Bulgarian Civil Servant General Competencies Test cheat sheet

The Civil Servant Act (Zakon za darzhavnia sluzhitel) governs the status, rights, obligations, recruitment, career development, disciplinary liability and termination of employment of Bulgarian civil servants.

Civil servants are appointed by an act of the appointing authority (zapoved) after successfully passing a competitive examination (konkurs); the probationary period is up to six months.

Core obligations include political neutrality, lawfulness, impartiality, confidentiality of official information, and the duty to serve citizens equally without discrimination.

The statute of limitations for initiating disciplinary proceedings is generally two months from discovery of the violation and five years from its commission, whichever comes first.

Disciplinary sanctions under the Act are: reprimand, written warning, postponement of salary increase for up to two years, demotion, and dismissal from the civil service.

A civil servant may appeal a disciplinary sanction or termination to the administrative court within 14 days of notification; the appeal does not automatically suspend enforcement unless the court orders so.

Civil servants are entitled to annual paid leave of at least 20 working days, plus additional leave for length of service and for harmful working conditions.

Declaration of assets and interests is mandatory for senior civil servants under the Public Officials' Asset Declaration Act; failure to declare or false declarations trigger disciplinary and criminal liability.

A civil servant is released from office upon reaching the statutory retirement age, resignation, loss of Bulgarian citizenship, or a final conviction for an intentional crime.

The Administrative Procedure Code (APC) governs the issuance, form, content, entry into force, execution and judicial review of individual and general administrative acts.

An administrative act must be issued in writing, identify the issuing authority, the addressee, the factual and legal grounds, the operative part, and the available remedies and deadlines for appeal.

Administrative acts enter into force upon their notification to the addressee, unless the law provides otherwise; general acts enter into force three days after promulgation in the State Gazette.

Notification is served personally, by registered mail, or electronically via the Single Electronic Access Point (SEAP) where the recipient has consented; refusal to receive is documented and deemed served.

Administrative acts may be appealed administratively (to a higher authority) within 14 days, and judicially (to the administrative court) within 14 days of notification or of the decision on the administrative appeal.

An administrative act is void when issued by an incompetent authority, in a form contrary to law, or when it violates a fundamental constitutional or statutory rule; nullity may be declared at any time.

The principle of legality requires that administrative acts conform to the Constitution, statutes and regulations; discretionary powers must be exercised within the limits and for the purposes set by law.

Administrative acts enjoy a presumption of validity; their execution may be suspended only by a court order or by the issuing authority pending appeal.

The Constitution of the Republic of Bulgaria, adopted 12 July 1991, establishes a parliamentary republic with a unicameral National Assembly (Narodno Sabranie) of 240 members elected for four years.

Article 4 declares the rule of law: the Republic is governed by the Constitution and the laws; no law may contradict the Constitution, and international treaties ratified by Bulgaria prevail over domestic law.

Separation of powers is embedded in the structure: legislative (National Assembly), executive (Council of Ministers), and judicial (courts and prosecution), with the Constitutional Court as an independent guardian of constitutionality.

Fundamental rights include equality before the law (Art. 6), inviolability of personal freedom (Art. 30), freedom of expression (Art. 39), right to education (Art. 53), and right to a fair trial (Art. 121).

The Constitutional Court consists of 12 justices appointed for nine-year terms: four by the National Assembly, four by the President, and four by the general assembly of the Supreme Court of Cassation and Supreme Administrative Court.

The President is directly elected for a five-year term and may serve a maximum of two consecutive terms; the President has a suspensive veto over legislation, overridable by an absolute majority of the National Assembly.

The Council of Ministers, headed by the Prime Minister, is the highest executive body; ministers are appointed by the National Assembly on the Prime Minister's proposal.

Local self-government is guaranteed at the municipal level; the mayor and municipal council are elected for four-year terms.

Bulgarian uses the Cyrillic alphabet; the definite article is a postpositive suffix (-ът/-ят for masculine subject, -а/-я for masculine object, -та for feminine, -то for neuter, -те for plural).

The vocative case is preserved in Bulgarian (e.g., господине, госпожо); it is required in formal salutations and in addressing officials.

The full stop (точка) and comma (запетая) follow standard punctuation; the Bulgarian quotation marks are „…“ and the dash for dialogue is - (em dash).

Official documents must begin with the issuer's name, address and identification number, followed by the addressee, subject line (Относно:), body, closing formula, date and signature.

Formal register avoids first-person colloquialisms; use the polite „Вие“ (capitalised) when addressing a single official or institution, and „вие“ (lowercase) for plural addressees.

Common spelling traps: „позволявам“ (not „позволяам“), „съществува“ (not „съществувам“), „разбира се“ (two words), and the prefix „през-“ vs. „приз-“.

Numeric and date conventions: dates written as „12 юли 2024 г.“; numerals up to ten spelled out in prose, digits used for measurements, percentages and legal citations.

In drafting, avoid nominalisations and passive voice where an active construction is clearer; each paragraph should express one idea with a topic sentence.

Deductive validity: an argument is valid if the conclusion cannot be false when the premises are true; validity concerns form, not content.

Modus ponens: from P → Q and P, infer Q. Modus tollens: from P → Q and ¬Q, infer ¬P. Affirming the consequent and denying the antecedent are fallacies.

Categorical syllogism: two premises sharing a middle term yield a conclusion; check distribution of terms and avoid the fallacy of the undistributed middle.

Sequencing problems: identify the rule (arithmetic, geometric, alternating, prime, Fibonacci-like) before extrapolating; verify the rule against at least two transitions.

Necessary vs. sufficient conditions: „A only if B“ means A → B (B necessary); „A if B“ means B → A (B sufficient).

Data interpretation: read axis labels and units first; distinguish absolute change from percentage change; a rise from 20 to 25 is +25%, not +5 percentage points.

Correlation does not imply causation; a confounding variable may explain an observed association between two variables.

Inference strength: an inference is warranted only if it is entailed by the given facts; plausible but unstated assumptions must be flagged as assumptions.

Percentage change = (new − old) / old × 100; percentage points measure the arithmetic difference between two percentages.

Successive percentage changes do not add: a 10% rise followed by a 10% fall yields 0.9 × 1.1 = 0.99, i.e., a net −1%.

Ratio and proportion: if a : b = c : d, then ad = bc; scale a quantity by multiplying by the ratio of the target to the source.

Average (mean) = sum / count; median is the middle value of an ordered set; mode is the most frequent value; the mean is sensitive to outliers, the median is not.

Compound growth: final = initial × (1 + r)^n; simple growth: final = initial × (1 + r × n).

Unit conversion: 1 km = 1000 m, 1 hectare = 10 000 m², 1 tonne = 1000 kg; convert before comparing.

Rounding: round only at the final step to avoid accumulation error; state the rounding convention (e.g., two decimal places).

Weighted average = Σ(wᵢ × xᵢ) / Σwᵢ; use when subgroups have different sizes.

Bulgaria joined the European Union on 1 January 2007 and is a member of NATO (since 2004), the Council of Europe (since 1992) and the United Nations (since 1955).

Bulgaria adopted the euro as its currency on 1 January 2026, becoming the 21st euro-area member; the lev was previously pegged to the euro via a currency board.

The National Assembly consists of 240 MPs elected by proportional representation with a 4% electoral threshold; elections are held every four years.

The European Commission, Council of the EU and European Parliament are the principal EU institutions; the Court of Justice of the EU sits in Luxembourg and the European Parliament in Strasbourg and Brussels.

The Ombudsman of the Republic of Bulgaria is elected by the National Assembly for a five-year term and protects citizens' rights against maladministration.

The State Gazette (Darzhaven Vestnik) is the official publication in which laws, decrees and international treaties are promulgated; promulgation is a condition for their entry into force.

The Supreme Administrative Court (VAS) is the highest judicial authority for administrative justice and reviews the legality of administrative acts and of subordinate legislation.

The European Charter of Fundamental Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights bind Bulgarian authorities in matters within their scope.

SEAP (Single Electronic Access Point) is the Bulgarian e-procurement platform; e-signature via a qualified certificate has the same legal effect as a handwritten signature.

The e-Government Act (Zakon za elektronnoto upravlenie) regulates electronic documents, electronic signatures, e-services and interoperability of registers.

A qualified electronic signature (КЕП) is issued by a certified trust service provider and is legally equivalent to a handwritten signature under eIDAS Regulation (EU) 910/2014.

Information security triad: confidentiality (access limited to authorised persons), integrity (data not altered), availability (data accessible when needed).

Strong passwords should be at least 12 characters, mixed case, digits and symbols; never reuse passwords across systems; enable multi-factor authentication where available.

Phishing indicators: mismatched sender domain, urgency cues, unexpected attachments, requests for credentials; verify via a separate channel before acting.

Office software essentials: mail merge, spreadsheet formulas (SUM, AVERAGE, IF, VLOOKUP), and track-changes for collaborative drafting of official documents.

Personal data processing must comply with GDPR (Regulation 2016/679) and the Bulgarian Personal Data Protection Act; data minimisation and purpose limitation apply.

Prioritisation matrix (Eisenhower): urgent + important → do now; important + not urgent → schedule; urgent + not important → delegate; neither → eliminate.

Conflict handling styles: competing, collaborating, compromising, avoiding, accommodating; collaborating is preferred when the issue is important and time permits.

Ethics in public office: declare conflicts of interest, refuse gifts that could influence decisions, and report corruption to the Commission for Combating Corruption and Confiscation of Illegally Acquired Property.

Teamwork: clarify roles, agree on deadlines, document decisions; escalate only after the responsible owner has been given a chance to resolve.

Situational judgement: read the scenario for the role, constraints and stakeholders; the best answer is lawful, proportionate, transparent and preserves institutional trust.

Time management: distinguish deadlines from durations; buffer critical tasks; batch similar administrative tasks to reduce context switching.

Whistleblower protection is guaranteed under the Protection of Persons Reporting or Publicly Disclosing Information on Violations Act; retaliation is prohibited.

Delegation requires clear authority, resources and accountability; the delegating officer retains responsibility for the outcome.