Illustrative image (internet)

Maintaining social insurance contributions until the labourers are retired will help them to receive many benefits from the social insurance policy, especially receiving a pension when they retire.

Voluntary social insurance is believed to be the security "cradle" to help unofficial workers receive a pension when they get old. Illustrative Photo

The voluntary social insurance policy has humanistic and superior values, bringing practical benefits to participants.

When participating in voluntary social insurance, participants will receive partial support from the State for payment according to regulations and can choose flexible payment methods, suitable to their own income, such as periodic payment (monthly; every three months; every six months; every year; every two, three, four or five years) or pay one time for the remaining years (not more than 10 years) to qualify for receiving the pension.

After receiving support from the State, the lowest payment level for voluntary social insurance participants is currently VND231,000 (US$9.6) per month for a poor household; and VND247,000 ($10.2) per month for a near-poor household; and VND297,000 ($12.3) for other groups.

Besides, many provinces now have provided additional support from the local budget, beyond the level prescribed by the State, to help the voluntary social insurance participants.

It aims to create conditions for unofficial workers to access and receive benefits from the social insurance policy.

Therefore, the actual amount paid by the voluntary social insurance participants in the provinces continues to be lower.

The procedures to participate in voluntary social insurance are also convenient and quick.

People can register and participate via two forms as follows:

1. Direct form

The participants submit documents and pay voluntary social insurance premiums according to regulations at the collection service organisation, which is authorised to collect social and health insurance, or the social security office near the participants’ place of residence or temporary residence.

After paying the voluntary social insurance contributions to the staff of the collection service organisation, participants can look up and control their voluntary social insurance payment information.

The information is public and transparent so that the rights of the participants are always guaranteed according to regulations.

Specifically, participants can look up detailed information about voluntary social insurance contributions at the Viet Nam Social Security Portal at: https://baohiemxahoi.gov.vn/ with the following steps:

Step 1: The participants access the portal at https://baohiemxahoi.gov.vn/

Step 2: Select the Online Lookup function

Step 3: Select the function of Looking up social and health insurance contributions

Step 4: Enter information to look up, including: Confirmation code (provided by the collection service organisation)

Step 5: Viet Nam Social Security provides information to participants according to the Confirmation Code and Social Insurance Code/Identity card numbers.

The provided information includes participant information such as social insurance code, full name, date of birth, gender, identity card numbers, participation type (voluntary social insurance, health insurance), payment amount, number of months of payment, record date; information of the collection service organisation such as the collection service organisation code, the collection service organisation name, collection staff code, collection staff name, code of the social insurance agency that the participant signed the contract, name of the social insurance agency that the participant signed the contract.

2. Online form

Participants do not need to go directly to the social insurance agency or authorised service organisation to pay social and health insurance contributions.

They can pay and submit voluntary social insurance contributions online via the Public Service Portal of Viet Nam Social Security or the National Service Portal with the process highly automated; or on the online application of some banks that ensure fast and convenient transactions, specifically:

2.1. Through Viet Nam Social Security’s Public Service Portal or the National Service Portal

Participants can carry out procedures on the National Service Portal (at: https://dichvucong.gov.vn/p/home/dvc-trang-chu.html) or the Viet Nam Social Security’s Public Service Portal (at https://dichvucong.baohiemxahoi.gov.vn). Applicable cases include registering to participate in voluntary social insurance for the first time; continuing to pay the voluntary social insurance contributions.

2.2. Through the bank's online apps

Currently, Viet Nam Social Security has signed bilateral electronic payment agreements with banking systems, such as Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam (Vietcombank), Military Commercial Joint Stock Bank (MB); Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BIDV); and Vietnam Bank for Industry and Trade (Viettinbank) to create convenience for people and businesses to participate in and enjoy social and health insurance policies in the spirit of the Government's direction on promoting non-cash payments. Accordingly, participants can continue to pay the voluntary social insurance contributions on the online applications of the banks with simple and easy-to-follow operations. The steps are as follows:

Step 1: Log in to the bank's application, find the Social Insurance section (depending on the display of the application, the section may be in the Payments or State budget section).

Step 2: Choose the type of service you want to perform named continuing to pay voluntary social insurance; select payers for individual or organisational customers; select the province or city where you register to pay voluntary social insurance; enter the social insurance book number or social insurance code if the payer is an organisation; check and confirm payment information.

Step 3: Enter the OTP code sent by the bank to complete the transaction.

 Pension is a solid support for workers at their old age

Registration and payment of voluntary social insurance through the service portals and online applications of some banks have been highly appreciated by participants because of fast and convenient transactions that can be done anywhere, at any time on devices (computers or smartphones) with an internet connection.

Statistics showed that by the end of August, the country had about 17.5 million people participating in social insurance, including nearly 1.5 million people participated in voluntary social insurance.

By August 18, there are 3,141 participants continuing their voluntary social insurance contributions through the National Service Portal./.