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Staggering of earnings-related daily allowance

The pending legislative package on changes to unemployment security includes a draft proposal on the staggered level of earnings security. The staggered level of earnings-related daily allowance will not have an effect on the amount of earnings-related daily allowance in short periods of unemployment, but if unemployment or lay-off were prolonged, the level of earnings-related daily allowance according to the draft proposal would be lowered.

According to the draft proposal, the staggering of the earnings-related daily allowance level is to be implemented in such a way that after 40 payment days, i.e. about eight weeks of unemployment, the benefit would fall to 80% of the original level and after 170 payment days, i.e. about 34 weeks, to 75% of the original amount of the daily allowance.

However, the earnings-related daily allowance could not be less than the basic daily allowance or the basic daily allowance plus the increase for the period of employment promotion services.

The level of earnings-related security would return to the level of 100 per cent, i.e. full daily allowance, when the working condition would be met again and the maximum period of daily allowance would start from the beginning. A staggered earnings-related daily allowance would consume a maximum of 300/400/500 days of earnings-related daily allowance in the same way as days would be spent without staggered allowance.

Draft proposal

The Government’s draft proposal on the graduation of the level of income security is currently in the consultation phase and its content may be subject to further changes before the final proposal is submitted to Parliament or during the parliamentary debate.

Draft proposal on the ministry’s website

Adjusted earnings-related daily allowance

The staggered level of earnings-related security would also apply to those job seekers who are paid adjusted earnings-related daily allowance. Because the adjusted earnings-related daily allowance is less than the full earnings-related daily allowance, the adjusted earnings-related daily allowance is consumed slower than the maximum period. For this reason, the staggering would also affect applicants for adjusted daily allowance later than applicants for full earnings-related daily allowance.

The staggering would only apply after a total of 40 full days of maximum time had been paid and a second staggering after a total of 170 full days of maximum time had been paid.

The amount of the staggered daily allowance would still be calculated on the basis of the original full daily allowance.

Transition from old to new

According to the draft proposal, the staggering of the level of income support would enter into force on 2.9.2024. However, the staggering would not apply to jobseekers whose maximum period of payment of earnings-related daily allowance had started by 1.9.2024, i.e. who had received at least one day of earnings-related daily allowance before 2.9.2024. When the new working condition is met on or after 2.9.2024 and the working condition is 12 months, the staggering would apply.

The first staggerings would therefore apply to claimants whose daily allowance would be determined after 2 .9.2024 and whose unemployment lasts for more than 40 working days.

Your full daily earnings-related allowance is 90 € per day and you apply for an earnings-related allowance from 1.8.2024.

Your working condition is met on 31.7.2024 and we pay you an earnings-related daily allowance after a seven-day waiting period from 12.8.2024.

Your unemployment continues for 100 days. Your daily allowance will remain at 90 € for the whole period of unemployment.

Your full earnings-related daily allowance is 90 € per day and you apply for an earnings-related daily allowance from 1.10.2024. Your working condition is met on 30.9.2024 and we will start paying you an earnings-related daily allowance after the waiting period from 10.10.2024. Your unemployment continues for 200 days.

For the first 40 days, we will pay you an earnings-related daily allowance of 90 € per day, i.e. a total of 3 600 €.

For the next 130 days, you will receive 80% of the initial amount. We will pay you 72 € per day for 130 days, making a total of 9 360 €.

After 170 days, you will receive 75% of the initial amount of the daily allowance, i.e. 67.50 € per day. We will then pay you a total of 2 025 € until the end of your unemployment.

In our example, we will pay you a total of 14 985 € for 200 days of unemployment. Without the staggering, the total amount of the 200 days would be 18 000 €, so the differentiation will reduce the total amount of your unemployment benefit by 3 015 € in this situation.

We will pay you an adjusted daily allowance of 20 € per day from 1.10.2025 on the basis of a condition of employment fulfilled on 31.8.2025.

Your full earnings-related daily allowance will be 80 € per day. The adjusted daily subsistence allowance of 20 € is 25% of this amount, so the maximum time spent on each day of adjusted daily allowance paid is only 0.25 days. In this case, only four days of adjusted daily allowance are equivalent to one full day of daily allowance. In this case, we will only apply the staggering when a total of 160 days of adjusted daily allowance of 20 € has been paid.

Staggering from additional days

If the entitlement to earnings-related daily allowance at the end of the maximum period of 500 days were to be converted into earnings-related daily allowance for the additional days, the earnings-related daily allowance would also be staggered for the additional days if the working condition on which the maximum payment period is based had been met on or after 2.9.2024 and the applicable employment condition was 12 months.

If the payment of earnings-related daily allowance for additional days had already started before 2.9.2024, the staggering of the level of earnings protection would not apply at all.

You are paid the full daily allowance on the basis of additional days, starting on 19.8.2024.

The staggering will not affect the amount of your daily allowance. We will pay you earnings-related daily allowance for the additional days without staggering until your entitlement to additional days ends.

Impact of staggering

Pre-unemployment
salary		Full earnings-related daily
allowance per month		After 40 payment days
-20 %		After 170 payment days
-25 %
       1 500 €       1 090 €-218 €-272 €
       2 000 €       1 306 €-261 €-327 €
       2 500 €       1 523 €-305 €-381 €
       3 000 €       1 739 €-348 €-435 €
       3 500 €       1 956 €-391 €-489 €
       4 000 €       2 094 €-419 €-523 €
Impact of staggering per month

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