Concept of Domestic Employee

The workers included within the field of application of the Special Regime for Domestic Employees are those who devote themselves to exclusively domestic services for one or several heads of household, provided that these services are rendered at the house where the head of household resides and that they receive a wage or compensation of any type. It includes childcare, gardening, driving of vehicles, and other analogous work provided that it is performed as part of the set of domestic tasks.

Classification within this Special Regime shall depend on the number of hours worked and on whether there is one single employer or several, in accordance with the following:

- Permanent domestic employees: are those who render services for a single head of household for 80 hours or more of effective work per month.

- Intermittent domestic employees: are those who render services for one or several heads of household, partially or intermittently, for a minimum of 72 hours of effective work per month, which must be performed during a minimum of 12 days in said month.

UP

Who are included?

This Special Regime shall include as domestic employees all workers, whatever their sex and marital status, who meet the following requirements:

• Over 16 years of age.
• They render exclusively domestic services for one or several heads of household, or a group of persons who, while not constituting a family, cohabit in the same household with such family character. 
• These services are rendered at the house where the head of household and the other persons who make up the household reside.
• They receive a wage or compensation of whatever type for this service.

Spanish domestic employees who reside abroad, at the service of State diplomatic and consular representatives and civil servants, officially posted outside of Spain, may apply for inclusion within this Special Regime, which shall be granted as long as they fulfil the remaining requirements.

UP

Who are excluded?

• Relatives of the head of household by consanguinity or affinity up to the second degree, except for female relatives of celibate priests who live with them.
• Legally or de facto adopted or foster children.
• Persons who render friendly, benevolent, or good-neighbourly services.
• Motor vehicles drivers at the service of private persons, and persons rendering gardening and childcare services when such activities do not form a part of the set of domestic tasks.

UP