Who can receive an earnings-related allowance?

The earnings-related allowance is an unemployment benefit that unemployment funds pay to their members based on their previous earnings.

You can receive an earnings-related allowance from your unemployment fund if

• you are a member of the unemployment fund,
• you are between 18 and 64 years old,
• you are fully or partially unemployed (e.g. working part-time or laid off),
• you have signed up as an unemployed job-seeker with the Employment and Economic Development Office (TE Office), and
• you satisfy the employment requirement while being a member of the unemployment fund.

Earnings-related daily allowances can be paid when you cannot work in the building or forestry industry because the temperature is below a certain threshold.

Persons under the age of 18 have been ineligible for an earnings-related allowance since 1 August 2021. This legislative amendment relates to the raising of the statutory minimum school-leaving age. Persons aged 17 years can nevertheless still qualify for an earnings-related allowance if

• they have completed compulsory education, or
• they have been exempted from finishing compulsory education under the Compulsory Education Act.

Membership requirement

The membership requirement is 26 weeks. This means that, to qualify for an earnings-related allowance, you must have been a member of your unemployment fund for at least 26 weeks. The membership requirement will extend from 26 weeks (approximately 6 months) to 12 months as of 2 September 2024.

Employment requirement

You can apply for an earnings-related allowance if you satisfy the employment requirement while being a member of an unemployment fund.

‘Employment requirement’ means that you must have worked for a period of 26 calendar weeks. Every week during which you worked at least 18 hours counts towards the employment requirement. You can satisfy the employment requirement by working several isolated periods, as long as all these take place within the review period.

The employment requirement will extend from 26 weeks (approximately 6 months) to 12 months as of 2 September 2024. In addition as of 2 September 2024, the employment requirement will accrue based on earnings rather than working hours.

You can read more about the employment requirement, the review period and special circumstances under Employment requirement.

Are you under the age of 25 and without a vocational qualification?

The TE Office has set certain special conditions that young people must satisfy in order to qualify for an earnings-related allowance.  These conditions apply to you if you are under the age of 25 and have no vocational qualification. The conditions relate to, for example, an obligation to apply for a place on a training course. For more information, see the TE Services website.

Strikes and the earnings-related allowance

The unemployment funds will not pay a strike pay during strikes. If you have any questions about strike pay, please contact your trade union.

If your work is prevented due to a strike that seeks to influence your working conditions or terms of employment, you are not entitled to earnings-related allowance for the days on strike.

We cannot pay you earnings-related allowance for strike days if you work part-time and apply for adjusted earnings-related allowance. Remember to report the strike days in your earnings-related allowance application.

We can pay you earnings-related daily allowance for these days only if

• you are entirely without work and already received earnings-related allowance before the strike, or
• you are temporarily laid off from all work and the lay-off notice was given before the strike.

Was your pay interrupted by a strike in another sector?

You may be entitled to earnings-related allowance if your work is interrupted by a strike in another sector. If this happens to you, register as a job seeker with the TE Office. We can only pay earnings-related allowance for the days when you are registered as a job seeker.

Please note that your employer is obligated to pay you wages for seven days if your work is prevented due to a strike in another sector and the strike does not seek to influence your working conditions or terms of employment. If the strike continues and your work is prevented for longer than seven days, you may be entitled to earnings-related allowance paid by the unemployment fund without a waiting period.