Is the hotel general manager the employer's representative? Appointment and liability

An employer's representative (işveren vekili) is a person who acts for the employer and takes part in managing the work, the workplace or the business. Under Labour Law No. 4857 Article 2 the employer is directly responsible for what that person does, and the Law's duties apply to the representative as well.

A general manager signs the payroll instruction, hires a seasonal receptionist and initials the safety instruction sheet. Months later a workplace accident or an unpaid premium file lands on a desk, and the first question is not what the contract said but who was acting for the employer. This article explains how the employer representative Türkiye labor law framework defines the role, who counts in a hotel, what an appointment letter settles and what it cannot move. After reading it, you will be able to document the arrangement in your own hotel, or ask for the right papers before you sign anything.

What does the law mean by işveren vekili?#

It means a person who acts on the employer's behalf and takes part in managing the work, the workplace or the business. Three statutes define it, and they do not use identical words.

Labour Law No. 4857 Article 2 (opens in a new tab) (Resmî Gazete 10 June 2003, No. 25134) sets two conditions together: acting on the employer's behalf, and taking part in managing the work, the workplace and the business. A title alone does not satisfy either. The same article says the employer is directly responsible for what the representative does, and for the obligations the representative takes on towards workers in that capacity. Every responsibility and obligation the Law sets for the employer also applies to the representative.

The article adds a protection that managers often miss: being a representative does not take away the rights and obligations the person has as a worker. Article 1 applies the Law to employers, employer's representatives and workers in the workplaces it covers.

The other two statutes use different wording. Law No. 5510 Article 12 (opens in a new tab) uses a narrower test: the person who manages the whole of the work or service on the employer's behalf and account. A department head who directs part of the operation may sit inside Article 2 and outside Article 12. Law No. 6331 Article 3(2) (opens in a new tab) is the broadest in effect: representatives who act for the employer and take part in managing the work and the workplace count as the employer for the purposes of that Law.

The practical consequence is that one person can be inside one statute and outside another. Whether a given role falls under a given article is a legal question, not an organisational one. This article covers the appointment and the liability only; what a general manager does day to day belongs to a separate piece on the job itself.

Each entry cites the Mevzuat Bilgi Sistemi consolidated text, 7 November 2026.

Who counts as an employer's representative in a hotel?#

Anyone who acts for the employer and takes part in managing the work or the workplace, whatever the job title says. In a hotel that usually reaches further down than owners expect.

The general manager almost always falls inside: hiring and dismissal proposals, rosters, purchase approvals, the daily operations meeting and the instruction sheets all point the same way. An HR manager who runs contracts, discipline and payroll instructions is a strong candidate, and so is a department head who decides who works which shift and how the work is done. If you are building your hotel organisation chart, mark these roles explicitly rather than leaving them implied.

Two cases trip hotels up. A contractor's site manager, for outsourced housekeeping or security, acts for the contractor: that person is not the hotel's representative, and the hotel is not that person's employer, but the hotel's own duties towards its own staff do not move because of the contract. An owner who sits on the board of the operating company is reached through a different route, the manager wording in Law No. 5510 Article 88, whether or not an appointment letter exists.

The test to apply is behavioural: does the person direct work, decide who works and when, commit the business to a supplier, or sign what goes to a public body? Write the answer down for each role. The organisation chart is evidence of the arrangement, not proof of it; a chart that shows a role as advisory while the person signs dismissals will not persuade anyone. Where a role is borderline, treat it as borderline in writing: name the person as a representative for the areas they really control, and say who holds the rest.

Two or more yes answers means the role needs a written appointment or a written explanation of why not. File the answers with the letter.

What does the appointment letter record, and what can it not move?#

It records who acts for the employer, in which areas and within which limits. It does not create the role, and it cannot reduce what the statutes say.

Searches for an "işveren vekili atama yönetmeliği" turn up nothing in the sources checked. No regulation by that name was found, and the duties come from the three statutes themselves. Say that plainly to anyone who asks for the regulation.

The letter should carry the person's name, the date it takes effect, the areas of authority (hiring, dismissal, payroll, safety, signing), the money and contract limits, who else holds the same authority, and how it is revoked. It cannot move the employer's direct responsibility under Law No. 4857 Article 2, cannot remove joint and several liability under Law No. 5510 Article 12, and cannot take the person out of Law No. 6331 Article 3(2). What it does do is fix the evidence: after an incident, the letter shows what the person was authorised to decide and what was reserved to someone else.

Keep the original in the personnel file and give the person a copy. A representative who cannot show the letter is relying on memory. Have a lawyer read the draft against the three articles before signature; the letter is short, and the reading is cheap compared with the argument it prevents.

Premiums and SGK: what does the text say about joint liability?#

Law No. 5510 Article 12 makes the employer's representative jointly and severally liable with the employer for the employer's obligations under that Law, and Article 88 separately reaches the senior managers and board members of a company for unpaid premiums.

Article 12 defines the representative as the person who manages the whole of the work or service on the employer's behalf and account, states that the word "employer" in the Law includes the representative, and makes the two jointly and severally liable. The same article names self-employed accountants and certified public accountants authorised by written contract, jointly and severally liable where the monthly withholding and premium return sent to SGK electronically does not match the books, records and supporting documents. Someone signs that return: know who, and know what they check before signing.

Article 88 works from the other direction. Where premiums and other receivables are not paid within the periods the Law sets and without a valid reason, the senior managers or authorised persons of employers that are legal persons, company board members included, and their legal representatives are jointly and severally liable to SGK together with the employer. These are two routes, not one: a person can be a representative under Article 12 and a senior manager under Article 88 at the same time, and the two are assessed on different wording.

Joint and several liability means SGK may pursue the person for the debt alongside the employer. It does not mean the debt is paid twice. Nothing in these articles lets a private contract between owner and manager change the position towards SGK or towards a worker; how the parties settle matters between themselves afterwards is a separate legal question for a lawyer.

Occupational safety: what does an employer's representative carry?#

Under Law No. 6331 Article 3(2), representatives who act for the employer and take part in managing the work and the workplace count as the employer for the purposes of that Law.

The scope is wide: Article 2(1) covers all public and private work and workplaces, their employers and employer's representatives, and all employees including apprentices and interns. Article 3(1)(ğ) defines the employer as the natural or legal person, or the body without legal personality, that employs employees. Who employs answers the employer question; who runs the building does not.

Read together, the two provisions put the representative inside the employer's duties rather than beside them. Which duty sits with which person in a given hotel is a legal question, and the answer is written in the safety organisation documents. What a general manager can do without legal training: know what those documents say about the hotel's hazard class, who the safety expert and workplace doctor are, and the time recorded for them, and know where the instruction and drill records are kept. Confirm what the law requires of your own facility with a legal adviser.

Ask for those documents in writing at the start, not after an accident. A representative who has never seen the safety file cannot show what they checked. After an accident, the record of who was appointed, what they were told and what they decided becomes the evidence. That record is built in quiet weeks, and a department-by-department safety checklist is a reasonable starting point.

In a leased or managed hotel, who is the employer?#

The employer is the person or company that employs the staff, which is not always the person who runs the hotel. The lease or management contract splits the commercial risk; it does not by itself decide the employment relationship.

Start from Law No. 6331 Article 3(1)(ğ): the employer is the one that employs employees. Then check whose name is on the employment contracts and the payroll. In an ordinary lease the operator usually employs the staff and the owner steps back from daily management, while keeping whatever the contract and the law place on the owner of the building. In a hasılat kirası or a management agreement, staff can stay on the owner's payroll while the operator directs the work. That is exactly the arrangement where representative questions surface, because the person giving the instructions and the person paying the wages are different. The choice between these structures is covered in more depth in our piece on leasing out a hotel in Türkiye.

Four checks settle most of it: whose name is on the employment contracts and payroll, who signs the SGK returns, who is named in the safety documents, and who signs the appointment letters. Whatever the structure, both sides should name their representatives in writing, with the areas each controls, and exchange the letters before the season starts. Have the lease or management agreement read by a lawyer together with the appointment letters; the two documents have to say the same thing about who directs staff.

What should a manager ask for in writing, on joining and on leaving?#

On joining, a dated appointment letter that names the areas of authority and their limits. On leaving, a dated revocation and a handover record.

On joining, ask for the letter, the list of who else holds the same authority, the safety documents naming you, and the name of the person who signs the payroll and the SGK premium return. Ask which of the three statutes the role is expected to fall under, and get the answer from a legal adviser rather than from the owner alone; the answer differs by article, as the table above shows. Keep a personal copy of everything you sign, dated. Memory is not a defence and a shared drive is not yours after you leave.

On leaving, ask for a written revocation with a date, a handover list signed by both sides, and a note of whether and how the change is reflected in the SGK records and the safety documents. Your adviser will tell you what notification is needed. Do not sign a blank, undated or backdated letter, and do not accept an oral appointment with the promise of paper later. The same list works in reverse for an owner: it is the shortest way to see whether the hotel's authority is actually documented.

What to do next#

Put the appointment in writing and have a legal adviser read it against Law No. 4857 Article 2, Law No. 5510 Articles 12 and 88 and Law No. 6331 Article 3. The three articles answer different questions: who acts for the employer, who answers for the premiums, and who stands in the employer's place on safety. One letter, read against all three, is what turns an oral arrangement into something a hotel, a manager and an owner can each defend.