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Every year at the end of May or beginning of June a Ministerial Order is published that states the regulations for drawing up the preliminary drafts for Social Security Budgets that must be sent to the General Directorate of Social Security Economic Organisation within 20 days of publication in the Official State Gazette.

The Ministry of Employment and Social Security integrates the preliminary draft budget of the Central Treasury for Social Security with those drawn up by the Management Bodies, Work-Related Injuries and Occupational Illnesses Mutual Funds, the preliminary drafts for budgets of other Institutions to draw up the preliminary draft budget of the Social Security System, that will be submitted to the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and from there onto the government so that they can approve it and include it in the General State Budget Proposal.

The proposal of the General State Budgets Bill, once approved by the Board of Ministers, shall be sent to the Spanish Parliament before 1 October of the year prior to the year it refers to. In conjunction with the Bill a number of explanatory reports must be included on the expenditure proposed and, among other documents, the accounts and balance sheet of the Social Security System for the previous year.

This documentation is justified by the fact that this Law is mixed as it combines a legislative and Government monitoring functions.

The Spanish Parliament will pass it as if it were another Law. First the Congress of Deputies will vote on its general approval or the amendments to it presented by parliamentary groups, which if successful mean the full text is returned to the government. After this process, the partial amendments are studied, the capacity of which to modify the text is subject to not altering the budget balance, first by the existing committees and then before a full Parliament. Once it is approved in this chamber, it passes to the Senate, where it is read for a second time. The parliamentary groups use this opportunity to introduce amendments that they were unable to propose in the previous stage, although taking into account that the possibilities for change are very limited. Having been approved in the Senate, it goes back to Parliament for a final vote and approval of the definitive text.

This process must be concluded, including the publication of the text in the Official State Gazette before 31 December. Should this not be possible, the General Budget Law establishes the automatic extension of the time-limit for the initial budgets of the previous financial year.