Conditions for claiming allowance

• Until 1 September 2024, the employment condition accumulates for each calendar week during which at least 18 hours of work have been performed.
• The date of salary payment is irrelevant.
• Working weeks up to 1 September 2024 are converted into months so that four weeks add up to one month. Of the remaining weeks, three weeks constitute one month, and one or two weeks constitute half a month accumulating the right to earnings-related unemployment allowance.

Salary paid for more than one month contrary to the normal pay period

If you are during a calendar month paid salary for a period longer than one month, the salary will be spread over as many months as the number of months for which it was paid. Pay sharing also requires that the salary has been paid outside the normal pay period. 

Example. 
You worked from 1 October to 30 November and your salary of €4,000 for the whole period of employment was paid on 30 November. The €4,000 salary is divided between October and November. The divided salary of €2,000 per month exceeds the threshold of €930 for the work requirement, so you accumulate two months of work requirement. 

Performance-related pay paid for a period of more than one month

If you are paid a performance-related bonus or salary (e.g. performance-related bonus, bonus, commission) for a period of more than one month, the bonus or salary is allocated to the calendar months during which it was earned.

Late payment of salary due to the employer’s fault

If your employer pays your salary late, for example because of an error in the payroll system, insolvency or some other reason, the salary will be allocated to the month in which it should have been paid. 

Reduced income due to an illness

The employment condition does not include

• salary for work you did while receiving partial disability allowance
• reduced salary paid to you due to a long illness (e.g. 2/3 of your salary). 

Working time bank

Salary or compensation based on working time transferred to a working time bank is not counted towards the employment condition when working time is transferred to a working time bank. However, the salary for time off withdrawn from the working time bank is counted towards the employment condition when the time off is taken and the salary is paid. Monetary compensation withdrawn from a working time bank does not count towards the employment condition under any circumstances.

Working as a teacher

If you are engaged in teaching work at an educational institution, up until 1 September 2024 the weeks during which your working hours have been at least half of the lowest weekly hours of a full-time hourly paid teacher in the respective teaching sector will contribute towards the work requirement. If your work as a teacher in a educational institution, working weeks are included in the employment condition if you work at least 8 hours per week.  

From 2 September 2024 onwards, the exception related to teaching work will no longer apply, and the employment condition will accumulate according to the general rule based on the salary paid during the calendar month. 

Working in a family business

If you work in a business owned by your spouse, but you do not own any part of the business yourself, you are considered to be an empoyee (and not a entrepreneur). 

From 2 September 2024 onwards, work done in a family business will accumulate the employment condition in the same way as other paid employment. However, you cannot combine work done in a family business with other paid employment until the 12-month work requirement has been fully met from the period after 1 September 2024. Before this, the entire employment condition must be fulfilled either in regular paid work or within a family business. 

Work for which employer receives a pay subsidy will only count towards the employment condition in rare circumstances. Subsidized work will only count towards the employment condition if the pay subsidy is granted to employ a disabled person or a long-term unemployed person aged over 60. The employment condition will only start to accumulate after 10 months of work and even then, only 75% of the paid months will accumulate the employment conditiont. In order to fulfill the employment condition through subsidized work, you must therefore work for at least 26 months on subsidized work (first 10 months for the subsidized work to start accumulating the employment condition and then 16 months, of which 75%, i.e. 12 months, is enough to accrue the employment condition). A further condition is that the employment relationship continues continuously.  

If you work in more than one subsidized employment relationship, the employment condition is calculated on a per-employment relationship basis. For each pay subsidy employment relationship organised to employ a disabled person or a long-term unemployed person over 60 years of age, 75% of the working time is taken into account for the calculation of the employment condition after the first 10 months of pay subsidy employment. The rounding down is done for each employment relationship to the nearest full month of employment.

For the period for which the subsidized employment does not accumulate the employment condition, it extends the 28-month reference period of the employment condition.  

You may lose the right to allowance you acquired working as employee in the following situations:

• You work as a full-time entrepreneur for more than 18 months.
• You are out of the labour market (i.e. not employed or registered as
  a job-seeker with the TE office) for more than six months without an
  acceptable reason.
• If you do not join a new unemployment fund within one month of resigning from your previous one
• You are dismissed from unemployment funds membership (e.g., due to unpaid membership fees).

In such cases, you will only be entitled to receive earnings-related unemployment allowance again once you have fulfilled a new 12-month employment condition. The new employment condition cannot take into account any employment condition you accumulated before the absence, because the new period of consideration for the employment condition starts when you go to work after the absence.

You can meet the employment condition again by working part-time or in temporary employment while receiving an adjusted daily allowance. You can also meet the employment condition again if you return as an applicant for earnings-related unemployment allowance after working in a job that counts towards the employment condition.

When you meet the employment condition again during the 28-month reference period

• the level of your daily allowance is redefined
• a new mandatory waiting period is set for you
• calculation of the 300 / 400 / 500-day maximum amount of earnings-related unemployment allowance begins from the start
• the possible graduated reduction of daily allowance is reset, and the daily allowance is paid in full again for the first 40 days
   

If your employment condition is not met when you reapply for the daily allowance after a period of work or, for example, after family leave, we will continue to pay you an earnings-related unemployment allowance on the basis of your previous entitlement to the earnings-related unemployment allowance for as long as there are days left in your maximum time limit.

The employment condition can accumulate during the period of employment support service as normal, for example if you are employed part-time during the service. If the employment condition is fulfilled again during a period of voluntary studies or labour market training, the maximum period of earnings-related unemployment allowance starts from the beginning, but only after the end of the training period.

Read more about the maximum payment period.