Minimum wage

The amounts of the minimum wage valid from 1 January 2021 are regulated by Act No 663/2007 Coll. on the minimum wage,  laying down the amount of the minimum wage for 2021 as follows:

• a monthly minimum wage for an employee paid a monthly wage of EUR 623.00 and
• an hourly minimum wage of EUR 3.580

The amounts of the minimum wage valid from 1 January 2020 were set by Regulation No 324/2019 Coll. of the Government of the Slovak Republic laying down the amount of the minimum wage for 2020 as follows:

• a monthly minimum wage for an employee paid a monthly wage of EUR 580 and
• an hourly minimum wage of EUR 3,333.

The nominal monthly minimum wage shall only be applied to employees who are paid a monthly wage, work the standard number of hours per week (i.e. there is no agreement for a shorter working time pursuant to Section 49 of the Labour Code with such employees) and who have worked the full standard number of hours in the relevant month.

If a shorter weekly working time has been agreed with an employee or the employee has not worked all the working days or hours in a month, the amount of the monthly minimum wage shall be reduced by the ratio of the time actually worked to the standard monthly number of working hours. The proportionate amount of the minimum wage in euros per month is rounded to the nearest 10 euro cents.

The nominal hourly minimum wage established for the relevant calendar year shall be applied to employees in establishments where the standard number of working hours according to Section 85 of the Labour Code is 40 per week.

In the event that the employer's establishment provides for a weekly working time of less than 40 hours, the amount of the hourly minimum wage shall be increased by a ratio of 40 hours to the established weekly working time; the adjusted amount of the minimum wage in euros per hour shall be rounded to three decimal places.

In the case of an employee with whom a shorter weekly working time has been agreed in the employment contract according to Section 49 of the Labour Code, the amount of the hourly minimum wage shall not be increased due to the shorter working hours. For such an employee, the hourly minimum wage valid for the established weekly working time at the employee's workplace is used as a basis.

An employee is entitled to be paid the difference up to the amount of the minimum wage if their wage in a calendar month is less than the minimum wage. When making the comparison, the amount of the employee's gross wage may not include any benefits that are not considered to be wage according to Section 118(2) of the Labour Code (for example, wage compensation or standby allowance).

The additional amount to be paid is equal to the difference between the minimum wage valid for the relevant calendar year adjusted by the number of hours worked by the employee in the relevant month and the wage actually earned by the employee. When calculating the difference, the amounts of overtime pay, additional pay for work on public holidays, additional pay for night work, standby allowance for the inactive part of on-call time at the workplace, wage compensation for difficult working conditions, additional pay for work on Saturday and additional pay for work on Sunday must be disregarded.

This will ensure that the amounts of the defined claimable wage components are identified, in addition to the wage amount that is to be increased to reach the minimum wage. All other wage components (e.g. bonuses, performance bonuses, personal incentives, non-claimable allowances and benefits) shall be included in the employee’s total wage to be compared with the minimum wage.

For the purposes of calculating the hourly rate of the wage earned and adjusted as described above, the number of hours worked per month shall not include overtime hours and the duration of the inactive part of on-call time at the workplace.