Greece — Expat HR Country Guide 2026 (E-book, PDF + EPUB)

Description

A 2026 field manual for the two people on either side of a Greek offer letter: the professional working out what will be left after the Greek state has taken its share, and the employer reconciling a monthly gross figure with an annual total cost. It is built to answer one decision – whether a Greek move or a Greek hire works on the numbers – and then to get the sequence right, because in Greece almost every delay comes from doing the right things in the wrong order.

What’s inside

• Can you go, and on what basis. Law 5275/2026 and the single combined residence-and-work permit, the 90-day decision deadline, the E.4 quota route and the EUR 200 metaklisi, the E.1 EU Blue Card at 1.6 times the Greek average wage, the Z.13A tech visa and Z.15 talent visa, the Golden Visa thresholds of EUR 800,000 and EUR 400,000, and exactly what the blue receipt does and does not let you do.
• What you will be paid and what you will owe. The Article 5C 50 percent exemption, its five-of-six-years gatekeeper and the 2 July filing pivot; the 2026 scale with the 44 percent band pushed to EUR 60,000; the child and age sub-scales; e-EFKA at 13.37 and 21.79 percent to a ceiling of EUR 7,761.94; the 30 percent electronic-payment rule; and tekmarta, the imputed-income floor the exemption also shelters you from.
• The contract and your rights. The one-week and one-month information duties under Law 5053/2023, the six-month trial period, the 14-salary structure and the EUR 920 minimum from 1 April 2026, overwork at 20 percent against overtime at 40 within a 150-hour cap, the full notice and severance table to the 12-month ceiling, and the three formal conditions that make a dismissal valid.
• Landing. The AFM, the klidarithmos, the AMKA and the PAAYPA in the order they actually work; Q1 2026 Athens asking rents by district; the three-year minimum lease and the unregulated agency fee; the all-in monthly budget for a single professional and a family of four; and 2026-27 tuition at Byron College and ACS Athens with the extras nobody quotes.
• Hiring there. IKE against branch against EOR against direct non-resident registration; e-YMS incorporation and the e-EFKA employer certification that unlocks it; ERGANI II since 16 February 2026 and the EUR 10,500 undeclared-worker fine; the digital work card phases binding from 12 October and 16 November 2026; the APD and FMY calendar; and the worked total cost that lands 42 percent above a twelve-month budget.

Who it’s for

The relocating professional who has an offer in hand, or wants one, and needs to know what the monthly figure becomes after fourteen payments, 13.37 percent of contributions and a scale starting at 9 percent – and what Article 5C does to all of it for seven years. It covers the arrival sequence in the order the institutions require, the rent you will pay in the district you will want, the school fee that dominates a family budget, and the two or three decisions worth five figures each.

The employer – a founder opening a Greek entity, an HR lead adding a Greek headcount, a CFO approving the budget line. It gives the structure comparison, the registration path with its real timeline, the filing calendar across three authorities, the fine ladder with the amounts that are published and a clear note where they are not, and the loaded cost per head built up to the figure the group will actually book.

Format

PDF and EPUB, instant download, 2026 edition. Five chapters with an infographic apiece, figures current as at October 2026 and dated in the text, named against the Greek laws, decisions and portals they come from. This is general information rather than immigration, tax or legal advice: rules change and individual circumstances differ, so confirm your position with the relevant authority or a qualified adviser before acting.