in the same category for two years. On calculating the payments, see our article on the severance payment.
The certificate of employment, and its four particulars
On expiry of the contract, the employer must give the worker, when he finally leaves, a certificate stating exclusively the date of his entry, the date of his departure, the nature and dates of the jobs successively held, and his occupational classification category (Labour Code, article L.61). The word “exclusively” is in the text. Adding an appraisal, a reason for leaving or an unfavourable comment exposes the employer to damages, just as refusing to issue the certificate or providing tendentious or erroneous information does. Where delivery is impossible because of the worker, the certificate is held at his disposal.
Finally, the words “in full and final settlement” cannot be relied on against the worker. A signed receipt therefore does not close the file: it simply becomes part of it.
| Document | When | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| Written letter of resignation | Departure at the worker's initiative; never presumed | Labour Code, article L.40 |
| Copy of the letter to the labour inspector | Before any dismissal | Article L.40 |
| Notice letter stating the ground | Dismissal and resignation | Articles L.41 and L.43 |
| Mutual termination protocol | Termination by agreement, copy to the inspectorate | Article L.50 bis |
| List, delegates' minutes and notification to the inspector | Economic dismissal | Article L.48 |
| Statement of payments due | Severance, long service, retirement | Articles L.53, L.54 and L.55 |
| Copy of the certificate of employment issued | Final departure, whatever its cause | Article L.61 |
| Movement declaration to INPS | Within 8 days of the end of employment | Social Welfare Code, article 163 |
The most common mistake
Assuming that a worker absent for three weeks has resigned. The employer may not presume resignation; he must start the dismissal procedure, with notification to the labour inspector and written notice of the ground. The second mistake is forgetting the departure movement declaration to INPS, whose eight-day period runs just as it does for arrivals.
A worker who does not come back has not resigned.
What you need to do
|
|---|
8. How to file: one folder per worker, one sub-folder per section
A complete but disordered file is barely better than an empty one. When the inspector asks for a worker's medical visit slip, he does not allow half an hour to look for it.
The simplest method comes down to one rule: one folder per worker, and inside it one sub-folder per section, each sub-folder carrying the same colour and the same label from one file to the next. The contract always in the same colour, marital and social status in another, performance and discipline in a third, medical status in a fourth. Anyone opening the file of a worker they do not know finds the right document without reading a single label.
This has two effects. It makes an inspection quick, and therefore less risky. And it makes gaps visible: an empty sub-folder is spotted at a glance, whereas a missing document in a single bundle is never discovered before the day it is needed.
Three points of discipline complete the filing. Documents that expire (collective life certificate, school attendance certificate, identity document, emergency contact) call for an annual review. Medical documents stay in their sub-folder and do not circulate. And each file follows a checklist, the same for everyone, showing at any moment what is missing.
An empty sub-folder is visible. A missing document in a bundle never is.
What you need to do
|
|---|
9. What the individual file does not replace
A complete individual file removes no collective obligation. The employer must keep permanently up to date a register known as the employer's register, whose model is set by order and which comprises three booklets: the first for persons and contracts, the second for work done, pay and leave, the third reserved for the labour inspector's endorsements, formal notices and observations (Labour Code, article L.130).
That register must be numbered and initialled by the district labour inspector before use, kept at the place of operation, and separate for each establishment, except for establishments with fewer than ten workers located within twenty kilometres, which may keep a single one. Only its second booklet may be replaced by your individual cards, and only if they are initialled by the worker.
To that must be added the payment register, in which the particulars of every payslip are reproduced together with an accounting of absences broken down by cause, and three mandatory displays: the endorsed internal rules, in the hiring premises and at the workplace; the minimum wage rates, at the employer's office and at the places of payment; and the INPS notice on industrial accidents, in every workshop, site or workplace.
The most common mistake
Speaking of a “single staff register”. That phrase comes from French law and has no Malian equivalent. The Malian document is called the employer's register and consists of three booklets. The confusion leads companies to forget the third, precisely the one on which the inspector records his health and safety formal notices.
The file proves for one worker. The register proves for the whole company. Neither replaces the other.
What you need to do
|
|---|
10. Keeping, protecting, and what an incomplete file costs
The payment register, the employer's register and the individual cards standing in for the second booklet are kept for five years following the last entry made in them. The starting point is the last entry, not the worker's departure.
Three periods govern in practice how long the individual file should be kept: an action for payment of wages and salary accessories is time-barred after three years, an insured person's action for social benefits after two years, and the right to demand travel tickets lapses two years after employment ends. The Code sets no retention period for the documents in the file itself: aligning the whole file on five years after the end of the relationship comfortably covers those three periods, but it is a management precaution, not a legal obligation.
As for access, the labour inspector may require the production of any prescribed register or document, and he is bound by professional secrecy. The medical record stays with the physician. The Labour Code, however, organises no general right of access for the worker to his own administrative file: several procedure templates circulating in Mali reproduce a foreign rule here that has no local equivalent.
The price of missing documents
Breaches of the payslip and employer's register rules are punishable by a fine of XOF 20,000 to 50,000 and imprisonment of fifteen days to three months, or by only one of those two penalties. For the employer's register, the fine applies as many times as there are omitted or erroneous entries (Labour Code, article L.319). Alongside this criminal route, the inspector collects directly flat-rate police fines whose rates were set by the order of 27 December 2024: XOF 18,000 for breaches of articles L.20, L.26, L.48, L.78 and L.130, and XOF 7,500 for breaches of articles L.7 and L.8.
Other failings in the file carry their own price: XOF 50,000 to 200,000 for the absence of a certificate of employment or of internal rules; XOF 10,000 to 50,000 for breaches of the rules on fixed-term contracts, endorsement and its particulars; XOF 20,000 to 50,000 for failure to file the hiring declaration under the placement rules.
Example. Back to Sahel Mangue on the morning of the inspection.
- Workers whose entry in the first booklet is incomplete: 12
- Missing particulars per worker, namely date of birth, NINA number and INPS affiliation number: 3
- Omitted entries: 12 × 3 = 36
- Flat-rate fine per omitted entry: XOF 18,000
- Total for the register: 36 × 18,000 = XOF 648,000
- To which is added, for the three files opened by the inspector, the missing medical visit slip and the missing proof of endorsement, each falling under its own text
If the matter goes before the labour court instead of being settled by the flat-rate fine, the same 36 omitted entries may each carry a fine of XOF 20,000 to 50,000, the total not being allowed to exceed fifty times the maximum rate, i.e. XOF 2,500,000. And the head of the undertaking remains civilly liable for sentences passed on his authorised agents or employees: delegating the keeping of files does not move the final responsibility.
What the file does not contain is what the company will not be able to prove.
What you need to do
|
|---|
A closer look: what the order of 27 December 2024 changed
Order no. 2024-4363/MTFPDS-SG of 27 December 2024, amending order no. 96-1566 of 7 October 1996 on the implementing arrangements for certain provisions of the Labour Code, tightened the employer's register rules on three points (our presentation of the order).
First, it sets out the exact list of particulars for each booklet. The first requires the identity card or NINA biometric card number, with its place and country of issue, together with the INPS affiliation number: two entries that a register opened before 2025 does not necessarily contain, and which presuppose holding the corresponding documents in each worker's file.
Second, it requires the register to be kept at the place of operation and to be numbered and initialled by the district labour inspector prior to use.
Third, it sets the rates of the flat-rate police fines that the inspector collects directly, without going through the court. That is what makes an inspection immediately expensive: the fine is payable on the spot, without waiting for a court decision.
Key takeaways in 6 points
- File first the original contract signed and endorsed by all parties, together with the proof of its filing with the labour inspectorate.
- Gather the complete marital and social status: birth certificate, identity document, curriculum vitae, certified diplomas, previous employers' certificates, marriage certificate, children's birth certificates, collective life certificate, school attendance certificate and emergency contact.
- Document the career through regular appraisals, regrading amendments and dated sanctions, never imposing a fine nor exceeding eight days of lay-off.
- From medical status keep only the visit slips, the rest certificates and the employer's copies of accident declarations, never the medical record.
- Add pay, working time and the departure documents, which the inspector asks for just as readily.
- File each section in a sub-folder of the same colour and label across every worker, and keep in parallel the employer's register and the payment register.