GEO 32/2026 brought several novelties that, on the day it was published in the Official Gazette, caught many people by surprise. Some, such as the digitalization of immigration procedures and the obligation to use the WorkinRomania.gov.ro portal, are welcome and long overdue. Others have stirred heated debate, such as the employer’s liability for the acts of third parties or the limitation of the right to defend oneself in court.

There is, however, one provision that is surprisingly little discussed, even though it can have very concrete consequences. It is Article 5, which requires Romanian companies to submit documents on the administrators and shareholders of the foreign entities that hold stakes in the employing company. First and foremost, the criminal record certificate, or its equivalent, issued by the country where these people reside.

At first glance, there is nothing to object to. The State wants to make sure that the right to bring in workers from outside the European Union goes to serious employers who comply with the law.

In reality, things are far more complicated. Think of a Romanian company that is part of an international group. The direct shareholder may be a Dutch company, itself owned by a Luxembourg holding, with an investment fund managed from London or New York at the top of the structure. For such a company, gathering the required documents is not a formality that can be sorted out in a week. It means months of correspondence, lawyers in several countries, certified translations, apostilles and many trips to institutions in different countries.

Hence a question that I believe deserves to be asked openly: does it make sense to tie a Romanian company’s right to hire foreigners to documents about people who have no connection to its day-to-day activity?

A lesson we have forgotten: the Register of Intra-Community Operators

Those with some experience in entrepreneurship or consulting will probably remember GEO 54/2010, which created the Register of Intra-Community Operators (ROI). At the time, companies that wanted to carry out operations within the Union had to file the criminal records of their associates and administrators. The stated purpose was to combat tax fraud. The result was different: extra bureaucracy and administrative difficulties for both companies and the tax authority (ANAF).

The business environment complained then about lost time, additional costs and blockages in day-to-day activity. In the end, the ROI was abolished. It was, in practice, an admission that the mechanism produced more paperwork than results.

The conclusion back then was simple and should have stuck: the more the State extends its checks beyond the Romanian company and starts examining the entire international shareholding structure, the more compliance costs grow, from month to month rather than from year to year.

Romania competes for investment with Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia. And investors do not look only at tax levels and labor costs. They also look at how easy or hard it is to do business in a country. That is why the authorities should honestly answer two questions. Do we want to verify the real risks presented by the Romanian employer, or do we want to turn the global shareholding structure into a new administrative obstacle? Do we want to control access to the labor market, or discourage investment?

How the success of GEO 32/2026 should be measured

The success of this ordinance will not be seen in the number of forms filed or the volume of documents collected. The real test is whether the State manages to keep a balance between security and flexibility, between control and competitiveness, between compliance and attractiveness for investment.

When procedures become too complicated precisely for the international groups that create jobs and bring capital to Romania, the administrative effort risks outweighing the benefits the legislator aimed for. The ROI experience has already shown us how excessive bureaucracy can produce exactly the opposite of the intended effect.

Investors can live with strict rules, but they accept unpredictability, inflated administrative costs and, above all, bureaucracy that turns compliance into an obstacle to business growth much less readily.