First, it is necessary to understand the retirement age under current normal working conditions. According to Article 1 of Decree 135/2020/ND-CP: Effective from January 1, 2021, the retirement age for employees under normal working conditions is 60 years and 3 months for males and 55 years and 4 months for females. Subsequently, each year, an additional 3 months is added for males until reaching the age of 62 in 2028, and an additional 4 months is added for females until reaching the age of 60 in 2035.

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Therefore, the retirement age for employees under normal conditions in 2023 is: 60 years and 9 months for males and 56 years for females. In 2024, the retirement age for employees under normal conditions is: 61 years for males and 56 years and 4 months for females.

If an employee retires before the retirement age milestones mentioned above, it is considered early retirement and subject to deduction of pension rates. Specifically, according to Article 54 of the Social Insurance Law 2014, most cases of early retirement are subject to a deduction rate of 2% for each year of early retirement. Except for the following cases:

Civil servants

According to the regulations in Article 5 of Decree 29/2023/ND-CP, civil servants who retire early without deduction of pension rates fall into five cases of personnel reduction, including:

- Personnel subject to staffing reductions who are younger by up to 5 years and at least 2 years than the minimum retirement age stipulated, and have contributed to social insurance for a mandatory period of 20 years, including at least 15 years of heavy, hazardous, or particularly heavy and hazardous work as listed by the Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs, or have worked for at least 15 years in areas with particularly difficult socio-economic conditions as stipulated by the Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs, including the time worked in places with a region allowance coefficient of 0.7 or higher before January 1, 2021.

- Personnel subject to staffing reductions who are younger by up to 5 years and at least 2 years than the minimum retirement age under normal working conditions as stipulated and have contributed to social insurance for a mandatory period of 20 years or more, are entitled to pension benefits as stipulated in Article 54 of the Social Insurance Law 2014 (amended by point a, clause 1 of Article 219 of the 2019 Labor Code).

- Personnel subject to staffing reductions who are younger than the minimum retirement age by less than 2 years and have contributed to social insurance for a mandatory period of 20 years or more, including at least 15 years of heavy, hazardous, or particularly heavy and hazardous work as listed by the Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs, or have worked for at least 15 years in areas with particularly difficult socio-economic conditions as stipulated by the Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs, including the time worked in places with a region allowance coefficient of 0.7 or higher before January 1, 2021.

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- Personnel subject to staffing reductions who are younger than the minimum retirement age by less than 2 years under normal working conditions and have contributed to social insurance for a mandatory period of 20 years or more (for female commune-level civil servants, a mandatory period of 15 years or more is required).

- Female commune-level civil servants who are younger by up to 5 years and at least 2 years than the minimum retirement age under normal working conditions and have contributed to social insurance for a mandatory period of 15 to less than 20 years.

Workers

Based on Article 2 of the Social Insurance Law 2014, workers who meet the conditions for receiving pensions as stipulated in Article 54 of the Social Insurance Law 2014 are entitled to a monthly pension.

Based on Article 54 of the Social Insurance Law 2014 (amended by point a, clause 1 of Article 219 of the 2019 Labor Code), cases of early retirement without deduction of pension rates include:

Workers who have worked for at least 15 years in areas with particularly difficult socio-economic conditions, including the time worked in places with a region allowance coefficient of 0.7 or higher before January 1, 2021.

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Based on point b, clause 1 of Article 54 of the Social Insurance Law 2014 (amended by point a, clause 1 of Article 219 of the 2019 Labor Code), workers who have reached the age as stipulated in Article 169, clause 3 of the 2019 Labor Code and have worked for at least 15 years in heavy, hazardous, or particularly heavy and hazardous occupations as listed by the Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs, or have worked for at least 15 years in areas with particularly difficult socio-economic conditions, including the time worked in places with a region allowance coefficient of 0.7 or higher before January 1, 2021, or are younger by up to 10 years than the retirement age stipulated for workers in Article 169, clause 2 of the 2019 Labor Code.

This includes those who have worked for at least 15 years in coal mining as specified in point c, clause 1 of Article 54 of the Social Insurance Law 2014 (amended by point a, clause 1 of Article 219 of the 2019 Labor Code).

Workers infected with HIV due to occupational accidents while performing assigned tasks.

Workers in these cases will not have their pension rates deducted as stipulated in point d, clause 1 of Article 54 of the Social Insurance Law 2014 (amended by point a, clause 1 of Article 219 of the 2019 Labor Code).