A New Era in Business Opening and Operating Licences

The Regulation on the Amendment of the Regulation on Workplace Opening and Operating Licenses (the “Regulation”) published in the Official Gazette dated 11 December 2025 and numbered 33104 and entering into force on the same date, introduces significant changes to business license procedures. These changes can be summarized as follows:

1. In respect of investments to be made or operations to be carried out on immovable properties subject to public or private ownership, where an application for a workplace opening and operating license is duly submitted by the business operator in accordance with the Regulation but the competent municipality fails to issue the business opening and operating license within two months from the application date, the business operator may submit the application to the Ministry of Environment, Urbanisation and Climate Change (the “Ministry”), and the Ministry may (against payment of the applicable fee) issue the business opening and operating license ex officio. Workplace opening and operating licenses to be issued within this scope shall be issued by the provincial directorates of the Ministry.

   The details are as follows: upon the business operator’s application to the provincial directorate, the provincial directorate shall request the opinion of the administration authority regarding the relevant file. The municipalities will be required to provide their opinion within 15 days at the latest, explaining in detail the reasons why the licensing procedures have not been finalized. If no opinion is provided within this period, the opinion shall be deemed to be affirmative. Following receipt of the municipalities’ opinion, the provincial directorate shall complete its review of the file within 15 days at the latest. If, as a result of such review, it is determined that the application is found to be compliant with the Regulation, the provincial directorates of the Ministry shall be authorized to issue the license ex officio. Where non-compliance with the legislation and/or deficiencies are identified during the review, such matters shall be notified to the applicant within the same period. Following the submission to be made after the elimination of the non-compliance or the completion of the deficiencies, the provincial directorate shall again be authorized to issue the license ex officio.

2. The amendments to the Regulation have eliminated the ambiguity surrounding the requirement to obtain a building use permit (occupancy permit) and a fire department report, which—although mandatory under the applicable legislation—had been subject to divergent interpretations in practice.

   In particular, the Regulation now expressly stipulates that these documents must be obtained for all establishments qualifying as accommodation facilities, including hotels, motels, mountain lodges and holiday villages; accordingly, it has been clarified that “a building use permit (occupancy permit) and a fire department report must be in place for accommodation establishments.”

The amendments are not limited to accommodation facilities; they also introduce new provisions applicable to various workplace categories, including entertainment venues, dwellings rented for tourism purposes (e.g., Airbnb), solar power plants (SPPs), carpet-cleaning facilities and beauty salons.