In brief
- A young person who has left the special protection system can claim 3,168 lei a month, whenever they left. Until now the procedure recognised only those who signed a waiver of the protection measure and left the system at that moment. From 16 September 2026 the right belongs to any young person under 26 who has left the system and who proves that they are following a form of education provided for by law or that they have a job. The amount is 4.8 times the social reference indicator, and the indicator stands at 660 lei.
- The money can also be claimed for the past, starting on 10 April 2026, but only if the application reaches the payments agency within 60 working days. The period runs from 16 September 2026 and ends on 9 December 2026 if only Saturdays and Sundays are deducted, or on 11 December 2026 if the public holidays of 30 November and 1 December are deducted as well. Anyone who applies later receives the allowance only from the month of the application, with nothing for the months that have passed.
- The „full-time education” condition disappears from the whole procedure and is replaced by „a form of education provided for by law”. The change concerns not only young people on the allowance but also the families, relatives, guardians and professional foster carers raising a child in placement: the monthly placement allowance of 1,193.28 lei and the monthly support allowance of 528 lei can be kept after the age of 18 for a young person enrolled in evening classes, in part-time education or in distance learning.
Published: Official Gazette of Romania (Monitorul Oficial) no. 787 of 16 September 2026
In force from: 16 September 2026, the date of publication; payment is made retroactively from 10 April 2026 for applications lodged within 60 working days
The Ministry of Labour has rewritten the procedure under which the money for children in placement and for young people leaving the special protection system is paid, and the biggest change concerns young people who left the system long ago: they can now claim an allowance of 3,168 lei a month, with payment starting on 10 April 2026. The mechanism resembles the one used for support for people leaving residential centres for persons with disabilities, where those who left in the meantime are paid retroactively: the right has existed in the law for months, the implementing act arrives later and recovers the time that has passed.
The act is an amending order, not a new procedure. It acts on Order no. 1.733/2015, published in Official Gazette of Romania no. 680 of 8 September 2015, whose annex contains the full procedure. The order has three articles: Article I makes fifteen amendments to the procedure, Article II governs the transitional period and payment for the past, and Article III orders publication. It was signed on 14 September 2026 by Silvia Monica Dinică, State Secretary, for the acting minister.
The direct legal basis is Article II of Law no. 49/2026 supplementing Article 129 of Law no. 272/2004, published in Official Gazette of Romania no. 282 of 7 April 2026 and in force since 10 April 2026. The law added a short paragraph, (45), with a large effect: the allowances for young people leaving the protection system „are established as a form of State protection granted to all young people, without discrimination”, and they are due to every young person under 26 who has left the system and meets the conditions. Before this law, anyone who had left the system before the right came into being was left without it.
What it changes in practice
A second category of beneficiaries appears. Article 171 of the procedure now has two points. Point (a) covers young people with full legal capacity who opt in writing for the ending of the special protection measure, that is, the situation regulated since 2022. Point (b) covers „young people who have left the special protection system”, with no further condition about the moment. A 24-year-old who left a residential centre at 19 and is working today is entitled to the allowance, even though in 2021 there was nothing to claim.
The file is lighter for the new beneficiaries. Young people under point (b) do not have to produce the counselling and information report drawn up by the general directorate for social assistance and child protection, because they have nothing left to waive: the protection measure ended long ago. Article 172(8) expressly exempts them from that report, but still asks for the remaining supporting documents: identity papers, the certificate from the general directorate on whose records they were held and, where applicable, the certificate from the school or from the employer.
The date from which the money is paid depends on a single date in the calendar. The general rule, in Article 172(9), is that the right is granted from the month in which the application is lodged. Article II of the order creates an exception for the transitional window: an application lodged within 60 working days of 16 September 2026 brings the money from 10 April 2026, provided that on that date the young person met the statutory conditions. For May, June, July, August, September, October and November 2026, seven full months, the arrears come to 22,176 lei, on top of which come the part for April and the following months.
A change of circumstances occurring in the meantime no longer wipes out the past. Under Article II(2), the allowance is established from 10 April 2026 „without a subsequent change in the beneficiary’s situation leading to the loss of the rights relating to the period in which he or she met the statutory conditions”. In practice, a young person who worked from April to July and then lost the job keeps the money for those months.
The form of education no longer matters. In seven of the fifteen points of Article I, the phrase „full-time education” is replaced by „a form of education provided for by law”. The effect shows in Article 9, which deals with the placement allowance, in Articles 11, 15 and 16, which concern the documents and the suspension of payment, and in Articles 171, 172 and 175, which concern the allowance for young people. A student in evening classes or in distance learning now clearly falls under the same rules as a full-time student.
What has changed compared with the previous situation
The 2015 procedure said nothing about young people leaving the system. It dealt only with the monthly placement allowance, and the title of the act was „approving the Procedure for establishing and paying the monthly placement allowance”. The support allowance and the allowance for young people entered the procedure only through the joint order of the Minister of Labour and Social Solidarity no. 1.954/2022 and of the Minister of Family, Youth and Equal Opportunities no. 20.868/2022, published in Official Gazette of Romania no. 1.044 of 28 October 2022, which introduced Articles 171 to 175, the application form in Annex no. 3 and the counselling report in Annex no. 4.
Compared with the 2022 version, the present order shifts the centre of gravity. In 2022, Article 171(1) said that the allowance is granted to young people who prove that they are following „a form of full-time education” or have a job „and who opt, in writing, for the ending of the special protection measure”. The written option was a condition of access. In the new version the written option remains only under point (a), as one of the two routes, while point (b) does not ask for it at all.
The list of documents has changed in the same way. In 2022, Article 172(1) required „an application and a declaration on the young person’s own responsibility that he or she has been counselled and informed”. The new version keeps that requirement only for young people under point (a) and puts it more simply, as „an application accompanied by the supporting documents”. The application can still be lodged electronically or on paper, with the county agency for payments and social inspection or with the agency of Bucharest.
The annexes change as well: Annex no. 3 to the procedure, that is, the application form, is replaced in full; a new annex appears, Annex no. 3a, with an application form without the declaration on counselling; and Annex no. 4, the counselling report, is replaced too. The new report refers explicitly to the allowance „amounting to 4.8 ISR until the age of 26 is reached”, a figure that appears nowhere in the body of the procedure, only in the law.
The amounts are not set by this order and are not changed by it. They come from Law no. 272/2004: the monthly placement allowance is 1.808 times the social reference indicator, under Article 128(1); the monthly support allowance for the person or family raising the child is 0.8 ISR, under Article 128(21), and the professional foster carer does not receive it; the monthly allowance for young people is 4.8 ISR, under Article 129(42). The social reference indicator stands at 660 lei and was kept at that value for 2026 as well by Law no. 141/2025 on certain fiscal and budgetary measures, so the three amounts are 1,193.28 lei, 528 lei and 3,168 lei.
Advantages and disadvantages
What it improves
- A right recognised by law since 10 April 2026 finally becomes claimable. With no form and no procedure, the payments agencies had nothing to lean on in order to register applications from young people who had already left the system.
- Retroactive payment is not lost through the administration’s delay. Lodged inside the 60-working-day window, the application brings the money from the date the law entered into force, not from the date the ministry found time to write the procedure.
- Dropping „full-time education” aligns the procedure with the law and with the reality of students who work. Young people from the protection system often enrol in evening classes or part-time education precisely because they work, and the old wording could leave them without the right.
- The allowance for young people is not taxed and bears no social contributions, under Article 22 of the procedure, so the 3,168 lei reach the beneficiary in full.
- The effects extend to foster families and guardians as well: the allowance and the support allowance can be kept after the age of 18 for a young person who continues studying in any form provided for by law, not only full time.
What remains a problem
- The retroactive payment window is short and is announced nowhere. Anyone who learns of the right in January 2027 loses the 2026 months for good, even though the law recognises the right from 10 April 2026.
- The young person has to obtain a certificate from the general directorate that held them on its records, that is, from the institution they left, sometimes in another county. The order gives the directorate no deadline for issuing the certificate, even though the young person’s own deadline is running all that time.
- The new form in Annex no. 3a is not assigned to anyone in the text of the procedure and does not list the certificate from the general directorate, even though it remains mandatory.
- The calculation for April 2026 is written in a formula that cancels itself out, so the first amount paid can be 3,168 lei, 2,217.60 lei or 2,112 lei, depending on how the agency reads it.
- The one-off allowance equal to three minimum wages, which the same law opens up to all young people leaving the system, is left with no procedure and no form.
Practical advice
- If you have left the special protection system, are under 26 and are either studying or working, lodge the application by 9 December 2026 at the latest. That date is the strict count in working days; the two public holidays of 30 November and 1 December may push the deadline to 11 December, but do not count on them.
- Ask in good time for the certificate from the general directorate for social assistance and child protection on whose records you were held. It is the document proving that you were in the system and, if it is late, so is your application. The application form does not mention it, but Article 172(3)(b) of the procedure requires it.
- Add to the file the certificate from the school or from the employer, a copy of your identity papers and proof of your bank account, or your choice of a postal order. The application can be sent electronically, so there is no need to travel to the agency.
- Write in the application that you are asking for payment from 10 April 2026, on the basis of Article II of Order no. 1.277/2026. The form has no box for this, and a written statement helps you if the decision comes back calculated only from the month of the application.
- Keep proof of lodging, with the date on it. If the decision is late, Article 172(4) of the procedure obliges the agency to pay within 30 working days of the application being lodged, and paragraph (7) requires it to notify the decision within 5 working days of issuing it.
- Once you are granted the right, send the agency the employer’s certificate every 3 months and the school’s certificate every 6 months. Failing to send them suspends payment, and going more than three months past the suspension ends it.
- If you move to another county, lodge a new application with the agency for your new address and report any change within 15 days of it occurring.
Frequently asked questions
Who can claim the allowance of 3,168 lei?
By when must the application be lodged for me to receive the money from April?
How much do I get for April 2026?
Do I have to waive the protection measure in order to receive the allowance?
I am in evening classes. Does the form of education still matter?
What does the family raising the child receive, rather than the young person?
Is the allowance taxed?
What do I do if the agency rejects my application?
Errors and inconsistencies in the published text
- Annex no. 3a has no addressee in the text of the procedure, and the only cross-reference that does exist leads to the other group’s form. Point 14 of Article I introduces Annex no. 3a, the second model application, entitled simply „Cerere pentru acordarea indemnizației lunare pentru tineri”, which is the application for the monthly allowance for young people, but the phrase „anexa nr. 3a” appears only once in the whole order, in that very point. Article 172(9), which governs the situation of young people under Article 171(2)(b), refers to paragraphs (4) to (7) applying accordingly, and paragraph (6), left unamended, says that „modelul cererii este prevăzut în anexa nr. 3”, the model application is the one in Annex no. 3. A young person reading the procedure in order ends up at Annex no. 3, a form that asks them to declare that they were counselled and informed before the measure ended, exactly the document paragraph (8) exempts them from.
- The form in Annex no. 2 to the order, which becomes Annex no. 3a to the procedure, leaves out a mandatory document and keeps a tick box with no text. Under the heading „Atașez următoarele documente”, I am attaching the following documents, three boxes appear: the first has nothing written beside it, and the next two are „adeverința de la angajator”, the employer’s certificate, and „adeverința de la unitatea de învățământ”, the school’s certificate. The certificate issued by the general directorate on whose records the young person was held, required by Article 172(3)(b) and maintained by paragraph (8), appears nowhere on the form. The twin form in Annex no. 1 carries, in the same position, the text „copia documentului eliberat de DGASP că am fost consiliat și informat”, a copy of the document issued by the DGASP stating that I was counselled and informed. The annex is reproduced in facsimile, but page 6 of the printed edition shows the empty box under magnification, so this is not a loss in conversion.
- The calculation formula for April 2026 uses the same figure both as divisor and as multiplier. Article II(2) provides that „împărțirea cuantumului prevăzut de lege la numărul de zile din lună”, dividing the amount laid down by law by the number of days in the month, is done „înmulțit cu numărul de zile din respectiva lună, calculate începând cu data de 10 aprilie 2026”, multiplied by the number of days in that month, counted from 10 April 2026. Read literally, the operation gives back the full amount, 3,168 lei, because it divides by 30 and multiplies by 30 as well. Read through the final addition, it gives 21 days and 2,217.60 lei if 10 April is counted, or 20 days and 2,112 lei if it is not. Three possible results for the same month, with a difference of up to 1,056 lei.
Editorial analysis
The order solves a real problem and solves it in people’s favour. Law no. 49/2026 said that the allowances for young people leaving the protection system are a form of State protection „granted to all young people, without discrimination”, but a statement of principle cannot be cashed. To reach a 23-year-old who left a residential centre in 2022, it needed a form, a list of documents and an agency that knows what it is registering. The order does exactly that and adds something that was not compulsory: it pays for the past, from the date the law entered into force, not from the date the procedure appeared.
The less honourable part is the timetable. Article II of Law no. 49/2026 gave the minister 90 days from the entry into force of the law to issue the order, that is, until 9 July 2026. The order was signed on 14 September and published on 16 September 2026, 69 days after the deadline expired. The ministry, which overran its own statutory deadline by more than two months, gives the young person 60 working days to lodge the application, on pain of losing the money for past months for good. The ratio between those two deadlines is the one place where the act reads as written by the administration for the administration.
The second delay is older and explains why the order has fifteen points rather than three. Law no. 298/2023, in force since 4 November 2023, removed the phrase „full-time education” from Article 55(2) and from Article 129(42) of Law no. 272/2004 and put „a form of education provided for by law” in its place. The procedure stayed unchanged for 1,047 days, during which an official who read the procedure rather than the law had written grounds to turn away a young person enrolled in evening classes. The present order makes the correction, but it makes it almost three years later and without a word about the applications rejected in the meantime.
Half a reform is also left standing. Paragraph (45) introduced by Law no. 49/2026 opens up two allowances to every young person leaving the system, not one: the monthly allowance of 4.8 ISR and the one-off allowance equal to three times the gross minimum wage, that is, 12,150 lei until 30 June 2026 and 12,975 lei after the minimum wage rose to 4,325 lei. The order deals only with the first. The one-off allowance is borne by the budgets of the general directorates for social assistance, under Article 129(43), and has no procedure, no form and no deadline. A young person who turns up at the general directorate with Law no. 49/2026 in hand has no form to fill in and no institution bound to answer within any time limit.
What should be changed
- Annex no. 3a should be tied to its beneficiaries by a provision in the text. A paragraph stating that the model application for young people under Article 171(2)(b) is the one in Annex no. 3a would close the circular cross-reference and spare the agencies from deciding on their own which form they accept.
- The empty box in Annex no. 3a should be filled in with the certificate from the general directorate. As it stands, the form sends the young person to the counter with an incomplete file, and the agency turns them away for the lack of a document the form never asked for.
- The formula for April should be rewritten with the figure inside it. „The monthly amount divided by 30 and multiplied by 21 days, corresponding to the period 10 to 30 April 2026” removes the three possible readings and fixes a single amount due.
- The general directorates need a deadline for issuing the certificate. Five working days from the request would be enough and would make the young person’s 60-working-day deadline depend on them, not on the speed of the institution they left.
- The 60-working-day window should be matched by a duty to inform. The agencies and the general directorates hold the lists of young people who have left the system; a written notice to every person under 26 on their records would turn the right from a piece of information in the Official Gazette of Romania into an application actually lodged.
- The one-off allowance under Article 129(41) needs a procedure of its own. Without a form and without a deadline for the general directorates, half of what Law no. 49/2026 promised stays on paper, and young people will end up claiming it in court.
Original text of the legal act
The text below is reproduced in Romanian, the official form of publication.
The full text, as published in the Official Gazette of Romania
Official Gazette of Romania no. 787 of 16 September 2026 16 pages PDF, 171 KB the act starts on page 3
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This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. For specific situations, consult a licensed attorney or tax advisor.