Thousands of workers won’t have Tet bonus In the current big economic difficulties, businesses would have to fasten their belt and reserve limited budgets for Tet bonus for workers, according to the Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs (MOLISA).   One-month salary bonus offered by profitable businesses A lot of businesses said they would offer the Tet bonuses equal to workers’ one-month salary. Ngo Van Thanh, General Director of PISD, an oil and gas service development firm, said the company spends VND700 million every year to give to workers as Tet bonus. No detailed plan has been drawn for this year, but Thanh said every worker would receive one-month salary more as their award in 2013, or VND11-12 million. A senior executive of the Vietnam Coal and Mineral Industries Group (Vinacomin) also said every worker would get the 13th-month salary as Tet bonus, though the group meets big difficulties in 2013 due to the big inventories. Commercial banks have reported the lower Tet bonuses this year than the previous year. Some of them have even warned their workers that there would be no Tet bonus due to the bad business performance. Thai Thang Long, Director of the Ninh Binh branch of Vietcombank, said after the equitization, the branch’s workers have not got bonuses, while their incomes depend on the business result. Ninh Binh is a newly set up branch which has the operation scale smaller than other branches. According to the Vietnam Labor Union, from January 1, 2014, the regional minimum age would increase by 15 percent. Therefore, foreign invested enterprises are considering adjusting the salaries and Tet bonuses for their workers. A 100 percent South Korean enterprise in the Tay Bac Cu Chi Industrial Zone last year spent VND25 billion on Tet bonus for its 10,000 workers. It plans to spend VND28 billion this year because of the wage increase. Most of the foreign invested enterprises in HCM City and BInh Duong province have planned to award one-month salary to workers, about VND3-5 million to each. Besides, the workers in some companies also receive rice, vegetable oil and sugar, worth VND200,000-500,000. Thousands of workers have no salary, bonus Pham Van Thanh, a senior official of MOLISA, who has checked the Tet bonus reports submitted by the enterprises in Hanoi, noted that there is a big difference in the Tet bonus budgets of the enterprises. The highest monthly salary offered by domestic enterprises to managers is VND37 million, while the lowest level is VND10 million. The workers at foreign invested enterprises receive better pay than domestic ones. Managers can earn up to VND80 million a month, while workers VND6-7 million. According to Thanh, a lot of workers would not get salaries or Tet bonuses as their enterprises have been dissolved or stopped operation. In Hanoi alone, 12,000 businesses out of the 140,000 businesses in the city have stopped operation so far this year, which means that thousands of workers may not receive salaries and Tet bonuses. Mai Duc Chinh, Deputy Chair of the Vietnam Labor Union, has denied the fact that the minimum wage increase, to be valid from January 1, 2014, would affect the enterprises’ pay fund, saying that in reality, a lot of enterprises pay higher than the minimum levels. Tien Phong