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An Austrian payslip (Lohnabrechnung) runs from gross pay through social insurance and wage tax to the net payout, and in the two months that carry the 13th and 14th salary it shows those payments on lines of their own. The extra payments are pay set by the collective agreement or the contract, so a monthly figure quoted “on 14 payments” already includes them. Employee social insurance takes 18.07% of regular pay (outside Vienna) and 17.07% of a special payment, wage tax is worked out separately for each, and the November slip adds the yearly e-card fee. This covers employees on an Austrian payroll; the rules are federal, with one small state difference in Vienna.
The payslip looks dense because it packs two kinds of payment into one document. Once the 13th and 14th salary are placed, the rest follows one pattern: gross pay, social insurance, wage tax, optional extras, payout. This article takes the lines in that order, and each deeper rule has its own article, linked where it comes up.
Where the 13th and 14th salary come from
Austrian law doesn’t create a 13th or 14th salary. The social affairs ministry says there is no statutory entitlement to special payments (in German), and that entitlement, amount and due date are set by the Kollektivvertrag (collective agreement) or, failing that, the employment contract.
That is the source of the idea that they’re a bonus the employer can pay or hold back. Where the agreement or contract provides for 14 payments, the two extra ones are part of the agreed annual pay, and the same page says most collective agreements set their minimum pay for 14 payments a year (how those agreements work is in the article on collective agreements and pay scales).
The practical consequence is in the offer letter. A gross EUR 3,500 a month on 14 payments is EUR 49,000 a year; the same yearly sum on 12 payments would be EUR 4,083.33 a month. A figure without its number of payments can’t be compared with anything.
In a month with a special payment the slip carries two pay lines, regular pay and the special payment, each with its own contributions and tax. The agreement or contract decides the months, and the Illustration below assumes June and November. How the special payments are taxed, and why a bonus can push part of them onto the ordinary tariff, is the subject of the article on the 13th and 14th salary.
Whether a special payment is owed in full after a mid-year start, or on leaving a job, is a labour-law question. The Arbeiterkammer is the first route (see Getting help).
What a payslip has to show
The employer has to hand over the monthly statement with the pay, or make it available electronically, and the income tax act’s rules on the payroll statement (in German) list its minimum content. That is gross pay, the base for contributions and the mandatory contributions, the base for wage tax, the base and amount of the severance fund contribution, any Familienbonus Plus applied, and the wage tax itself.
Every other line (union dues, allowances, benefits in kind, the e-card fee) is additional. There’s no prescribed layout, so a payslip from a payroll bureau and one from an in-house system can order the same lines differently.
The words need care. The monthly statement is the Lohnabrechnung (or Gehaltsabrechnung), and people say Lohnzettel for it in everyday speech, but in tax law the Lohnzettel is the annual wage statement the employer files with the tax office, as the government portal’s glossary (in German) puts it. The assessment starts from that annual statement, and the article on the employee tax assessment explains how.
Tip
Payroll software shortens everything. These are the abbreviations that turn up most.
| Abbreviation | German | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| SV | Sozialversicherung | Social insurance |
| LSt | Lohnsteuer | Wage tax |
| BMGL | Bemessungsgrundlage | The base a rate is applied to |
| lfd. | laufend | Regular pay, as opposed to a special payment |
| SZ | Sonderzahlung | The 13th or 14th salary |
International organisation staff
Staff of international organisations in Vienna often have wage tax and social insurance settled by their organisation’s headquarters agreement, not by an Austrian payroll. For them some or all of the deduction lines below may not exist, and the payslip may come from the organisation’s own system. The organisation’s HR or legal office is the first stop, and the article on international organisation staff covers which Austrian money rules still reach them.
Social insurance: the first block of deductions
Social insurance comes off first, and it’s worked out on gross pay. The employee shares for 2026 are these, according to the umbrella body’s table of contribution values (in German):
| Line | Employee share | Charged on special payments? |
|---|---|---|
| Health insurance (Krankenversicherung) | Yes | |
| Pension insurance (Pensionsversicherung) | 10.25% | Yes |
| Unemployment insurance (Arbeitslosenversicherung) | 2.95% | Yes, with reduced bands for low pay |
| Chamber of labour levy (Arbeiterkammerumlage) | 0.50% | No |
| Housing-subsidy contribution (Wohnbauförderungsbeitrag) | 0.50% | No |
Added up, regular pay carries 18.07% and a special payment 17.07%, because the last two lines have no special-payment base in the table. These are the employee’s shares; the employer pays more on top, as the section on employer costs shows.
Each branch has a ceiling. Contributions stop above a monthly base of EUR 6,930, and special payments have a separate yearly ceiling of EUR 13,860. The article on employee social insurance contributions covers what each branch pays for and how the ceilings work.
State note
The housing-subsidy contribution is the one state-dependent line. Vienna charges an employee share of 0.75% from 1 January 2026, against 0.50% elsewhere, so regular pay carries 18.32% there. The 17.07% on special payments is the same in every state.
The reduced unemployment bands
Low earners pay less towards unemployment insurance, and the cut shows on the slip as a lower percentage on that line. The ÖGK’s page on unemployment insurance contributions at low pay (in German) gives the bands for the monthly contribution base:
| Monthly contribution base | Employee share |
|---|---|
| Up to EUR 2,225 | None |
| Up to EUR 2,427 | 1 % |
| Up to EUR 2,630 | 2 % |
| Above that | 2.95% |
The ÖGK says regular pay and special payments are tested separately and not added together, so a month’s pay and a 13th salary can land in different bands. The cut applies only to the employee’s share; the employer’s unemployment share stays unchanged.
Contested flag
The reduced bands end with the last day of 2026, and the 2027 contribution values aren’t published yet. A budget accompanying law published in July 2026 in the Federal Law Gazette (in German) deletes the rule behind the bands from 1 January 2027 and replaces it with a transition. For jobs that exist on 31 December 2026 the lowest rates step up in half-point stages, from 0.5% in 2027 to 2.5% in 2031 for the lowest band; for jobs that start after that date the steps are faster.
The social insurance values for 2027, including the limits above, are due by ordinance in late November 2026. Until they appear, the values in this article are the current ones, and this article states no 2027 value.
Wage tax: how payroll gets the number
Wage tax (Lohnsteuer) is withheld by the employer as an advance on income tax. It isn’t a final figure: the assessment settles the year, and an employee who joined or left mid-year, or whose pay changed, is often over- or under-withheld until then.
For regular pay, payroll starts from gross pay and takes off the social insurance. It also takes off anything the employee has told the employer about (the commuter allowance, union dues the employer withholds) and one twelfth of the yearly flat allowance for work-related expenses of EUR 132, which the finance ministry says is already built into the wage tax tables (in German).
What’s left is multiplied by 12 and put through the tariff, as if the month’s pay repeated all year. The standard employee credit (Verkehrsabsetzbetrag, EUR 496 a year) comes off the tax, and the result is divided by 12. The slip shows the base and the tax, and the tariff itself is in the article on how the income tax brackets work.
Special payments follow a separate path. After their contributions, the first EUR 620 of the year’s special payments is tax-free and the rest is taxed at 6 %, as long as it fits within the annual sixth, according to the income tax act’s rules on special payments (in German). That is why the slip has a second wage tax line in those months.
How the sixth works is in the article on the 13th and 14th salary, and the article on gross to net pay shows how all these deductions combine over a year.
US persons
The payslip’s Austrian wage tax and social insurance are the numbers a US return starts from, because US citizens and residents abroad generally file in the same way as people in the US, according to the IRS page on filing requirements abroad. Austrian withholding doesn’t settle the US side. The article on US persons covers the overlay, and a US-qualified tax professional is the route for the US return.
Lines that appear only for some employees
These lines depend on what the employee has set up with the employer or what the job includes.
- Union dues (Gewerkschaftsbeitrag). Dues withheld by the employer are taken into account in payroll and lower the taxable pay, and they can’t be claimed again in the assessment, according to the finance ministry’s alphabetical guide to work-related expenses (in German). The union sets the amount, not the employer.
- Works council levy (Betriebsratsumlage). The same ministry page says it is withheld in payroll but doesn’t reduce tax there, and it can be claimed in the assessment.
- Commuter allowance (Pendlerpauschale and Pendlereuro). The employer applies them once the employee hands in the printout of the finance ministry’s commuter calculator (form L 34 EDV), as the government portal’s page on applying for them (in German) explains. The Pendlerpauschale lowers the base for wage tax and the Pendlereuro is a credit; the amounts are in the article on the commuter allowance.
- Familienbonus Plus. The credit per child, EUR 166.68 a month for a child under 18, is applied in payroll when the employee gives the employer form E 30, according to the finance ministry’s page on the Familienbonus Plus (in German). It comes off the tax and it must appear on the payslip; the article on the Familienbonus Plus covers who can claim it.
- Overtime pay, supplements and benefits in kind. Overtime appears as its own lines, some tax-free up to limits (the article on overtime and allowances). Benefits such as meal vouchers or a company car add a taxable value to the pay without any cash arriving (the article on employee benefits and the one on the company car benefit).
- Severance fund base. The slip shows the base for the contribution to the severance fund (the BV-Kasse), but the employer pays the contribution itself, so it isn’t deducted from pay. The article on severance pay covers what it builds up.
The Service-Entgelt in November
Every November the payslip carries one line that has nothing to do with income: the Service-Entgelt, the yearly fee for the e-card (the social insurance card). The employer collects it for the following year from employees who are in work with health cover on 15 November, and the ÖGK’s page for employers on the fee for the e-card (in German) says it is withheld from pay.
The fee withheld with the November 2026 pay is the fee for 2027, EUR 26.85. The amount was indexed from 1 January 2026, so it is higher than the EUR 25 withheld in November 2025 for 2026, which is the figure many pages still quote. The fee is indexed every 1 January.
The ÖGK lists who is exempt: marginally employed workers, employees with no pay on 15 November (on maternity benefit, parental leave, military or civilian service, for example), and employees on sick leave who get less than half their pay from the employer. A person with two jobs can find it withheld twice, and the health insurer refunds the excess on application. How the e-card and the social insurance number work is in the article on the social insurance number and e-card.
What the employer pays that isn’t on the slip
A gross salary is not the employer’s cost. The employer pays its own share of social insurance, a contribution to the severance fund, and payroll levies, none of which reduce the employee’s pay or appear as deductions.
| Employer cost | Rate | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Pension insurance | 12.55% | Paid on top of the employee’s share |
| Health insurance | 3.78% | Same base as the employee’s share |
| Accident insurance | 1.10% | Employer only |
| Severance fund (BV-Kasse) | 1.53% | Paid to a fund, not to the employee |
| Unemployment insurance and the insolvency fund supplement | In the same table | Employer shares |
| Dienstgeberbeitrag, its surcharge and Kommunalsteuer | Payroll levies | Calculated on the total payroll |
The first five rows come from the same umbrella-body table as above; the payroll levies in the last row aren’t in it. The business service portal’s page on non-wage costs of employing someone (in German) lists the employer’s social insurance share, the employer contribution to the family burdens fund and its surcharge, and the municipal payroll tax. The article on the cost of a first employee works through what a salary costs the employer in total.
For a hypothetical employee comparing an offer, the point is that the gross figure on the contract and the figure the employer budgets are different numbers, and only the first appears on the slip.
A November payslip, line by line
The numbers below build one November slip, from gross pay to the payout. The pay matches the first example in the article on the 13th and 14th salary, so the two articles can be read side by side.
Illustration
A hypothetical single employee in Graz, Styria, earns a gross EUR 3,500 a month on 14 payments for the tax year, and the November payslip carries the second special payment of EUR 3,500 plus the yearly e-card fee.
Assumptions: a full year with one employer, tax resident in Austria, no children, no commuter allowance, no union dues (a union variant follows), no benefits in kind and no work-related expenses beyond the flat allowance of EUR 132. The first special payment of EUR 3,500 was paid in June. Not a US person, not international organisation staff. Pay stays under all contribution ceilings. Styria matters only for the housing-subsidy contribution, which is the lower rate outside Vienna.
Contributions come first, on gross pay:
| Line | On regular pay | On the special payment |
|---|---|---|
| Health () | EUR 135.45 | EUR 135.45 |
| Pension (10.25%) | EUR 358.75 | EUR 358.75 |
| Unemployment (2.95%) | EUR 103.25 | EUR 103.25 |
| Chamber of labour levy (0.50%) | EUR 17.50 | EUR 0 |
| Housing-subsidy contribution (0.50%) | EUR 17.50 | EUR 0 |
| Total | EUR 632.45 | EUR 597.45 |
The pay is above the top of the reduced unemployment bands, so the full unemployment share applies to both.
Wage tax on regular pay. Payroll takes the EUR 3,500 less EUR 632.45 of contributions and one twelfth of the flat allowance (EUR 11 a month), which leaves EUR 2,856.55. Multiplied by 12 that is EUR 34,278.60, and the tariff applies to it, according to the income tax act’s tariff (in German):
| Tariff band | Annualised pay in band | Tax |
|---|---|---|
| Up to EUR 13,539 at 0 % | EUR 13,539 | EUR 0 |
| EUR 13,539 to EUR 21,992 at 20 % | EUR 8,453 | EUR 1,690.60 |
| EUR 21,992 to EUR 34,278.60 at 30 % | EUR 12,286.60 | EUR 3,685.98 |
| Tariff tax on the annualised pay | EUR 34,278.60 | EUR 5,376.58 |
The Verkehrsabsetzbetrag of EUR 496 comes off, leaving EUR 4,880.58 a year, and a twelfth of that is EUR 406.72 for the month. Payroll uses the employer’s official monthly tables, which work in rounded steps, so a real payslip can differ from this by a few euros.
Wage tax on the special payment. After EUR 597.45 of contributions, the base is EUR 2,902.55. Payroll applies the tax-free first EUR 620 once a year, and in this example June used it: June’s tax was 6 % of EUR 2,282.55, which is EUR 136.95.
In November the whole base meets the rate, so the tax is 6 % of EUR 2,902.55, which is EUR 174.15. The two payments together come to EUR 311.10, a cent less than the EUR 311.11 in the other article, which taxes the year’s special payments in one step; the difference is rounding payment by payment. The sixth is EUR 7,000 (twelve salaries of EUR 3,500 divided by six), exactly the two special payments, so both keep the fixed rate.
The November slip:
| Line | Amount | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Regular pay, gross | EUR 3,500.00 | The month’s salary |
| Special payment, gross | EUR 3,500.00 | The 13th or 14th salary |
| Social insurance on regular pay | EUR 632.45 | 18.07% of EUR 3,500 |
| Social insurance on the special payment | EUR 597.45 | 17.07% of EUR 3,500 |
| Wage tax on regular pay | EUR 406.72 | Annualised tariff, less credit |
| Wage tax on the special payment | EUR 174.15 | Fixed rate on the base |
| Service-Entgelt | EUR 26.85 | The e-card fee for 2027 |
| Net payout | EUR 5,162.38 | EUR 7,000.00 less EUR 1,837.62 |
The deductions are about 26% of the gross EUR 7,000. In a month without a special payment the same employee would take home EUR 2,460.83 (EUR 3,500 less EUR 632.45 less EUR 406.72).
Union variant. Suppose the same employee pays union dues of EUR 35 a month, a hypothetical amount that the union sets. The taxable pay falls to EUR 2,821.55, or EUR 33,858.60 annualised, and the tariff tax becomes EUR 5,250.58, which leaves EUR 4,754.58 after the credit and EUR 396.22 a month. Wage tax is EUR 10.50 lower, so the dues cost EUR 24.50 net, and the contributions and the special payment’s tax are unchanged.
For a hypothetical employee on 14 payments at this pay, the November slip pays out more than twice a normal month. The special payment is taxed lightly: EUR 174.15 of wage tax on EUR 3,500 gross is about 5%, against about 12% on regular pay of the same size, which is why the two payments have separate tax lines.
Wage tax on regular pay is the largest single deduction on the slip, ahead of the pension share.
Bottom line
The 13th and 14th salary are part of pay set by the collective agreement or contract, and the payslip shows them on lines of their own with their own contributions and tax. Social insurance comes off first, wage tax is computed on what’s left, and the November slip adds the e-card fee for the following year. Why a particular slip shows a particular figure depends on the employee’s own set-up, and the employer’s payroll office is the one that can say.
Getting help
The payroll office (Personalverrechnung) at the employer is the first place to ask how a line was computed, and an employee is entitled to the monthly statement with the pay.
For a view of the whole year, a Steuerberater (licensed tax adviser) can go through the figures, and the member directory of the Chamber of Tax Advisers and Auditors shows who holds a licence. Payroll accountants (Bilanzbuchhalter and Personalverrechner) are listed in the Bilanzbuchhaltung register. The article on tax and payroll help sets out who may do what.
For questions about pay, the contract or a missing special payment, the Arbeiterkammer (chamber of labour) advises its members in each state, and its online payslip explainer, Mein Lohnzettel, walks through the lines of a real slip. Disputes about unpaid pay belong with the Arbeiterkammer and, ultimately, the labour and social court.
Official sources
- Income tax act: rules on the payroll statement, Legal Information System of the Republic (in German)
- Contribution values in social insurance for 2026, umbrella body of the social insurance carriers (in German)
- Unemployment insurance contributions at low pay, Austrian Health Insurance Fund (in German)
- Service-Entgelt (fee for the e-card), Austrian Health Insurance Fund (in German)
- Income tax act: rules on special payments, Legal Information System of the Republic (in German)
- Minimum wage in Austria, Federal Ministry of Social Affairs (in German)
