| Please note! Amendments have been made to the Unemployment Security Act. Beginning 2.9.2024 the employment requirement and membership requirement will be 12 months, so roughly 52 weeks and the employment requirement will be accumulated based on paid wage income. |
As you receive daily allowance, the Fund tracks the accumulation of your new employment requirement. In general, every week during which you work at least 18 hours (or 8 hours in fields legislation has deemed teaching) in an employment relationship, you accumulate some of your new employment requirement. There are some exceptions to how the employment requirement is accumulated, for instance during pay-subsidized work and concerning people who have turned 60 years old and are employed by statutory obligation. Read more about the accumulation of the employment requirement.
If you have accumulated 26 new calendar weeks that meet the employment requirement within a span of 28 months and after the last time your earnings-related allowance was calculated, then you have re-fulfilled the employment requirement. When this happens, the maximum payment period counter is restarted even if you had not been paid for the full duration of the maximum payment period (300/400/500 days) yet.
When the 26-week employment requirement is fulfilled again, the Fund examines if the amount of your earnings-related daily allowance will be calculated again and if you will be set a new waiting period equivalent to 5 days of unemployment. If your earnings-related daily allowance is not recalculated, payment will continue using the same allowance amount as before.
- Earnings-related daily allowance is not recalculated
- if the first day you would be paid daily allowance is within a year of the day your previous maximum payment period began and
- if your daily allowance was recalculated the last time your maximum payment period began.
- A new waiting period is not set
- if the first day you would be paid daily allowance is within a year of the day your previous maximum payment period began and
- if the waiting period was set the last time your maximum payment period began.
If the amount of your daily allowance is recalculated, the recalculation is done based on your income from the new weeks that have fulfilled the employment requirement. The full amount of your new daily allowance will be at least 80 % of your previous daily allowance as long as your previous maximum payment period was not full yet. If you have received earnings-related daily allowance for the full 300/400/500-day maximum payment period, this 80 % rule does not concern you. You will receive a decision about the new amount of your daily allowance and the new waiting period when the Unemployment Fund pays your daily allowance for the first time after your new waiting period.
The amount of daily allowance is protected once you turn 58 years old
The rule stated previously, by which the amount of your earnings-related daily allowance will not be recalculated if a year has not yet passed since the last time the maximum payment period began and the daily allowance was calculated, also concerns people that have turned 58 years old.
If your daily allowance is to be recalculated, the recalculation is not done if you have turned 58 years old by the time you have fulfilled the new employment requirement and the recalculated daily allowance is less than your previous daily allowance.