Working when receiving allowance

You can do part-time work, gig work or start a small-scale business while receiving unemployment allowance

Small-scale work is worthwhile, as it allows you to:

• Increase your earnings
• Extend the maximum payment period of the daily allowance
• Accumulate new working weeks and leads to the maximum payment period for the daily allowance resetting.

Half of any income from work reduces the daily allowance by half. For example, a salary income of 500 EUR will reduce the daily allowance by EUR 250. You can estimate how your salary will affect the daily allowance using the allowance calculator.

Earnings-related unemployment allowance can be paid during periods of part-time work, full-time work lasting up to two weeks, parti-time self-employment, or partial layoff. The job search must remain active during the period of partial employment.

Please note that earnings-related unemployment allowance cannot be paid if you have agreed with your employer to reduce your working hours.

If you have found a part-time or gig job

You should report your working hours in your application to the unemployment fund and also send the fund a salary slip. Remember to also inform the TE Office about this work.

If you will only receive a salary payment in the following month, the job will not affect the payment of your daily allowance before the salary payment.

What kind of work is part-time work, gig work, and full-time work?

Part-time work is work done up to 80% of the maximum working time permitted in the sector in question. If the line of industry has a maximum working time of 40 hours per week, 32 hours per week constitutes part-time work.

Gig work is full-time work that lasts no more than two weeks.

The time spent in part-time or gig work is assessed according to the payment period. This means that the 80% limit may not be exceeded during the application period, which is a month or four weeks.

If the work exceeds the 80% ratio and it lasts for more than two weeks, it will be considered to be full-time work. In this case, you will receive the full daily allowance until you start work and after its eventual termination.

If you have started a business

Having a small-scale business affects the daily allowance in the same way as part-time work. Send your last tax statement showing your income from the business to your unemployment fund. If you have just begun a business and have not yet completed a tax return, please send your own explanation of the company’s income and expenses.

You can estimate the impact of your income on the daily allowance using the allowance calculator. Change the income stated in your annual income tax statement to monthly income by dividing the amount by 12.

The TE Office will evaluate how extensive your business activity is and decides whether the business activity is sufficiently small to allow payment of the earnings-related allowance. In general, a business that has been practiced alongside full-time employment for 6 months does not prevent payment of the daily allowance.

If a business is started while being unemployed the scale of the business will not affect you right to earnings-related allowance for the first 4 months. This means that, other than in relation to your income, the first 4 months of business activity do not affect your daily allowance. After 4 months, the TE Office will check to see if this business activity is small-scale enough for you to still receive unemployment benefits. You can only start your business in this way once within the maximum payment period of the earnings-related allowance. In the future, the scale of the business will be checked immediately.

If your business activity lasts for no longer than two weeks, the scale of the business will not be evaluated at all. You can have any number of periods of business activity lasting up to 2 weeks during the maximum payment period.

The TE Office must be informed of any business activities lasting more than 2 weeks. Your unemployment fund must be notified of all business activities as the income will affect the amount your daily allowance.

You can work as an employee or an entrepreneur through a cooperative

If you are working through a cooperative or a company that manages invoicing and accounting on your behalf, this is usually considered to be business activity. In this case, you acquire your customers and they agree to work with you.

If you are working in a cooperative that provides services in the same field as the one in which you are working, this is often considered to be an employment relationship. In this case, customers purchase services from the cooperative, and not from you directly.

What is the maximum daily allowance?

In cases in which the effect of your work-related income is taken into account in the payment of a daily allowance, the combined value of the daily allowance and the work-related income cannot exceed the value of the salary on which receipt of the daily allowance is based.

If your daily money has been reduced on the basis of the maximum payment amount, this means that your earnings are equal to the income on which your daily allowance is calculated.

However, the daily allowance is always of at least equal value to that of the payment made if the allowance were to be paid as a basic daily allowance.

Recalculate daily allowance and payment protection

If you work for 12 months and earn at least 930 euros per month, the maximum period for earnings-related unemployment allowance will reset. A salary between 465 and 930 euros counts towards the work requirement as half a month. The maximum period for earnings-related allowance can be reset, for example, by working 10 full months and 4 half months.

When the maximum period starts again, the level of the allowance is recalculated, and a new seven-day waiting period begins.

The new level of earnings-related allowance is calculated even if there are unpaid days remaining from the previous allowance period.

If you are working part-time, recalculating the allowance might reduce the amount. However, earnings-related allowance can only be reduced by a maximum of 20% at a time if the maximum period has not been exhausted.