Thai Labour Law: Employer Rules, Employee Rights and When to Call a Labour Lawyer

Reviewed by ThaiLawOnline, a licensed Thai law firm practising in Thailand since 2006. Thai lawyer of record: Wichuda Atthamethakon, LL.M., Thai Bar Licence 3149/2556.

Last updated on 24 September 2026

Thai employment is governed mainly by the Labour Protection Act B.E. 2541 (1998), as amended. It sets the floor: minimum wage, working hours, leave, and above all what an employer must pay when it ends someone’s employment. These rules apply to a foreign employee working in Thailand just as they apply to a Thai one, and a contract cannot take them away. This page covers the parts that matter most in practice, with the section numbers so you can check them.

Employment duties begin as soon as the company hires, as explained in our guide to business setup in Thailand.

Severance Pay: the Rule Employers Underestimate

If an employer terminates an employee who has worked at least 120 days, and the dismissal is not for one of the serious causes in the Act, statutory severance is due on top of any notice pay. The amount rises with length of service (Labour Protection Act sections 118 to 122):

Continuous service	Severance (days of last wage)
120 days but less than 1 year	30 days
1 year but less than 3 years	90 days
3 years but less than 6 years	180 days
6 years but less than 10 years	240 days
10 years but less than 20 years	300 days
20 years or more	400 days

The top tier, 400 days for twenty years of service, was added by the Labour Protection Act (No. 7) B.E. 2562, effective 5 May 2019. A long-serving employee is therefore entitled to more than thirteen months of pay on termination, and this is the figure that surprises employers who assumed a month or two would cover it. Severance is not due where the employee resigns, or where dismissal is for a serious cause listed in section 119, such as dishonesty, an intentional criminal act against the employer, or gross negligence causing serious damage.

Can Severance Be Waived? Advance Waiver Void, Release After Termination Valid

Severance and annual leave pay cannot be signed away while the employment continues. The Labour Protection Act is a law of public order, and the Supreme Court has confirmed that an agreement made in advance to exclude an employee from its protection is void under section 150 of the Civil and Commercial Code. A clause in the employment contract, the work rules or a retirement scheme that says no severance will be payable has no effect, and the employee can still claim the statutory amount.

The position changes once the employment has ended. In Supreme Court Decision No. 1162/2569 (Labour Division, 2026), a company president who retired on 31 August 2020 signed two receipt documents on his retirement date stating that he had been paid in full and would claim nothing further, then sued for severance of more than 6.2 million baht and annual leave pay. The Court held that the employment relationship ended on the retirement date, that the documents were a compromise under section 850 settling an existing dispute by mutual concessions, and that because he knew the amounts due, held the most senior position and was not under pressure from his employer, the compromise bound him and extinguished the waived claims under section 852. The severance and leave pay claims were dismissed. The practical lessons for employees before they sign an exit document, and for employers drafting one, are set out in our guide to the severance pay waiver rule in Thailand.

Notice of Termination

Separate from severance is advance notice. For an employment contract with no fixed end date, section 17 requires notice of one pay period: given at or before a wage-payment date, to take effect on the next payment date, and never more than three months. The employer can pay wages in lieu of that notice instead of having the employee work it. Section 17/1 puts a figure on that: where the employer ends the contract without the notice section 17 requires, it must pay the employee, on the day it puts them out, the wages they would have earned up to the date the termination would have taken effect. Notice and severance are two different obligations, and a terminated employee is generally entitled to both.

Working Hours and Overtime

Normal working hours are capped at 8 hours a day and 48 hours a week for non-hazardous work, and 7 hours a day and 42 hours a week for work classified as hazardous (section 23). Employees are entitled to a rest period of at least one hour after five hours of work, at least one weekly holiday, and the traditional public holidays. Overtime rates are fixed by the Act, not by the contract. Overtime on a normal working day is paid at not less than 1.5 times the hourly wage (section 61). Work on a weekly, traditional or annual holiday is paid at not less than one extra time the hourly wage for an employee who is paid for holidays, and not less than 2 times for an employee who is not (section 62). Overtime worked on a holiday is paid at not less than 3 times the hourly wage (section 63). Where the employer has agreed a higher rate, the agreement governs (section 74). Overtime generally requires the employee’s consent.

Leave

• Annual holiday: at least 6 working days a year once the employee has completed one full year of service (section 30).
• Sick leave: as long as the employee is genuinely sick (section 32), with the employer paying wages at the working-day rate for up to 30 working days a year (section 57). A medical certificate can be required for an absence of three working days or more. Days off because of a work injury, and maternity leave under section 41, are not counted as sick leave.
• Maternity leave: up to 120 days per pregnancy, counting holidays that fall within the leave and days taken for prenatal check-ups. The employer pays full wages for up to 60 of those days (section 41 and section 59), and the Social Security Fund pays a separate benefit of 50% of wages for up to 90 days. Until the Labour Protection Act (No. 9) B.E. 2568 came into force on 7 December 2025 the leave was 98 days and the employer’s share of it 45 days. The Social Security benefit was not changed by that Act; it is paid under the Social Security Act and is unaffected by the 2025 amendment.
• Spouse leave (paternity leave): up to 15 days on full wages for an employee whose spouse gives birth, to be taken within 90 days of the birth (section 41/1 and section 59/2). This is new in the 2025 amendment and is drafted by reference to the employee’s spouse rather than the employee’s sex, so it is available to husbands and, following the 2024 marriage equality amendments, to same-sex spouses.
• Infant-care leave: a further 15 days on top of maternity leave, paid at 50% of wages, where a medical certificate shows the newborn has a condition, an abnormality or a disability that requires care (section 41 and section 59/1). Also new in the 2025 amendment.
• Business leave: at least 3 working days a year for necessary personal business (section 34), paid by the employer for up to 3 working days a year (section 57/1).
• Military call-up leave for inspection, training or readiness testing (section 35), paid for up to 60 days a year (section 58), and training leave on the conditions set by ministerial regulation (section 36).

Minimum Wage

Minimum wage is a daily rate set by province and reviewed periodically, so check the current figure for the province where the work is performed rather than relying on a single national number. It applies to all employees, Thai and foreign alike, and a contract paying below it is unenforceable to that extent. Our guide to the minimum wage in Thailand gives the current provincial rates and the date they took effect.

Thai Labour Law for Foreign Employees

The Labour Protection Act applies to a foreign employee in Thailand in full. Severance, notice, overtime, leave and the right to bring a claim in the Labour Court do not depend on nationality, and a contract written abroad cannot reduce them. A foreign teacher on a one-year contract, an engineer on secondment and a Thai colleague in the same office are on the same statutory floor. What nationality changes is permission to work, which is a separate body of law with its own penalties.

Permission to work is granted under the Emergency Decree on Managing the Work of Foreigners B.E. 2560, as amended by the Emergency Decree (No. 2) B.E. 2561, and it is tied to the employer named in it. Section 13 puts two duties on that employer: tell the registrar the foreign employee’s name, nationality and the nature of the work within 15 days of the hiring, and tell the registrar within 15 days of the employee leaving, stating why they left. Some occupations are reserved to Thai nationals by ministerial notification. Our e-Work Permit guide covers the application, the renewal and the documents.

The practical difficulty for a dismissed foreign employee is that the job, the work permit and the visa fall together, and the permission to stay is usually cut short once the employment ends. The claim for severance survives your departure, but it is far harder to run from outside Thailand. Take advice in the week the termination is announced, not after the permit has been cancelled.

Employee Welfare Fund: Contributions From 1 October 2026

Added 15 September 2026. From 1 October 2026, employers must start paying into the Employee Welfare Fund set up under Chapter 13 of the Labour Protection Act B.E. 2541. The start date is fixed by the Royal Decree on the Starting Period of the Collection of Contributions for the Employee Welfare Fund B.E. 2568, published in the Royal Gazette on 14 September 2025, after the original October 2025 start was postponed by a year. The fund pays out to employees when their employment ends, and to their heirs on death.

• Who must contribute: employers with ten or more employees, Thai and foreign staff alike.
• Who is exempt: an employer whose registered provident fund covers all of its employees, or which runs an alternative scheme for employees on termination or death that meets the conditions of the law. A provident fund that covers only some staff does not exempt the others.
• Rates: 0.25 percent of each employee’s monthly wages, deducted from pay, matched by 0.25 percent from the employer, from 1 October 2026 to 30 September 2031. Both rates rise to 0.50 percent from 1 October 2031.
• Deadline: both amounts must be remitted by the 15th of the month following the deduction, so the first payment, for October 2026 wages, is due by 15 November 2026. Late payment attracts a surcharge of 5 percent per month on the amount outstanding.

What to do before 1 October: check whether your provident fund really covers every employee, set up the deduction in the October payroll, and make sure your employment contracts or work rules record the welfare-fund deduction. Primary sources: Royal Decree B.E. 2568 fixing the start date; Ministerial Regulation B.E. 2568 setting the rates, including the 2031 increase; remittance rules, clauses 5 and 7.

Employee Welfare Fund: five steps to prepare October payroll

Migrant Worker Deadlines: 28 September and 11 December 2026

Employers of Lao, Myanmar and Vietnamese workers face two separate cut-offs this year. Workers whose permission ends on 11 December 2026 (Cabinet resolution of 14 July 2026) can be renewed through e-WorkPermit between 8 September and 11 December 2026, for 100 THB plus 900 THB, with passport or substitute document, health check and social security or insurance evidence. Workers from the 31 March 2026 renewal group had to complete their visa or temporary-stay stamp at Immigration by 28 September 2026. The groups do not overlap, so check the Cabinet resolution and the expiry date on the existing permit before acting. Our e-Work Permit guide sets out the documents and the sources.

Where Disputes Go: Unfair Dismissal and the Labour Court

Employment disputes are heard by the Labour Court, which is designed to be quicker and less formal than the ordinary courts, and an employee does not pay court fees to bring a claim. Unfair dismissal has its own statute, and it is not the Labour Protection Act: it is section 49 of the Act on the Establishment of Labour Courts and Labour Court Procedure B.E. 2522. If the court finds the dismissal unfair it may order the employer to take the employee back at the wage they were on when they were dismissed. If it finds that the two can no longer work together, it fixes damages instead, weighing the employee’s age, their length of service, the hardship the dismissal causes them, the reason for the dismissal and the severance they are already entitled to. That award sits on top of statutory severance, which is why terminating without proper grounds and a proper process is expensive in Thailand. Employers planning a restructuring should read our guide to employment law for employers.

Deadlines for a Claim, and the Labour Inspector Route

Two different clocks run after a dismissal, and employees routinely assume the shorter one applies to everything. A claim for unpaid wages, overtime or other remuneration is an employee’s claim for pay and prescribes in 2 years under section 193/34(9) of the Civil and Commercial Code. Severance and pay in lieu of notice are not wages: they fall under the general 10 year period in section 193/30, counted from the date of dismissal, which is the day the claim can first be enforced under section 193/12. The Supreme Court applied exactly that in Decision No. 892/2560, where an employee dismissed on 20 October 2004 sued for severance and pay in lieu of notice on 11 December 2014 and was out of time by weeks.

An employee who is owed money under the Act does not have to sue for it. Section 123 allows a complaint to a labour inspector, in the area where the employee works or where the employer is domiciled, on the form the Director-General prescribes. The inspector investigates and must issue an order within 60 days of receiving the complaint, extendable by up to 30 days more with the Director-General’s permission (section 124). If the order is in the employee’s favour, the employer must pay within 30 days of learning of it. Either side that is unhappy with the order has 30 days from learning of it to take the case to court, and an employer that does so must first deposit the ordered amount with the court; if nobody goes to court in time, the order is final (section 125).

The inspector route costs nothing and suits a clean money claim. It does not reach compensation for unfair dismissal, which only the Labour Court can award under section 49. Where both are in play, the choice of route should be made before either clock runs down.

Frequently Asked Questions

Hiring a Labour Lawyer in Thailand: What We Do for Employers and Employees

We act for both employers and employees, in Bangkok and elsewhere in Thailand. Most labour work turns on documents that already exist, so the first step is reading the contract, the work rules and whatever was said in writing at the end.

For employers:

• Employment contracts, work rules and policies that meet the Act rather than repeat a foreign template.
• The termination number worked out before you act: severance under section 118, notice or pay in lieu under sections 17 and 17/1, unused annual holiday.
• Exit documents drafted so a release actually binds, on the reasoning in Decision No. 1162/2569 above.
• Defending a section 49 unfair-dismissal claim, or a labour inspector’s order under section 124.
• Foreign hires: the permit, the reserved occupations and the section 13 notifications on hiring and on leaving.

For employees:

• Whether the dismissal was lawful, and whether it was unfair within the meaning of section 49.
• What you are owed, calculated: severance, notice, holiday pay, overtime.
• Which route to take, the labour inspector or the Labour Court, and what each one can and cannot award.
• Representation at the Labour Court.
• A review of any exit document, release or settlement before you sign it, not after.

An initial consultation is 2,000 THB per hour. A labour matter is quoted per case once we have read the documents, because the work depends on the length of service, the reason given and what was put in writing. Book a consultation, or see our legal fees and our employment agreement templates.

Last reviewed: 24 September 2026, when the page was also expanded and one correction was made: compensation for unfair dismissal was attributed to “the Act” in a passage about the Labour Protection Act, and it is governed by section 49 of the Act on the Establishment of Labour Courts and Labour Court Procedure B.E. 2522, which is now cited and quoted in substance. Read against the Krisdika consolidated text of the Labour Protection Act on 24 September 2026, which is current to Act (No. 7) B.E. 2562: sections 17/1, 32, 34, 57, 57/1, 61, 62, 63 and 74, and the labour inspector procedure in sections 123 to 125. The two later amendments are treated separately on this page: Act (No. 8) B.E. 2566 on work from home, and Act (No. 9) B.E. 2568 on family leave. Also read on 24 September 2026: section 49 of the Labour Court Act B.E. 2522; sections 193/12, 193/30 and 193/34(9) of the Civil and Commercial Code; section 13 of the Emergency Decree on Managing the Work of Foreigners B.E. 2560; and Supreme Court Decision No. 892/2560 (Labour Division), read to its disposition in the text issued by the Office of Judicial Assistants of the Supreme Court, which holds severance and pay in lieu of notice to be subject to the ten-year period in section 193/30 running from the dismissal date. Verified on 5 September 2026: the severance bands in section 118 (30/90/180/240/300/400 days, the 400-day tier added by the Labour Protection Act (No. 7) B.E. 2562), the serious causes in section 119, the notice rule in section 17 including the three-month ceiling, working hours in section 23 (8 a day and 48 a week, 7 and 42 for hazardous work), and annual holiday in section 30. Supreme Court Decision No. 1162/2569 was read in full in the text issued by the Office of Judicial Assistants of the Supreme Court as reproduced at deka.in.th; the Supreme Court’s own search database was not reachable on the day of review and the citation will be re-checked against it. The 2025 family-leave figures were checked against the Labour Protection Act (No. 9) B.E. 2568 itself, published in the Royal Gazette on 7 November 2025 and in force 7 December 2025: maternity leave of 120 days with the employer paying up to 60, spouse-assistance leave of 15 fully paid days within 90 days of the birth under sections 41/1 and 59/2, and infant-care leave of 15 days at half wages under section 41 paragraph four and section 59/1. Not verified against a primary source, and stated here so the date above does not imply more than it should: the Social Security Fund maternity benefit of 50 per cent for 90 days, which is paid under the Social Security Act and not under the Labour Protection Act.

A note from experience: the most common and costly mistake we see is an employer treating a termination as a simple matter of one month’s notice, then discovering that a long-serving employee is owed six months to over a year of severance, plus a possible unfair-dismissal award on top. Work the number out before you act, not after. Contact us for a calculation on a specific case.