Korean Job Discussion Forums

teacha · Joined: 09 Oct 2008 Location: South Korea

(this is only relevant for those whose home countries let them collect their korean pension.

I'm making the same salary each month with my GEPIK public school

2,100,000

and with the matching 4.5% pension deduction, the amount put in to my fund came to 189,000 won a month.

Now I noticed on www.npc.or.kr, my school is only reporting my salary as

1,438,000 won

for both July and August instead of the usual 2,100,000 that they reported for the previous 8 months.

As a result, I'm only receiving 129,420 won a month for these months instead of my usual 189,000.

The lady in my school's administration said this is because the government is no longer considering your full income when taking out pension. That this is a new rule that just went into affect in July and it's affecting all teachers, korean and foreign alike.

Has anyone else heard about this new rule?

OculisOrbis · Joined: 17 Jul 2006

many schools are trying that now and the pension office is backing them up. its because we get a 30% reduction in our taxable income (for TAX purposes) so they are trying to apply it to everything - and nobody (the tax office) will tell them they can't. i argued with my school about it and they now pay the full 4.5%, although they didnt want to nor did they have to if they hadnt caved in at my insistence. there's nothing in any legislation that says it applies across the board, but the standard reply from everyone is: "it's korean law." ask them to 'show me' and watch the stammering begin.

teacha · Joined: 09 Oct 2008 Location: South Korea

thank you for the info, OculisOrbis!

Big Mac · Joined: 17 Sep 2005

My school just realized they could use this 30 per cent exemption for foreigners to their advantage and reduced my pension contributions. I called the pension office and they totally backed up my school on it. Apparently the pension office even sent out a document to my school instructing them to do this. Otherwise they wouldn't have known about it.

So basically now I pay 4.5 per cent on 70 per cent of my salary.

What do you do when it's coming from the pension office? Can't really argue about it. They're the ones who set the rules.

OculisOrbis · Joined: 17 Jul 2006

its a 30% TAX reduction that is meant to save money on our TAXES -- its not supposed cause a forced loss in our PENSION contributions. it's the typical skewed-in-their-favor interpretation of a regulation that shouldnt be applied when calculating contributions to things other than taxes.

ask for someone to show you the legislation that says to apply the 30% reduction to pension -- it doesnt exist. pension office will say its a tax law and you need to call the tax office. the tax office agrees its law but refuses to provide a reference for it. i've searched all the relevant legislation and was unable to find it.

as for the part about that it came into effect in june - my school tried doing it in march. also, it does not apply to koreans, regardless of what you are told, because koreans dont have that 30% reduction at tax calculation time. it is a pure and simple cash grab from foreign teachers/workers.

OculisOrbis · Joined: 17 Jul 2006

Big Mac · Joined: 17 Sep 2005

Yeah, no one told me that my pension was reduced. I'm one of those people who looks at every number on their pay slip though and nothing gets past me.

The administration office told my co-teacher they were only going to explain it to me if I noticed, which of course I did.

I understand this is a tax law and I tried pointing out to the pension office that I don't understand why a tax law applies to pension but it was beyond their comprehension. They just said that it does apply to it and that it is something that they are OK with. When the pension office is on their side it really takes the wind out of my sails when I try to argue that a tax law shouldn't apply to pension, doesn't it?

teacha · Joined: 09 Oct 2008 Location: South Korea

luckily I'm gone in October, so I'm only going to be out around 200,000 ₩

For all of you who're just starting their contracts right now, you're going to be losing around 700,000 ₩ because of this if you make the standard 2.0 to 2.1 million ₩ salary. And if you have a higher salary than that, you'll be losing even more. I'd be pissed if I was just starting out.

cmr · Joined: 22 Mar 2006

I'm in the same boat. Sad

I was going to go the pension office about this because I thought someoen at my school had misunderstood something, but now that I know it's pointless... Evil or Very Mad

If anyone finds a way to prove them that's it's wrong, please share!

Epicurus · Joined: 18 Jun 2009

I've become curious about this.. but the LINKEE doesn't workee. (to Korean Pension site)

how/where do you find out how much is taken out etc?

You · Joined: 31 May 2009

The link doesnt work because theres an , at the end

http://www.npc.or.kr/

This one will work

ontheway · Posted: Sun Aug 30, 2009 1:30 am Post subject:

Draz · Joined: 27 Jun 2007 Location: Land of Morning Clam

ontheway · Posted: Sun Aug 30, 2009 3:06 am Post subject:

Big Mac · Joined: 17 Sep 2005

What I'm going to start asking about this week is this:

If there is a 30 per cent tax exemption for foreigners, then why is this exemption being applied to my pension but not to my taxes?

Seems like they only like this exemption when it saves them money, but they don't really care when it could save you money.[/b]