Notification deadline alert for energy relief packages beneficiaries in Germany

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Notification deadline alert for energy relief packages beneficiaries in Germany

Notification deadline alert for energy relief packages beneficiaries in Germany

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July 21, 2023

By July 31, 2023, according to the relevant laws, energy customers who, including affiliated companies, receive or expect to receive reliefs based on the German Strompreisbremsengesetz and/or the Wärme-/Gaspreisbremsengesetz exceeding an amount of €2 million (electricity, gas heat, and affiliated companies cumulated) shall notify the relevant authority (Prüfbehörde) about one of the following options:

Collective agreement or company agreement on job retention;
A statement explaining why a collective agreement or a company agreement has not been reached, plus a self-declaration that the company will retain at least 90 percent of jobs (full-time equivalents) by April 30, 2025, compared to January 1, 2023.

Without such a declaration, the maximum relief is capped at €2 million. A claw-back mechanism is in place.

Fun factor: the relevant authority has not been appointed yet, and the German Ministry of Climate and Economy takes the stand that the relevant information shall, for the time being, be sent by email to PwC as administrative aid (Verwaltungshelfer). In relation to the deadline of July 31, BMWK states in its FAQs to the price break acts declarations on job retentions (Section 29 (2) sentence 1 EWPBG and Section 37 (2) sentence 1 StromPBG) plus the relevant documentation and, if applicable, declarations to the prohibition of bonuses and dividends (Section 29a (6) EWPBG or Section 37a (6) StromPBG could be submitted by September 30, 2023 (BMWK FAQs: "no objections will be raised"), latest.

If you want to know more about the relief, the potential claw-back mechanism, how reliefs for gas and heat granted via landlords shall be considered, what the required collective agreement, company agreement / self-declaration should look like, and, very importantly, if there's flexibility in relation to the July 31 deadline, i.e., in particular if the extension of the deadline – in deviation from the language of the law – according to the FAQs of the BMWK is a risk-free option, feel free to reach out to our team – we know the answers.