A one-off cash payment made by the employer to an employee is referred to as severance pay if this payment is made on the occasion of the termination of the employment relationship. The purpose of the severance payment is to partially compensate for the salary payments that will not be paid in future due to the termination of the employment relationship and to give employees time to look for a new job.

Mini-jobbers and part-time employees have the same entitlements and rights as full-time employees.

No, if you resign yourself, there is no reason for the employer to pay a severance payment. As a rule, employers only pay this if they wish to terminate the employment relationship and have no grounds for dismissal.

In principle, the amount of severance pay is a matter for negotiation. The following calculation is often used as a ‘rule of thumb’: half gross salary x years of employment = severance payment amount. However, this is only an orientation value. We normally achieve a much higher settlement amount for our clients.

A severance payment is subject to income tax. However, the tax is slightly reduced due to the one-fifth rule and social security contributions are not payable.

You should contact a lawyer for employment law immediately. Firstly, you only have three weeks (from receipt of the notice of termination) to file a complaint. Secondly, notices of termination often have formal errors (e.g. an unauthorised person has signed the notice of termination). In this case, the termination could be legally rejected so that it would be invalid. However, you only have one week to do this, after which a rejection is usually out of time.

If you have received a termination notice from your employer in Germany and wish to file an appeal with the labour court, you must file an action for protection against dismissal within three weeks of receiving the written termination notice, otherwise the termination would be effective. This deadline is set out in the Termination Protection Act and is very strict.

As soon as you know that you will be unemployed, you are obliged to report to the employment agency immediately, because if you do not do so within 3 days of receiving your notice of termination, you will be suspended from receiving unemployment benefit. If it takes more than 3 months until the employment relationship is terminated, it is sufficient to report to the employment agency at least one day before the 3-month period expires. It is better to go there 3 months plus 1 week earlier.

If you have legal expenses insurance, you will not incur any costs. If you have an excess with your insurance, this is usually between 150 – 300 EUR. If you do not have legal expenses insurance, don’t worry. With us, there are no hidden fees or additional costs. Everything is clearly communicated in advance. We charge in accordance with the German Lawyers‘ Fees Act, i.e. the statutory minimum.