An international treaty on violence and harassment at work takes full legal effect in Costa Rica today. It applies to every workplace, from government ministries to small private businesses. The International Labour Organization’s Convention 190 widens what counts as harassment, stretches protection well beyond the office, and shifts the burden toward prevention rather than reaction after a complaint lands.
So what actually changes today? On paper, less than some headlines would suggest but in practice, potentially a great deal. The biggest shift is that a single incident can now be enough. Costa Rican courts long treated workplace harassment as a pattern of repeated conduct but the convention instead defines violence and harassment as unacceptable behavior or threats, whether they happen once or repeatedly, that aim at, cause or are likely to cause physical, psychological, sexual or economic harm.
The courts were already moving that way as the Supreme Court’s Second Chamber, which handles labor cases, dropped the requirement that harassment be repeated and accepted that one act can qualify. Cristhian Monge said employers can no longer assume a case requires repeated behavior. A single act, he said, may now carry legal weight depending on its nature and its effects.
The second change is where the rules apply. Protection now covers anything that happens during work, in connection with work, or as a result of it. That includes business trips, training sessions, work social events, rest areas and restrooms, housing provided by an employer, and the commute between home and work.
It also covers work-related messages sent through digital tools. A harassing WhatsApp message from a supervisor late at night falls inside the framework just as much as a comment made across a desk. The third change is who is protected. The convention reaches far beyond salaried staff in the public and private sectors. It also covers interns, apprentices, trainees, volunteers, job applicants and people whose employment has already ended, regardless of their contract status.
What the convention does not do matters just as much. It does not rewrite existing employment contracts, create new grounds for dismissal or replace current labor law, according to Daniel Valverde, a labor law partner at the firm Ecija. Valverde said its force is as an interpretive standard. The Ministry of Labor and Social Security and the courts can now use it as a reference when deciding specific cases.
Costa Rica still has no standalone law that comprehensively regulates workplace harassment in the public and private sectors. A bill to prevent and punish workplace harassment in both sectors was filed in the Legislative Assembly in August and remains under debate.
The Labor Ministry has confirmed the ratification but had not, as of yesterday, issued official guidelines on how the convention will work alongside existing national law. Sexual harassment is a separate matter. Law 7476, in force since 1995, already requires every employer to maintain an internal policy that prevents, discourages and punishes sexual harassment. Labor lawyers say that policy alone no longer covers the scope of the new standard.
Specialists disagree on how quickly employers face real consequences. José Edgardo Jiménez, a lawyer and accountant who advises small and medium-sized businesses, said that from today all employers should have harassment policies and procedures in place and documented.
According to Jiménez, a company found without them during a Labor Ministry inspection could be fined under Article 398 of the Labor Code. Those fines are calculated in base salaries and range from one to 23. A base salary is not anyone’s actual paycheck. It is a fixed reference amount, tied to the pay of an entry-level judicial clerk and updated each year, that Costa Rica uses to calculate fines and penalties.
Jiménez put one base salary at â‚¡462,200, which he said is the likely minimum for a first offense. Repeat offenders could face the maximum of 23, or roughly â‚¡10.6 million. Valverde, by contrast, said the convention’s taking effect does not by itself trigger an immediate regulatory change for each company. He and other specialists nonetheless advise employers to act now rather than wait for a case or an inspection.
If you run a business or manage staff, the advice from labor lawyers follows a similar path. Start by finding out what you already have, since many companies have codes of conduct that partly cover the issue. Update that language to reflect that one incident can count and adopt a general policy against violence and harassment rather than relying on a sexual harassment policy alone.
From there, the lawyers recommend assessing where risks exist in day-to-day operations, setting up clear and confidential complaint channels, and writing a straightforward protocol for investigating cases. They also advise protecting the people involved from retaliation, training managers and human resources staff, documenting every complaint and action taken, and telling employees plainly how the system works.
Labor Ministry inspectors already check whether companies have internal procedures for receiving and handling complaints, the lawyers noted. Óscar Corrales said the core message is prevention. Having a procedure to react to a complaint is not enough, he said; companies need to identify risks, train people, and review interactions that happen outside the office, including on digital platforms, during travel and at work events.
If you are an employee, the change is mainly in what can be raised and how seriously it may be weighed. A single serious incident, a message in a work chat or behavior at an off-site event can now form the basis of a complaint, either through your employer’s internal channel or before the Labor Ministry and the labor courts.
The convention arrives at full strength without a dedicated national harassment law or official ministry guidance in place. For now, the courts and the pending bill will do much of the work of deciding how far the new standard reaches.
