Redundancy Payment Ireland: How Much You're Owed

JobChamp Guide · Updated July 17, 2026

Under the Redundancy Payments Acts 1967 to 2014, a redundancy payment Ireland calculation comes down to three numbers: your reckonable years of service, your weekly gross pay capped at €600, and one extra bonus week on top. You need at least 2 years of insurable employment to qualify, and the statutory lump sum you receive is entirely tax-free.

What counts as a genuine redundancy (and what doesn't)

Redundancy is not just a polite word for being let go. Under the Redundancy Payments Act 1967, a dismissal is only a genuine redundancy if it fits one of a small number of legal definitions, and in every case it is the job that has to disappear, not you personally. The recognised grounds are:

• Your employer's business, or the part of it you work in, is closing down or moving location.
• The business needs fewer or no employees at all going forward.
• Your employer no longer needs employees to do work of the particular kind you were doing, or needs fewer of them.
• Your role is being reorganised so that the work is done differently, by fewer people, or by new technology.
• There is a genuine reduction in the amount of work available for someone with your skills.

If your employer hires someone else to do essentially the same job shortly afterwards, or your "redundancy" conveniently coincides with a personality clash or a period out sick, that is a strong signal the redundancy may not be genuine at all, and may in fact be a disguised, unfair dismissal.

Unfair selection: when redundancy becomes unfair dismissal

Even where the redundancy itself is completely genuine, you can still have a valid claim if you were unfairly selected for it. Your employer should apply selection criteria consistently and fairly, whether that is an agreed procedure such as last in, first out, or a scored matrix of skills and performance. Selecting you because you are pregnant, on parental leave, active in a trade union, have made a protected disclosure, or asserted a statutory right at work is unlawful, and departing from an agreed selection procedure without a good reason can also turn an otherwise genuine redundancy into an unfair dismissal you can challenge at the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC).

Do you qualify for a statutory redundancy payment?

To qualify for a statutory redundancy payment you generally need to tick all of the following boxes:

• You are aged 16 or over. There is no upper age limit.
• You have at least 2 years, meaning 104 weeks, of continuous service with the same employer.
• Your employment was insurable for all benefits under the Social Welfare Acts, in other words ordinary PRSI Class A employment.
• You are actually being made redundant, laid off, or kept on short-time under the statutory rules, rather than dismissed for conduct or performance reasons.

How the statutory redundancy payment is calculated

The formula itself is straightforward: 2 weeks' gross pay for every year of reckonable service, plus 1 additional bonus week. Part years count on a pro-rata basis. Your weekly pay is capped at €600 for this calculation, which works out to a maximum reckonable annual pay of €31,200, no matter how much more you actually earn.

Worked example

Say you have 6 years and 6 months of reckonable service and your actual gross weekly pay is €680. Because that is above the €600 ceiling, the calculation uses €600, not your real wage. The maths runs: 2 weeks × 6.5 years = 13 weeks, plus the 1 bonus week, giving 14 weeks in total. At €600 a week, that is 14 × €600 = €8,400, paid as a single tax-free lump sum.

Is the redundancy payment taxed?

No. The statutory redundancy payment calculated under the formula above is fully exempt from income tax, USC and PRSI, regardless of how large it is. This is separate from any additional, non-statutory ex-gratia sum your employer might offer on top, which can carry its own tax-free thresholds and is worth checking with Revenue or an accountant before you sign anything.

Notice: how much warning you must get

Your employer must give you at least 2 weeks' written notice of redundancy specifically, under the Redundancy Payments Act. Separately, the Minimum Notice and Terms of Employment Act 1973 sets out general minimum notice that scales with your length of service, and whichever notice period is longer, or whatever your contract promises if it is more generous, is what applies. For the full breakdown by years of service, see our guide on notice periods in Ireland.

Collective redundancies: extra rules when many jobs go at once

When an employer plans to let go of a significant number of staff at the same time, the Protection of Employment Acts 1977 to 2024 add extra obligations on top of the individual rules. A collective redundancy is triggered within any 30 consecutive days once the numbers involved cross a threshold tied to the size of the workforce: 5 or more redundancies in a workplace of 21 to 49 employees, 10 or more in one of 50 to 99, 10% of the workforce in one of 100 to 299, or 30 or more in a workplace of 300 or more.

Once a collective redundancy is proposed, the employer must consult employee representatives at the earliest opportunity, at least 30 days before the first notice of dismissal is issued, and must notify the Minister for Enterprise, Tourism and Employment of the proposed redundancies. No dismissal notices can take effect until that 30-day window has passed. Since a 2024 amendment, this notification duty applies even where the redundancies are being driven by the employer's own insolvency.

What if your employer can't pay: the insolvency route

If your employer is insolvent, or can genuinely show they are unable to pay your statutory redundancy lump sum, you are not simply left without it. A claim, historically made on the paper RP50 form and now largely handled online, can be submitted to the Department of Social Protection's Redundancy Payment Scheme. Once your entitlement is confirmed, most commonly after a WRC decision where the employer disputes liability, the statutory payment is made directly to you from the Social Insurance Fund rather than out of your employer's own pocket.

What to do if you disagree with your redundancy

Start by raising your concerns directly and in writing with your employer, whether that is about the genuineness of the redundancy, the selection process, the notice given, or the figures used in the payment calculation. If that does not resolve things, you can bring a complaint to the Workplace Relations Commission, generally within 6 months of the dismissal, extendable to 12 months in exceptional circumstances. A trade union, if you are a member, or an employment solicitor can help you assess whether your case is strong before you commit to a formal claim.

Frequently asked questions

This article is general information and not legal advice for your specific situation. For concrete disputes, contact the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC), Citizens Information, your trade union, or an employment solicitor.