The money you leave with
Years of work add up to money you are owed: severance, pension contributions, a deposit, a tax settlement. You can collect most of it. But the timing is tight, and getting the order wrong costs people real money.
Why the order matters more than the paperwork
Severance is legally due within 14 days of your last day. That date often lands after the flight people have already booked. Cancel your residence card (ARC), close your bank account and fly before the clock runs out, and you are chasing the money from another country with no Korean account to receive it.
Why is that? Every payout in this list needs something you are about to give up. Severance needs a Korean account. The pension refund needs your identity documents. The health-insurance settlement lands on your final payslip. The deposit needs you to stay a registered resident until the landlord pays. The exit is a sequence, not a checklist you can shuffle.
Severance: one month per year, paid in 14 days
If you worked a full year for the same employer and averaged at least 15 hours a week, severance is a legal right: roughly 30 days of pay for each year of service. Nationality changes nothing, and even a worker without valid status keeps the entitlement.
Why is that? The law fixes the formula: 30 days of your average wage for each year of continuous service. The average comes from your last three months of pay, divided by the calendar days in that period. If those months were unusually thin, a second rule protects you: when the average falls below your ordinary wage (통상임금 — your contractual base rate), the ordinary wage is used instead.
On E-9 or H-2? Your severance works differently
Your employer does not hold your severance. It goes into departure guarantee insurance (출국만기보험) as you work, at 8.3% of your monthly ordinary wage. The catch is the timing: that money is paid out only after you have actually left Korea, within 14 days of departure or of your application.
Why is that? The rule ties payment to departure on purpose. So plan for the gap. You will be flying home before the money arrives, which means you need a receiving account that still works and a claim filed on time. The application window opens about a month before departure and closes roughly a week before you fly.
The pension refund: not everyone gets one
Korea does not return national pension contributions to foreigners by default. The refund comes through one of three routes: your nationality is on the reciprocity list, your country’s social security agreement specifically covers the refund, or you were enrolled under a listed residence status. In practice the third route means E-9 or H-2, and it works for any nationality.
Why is that? The rule is reciprocity: Korea refunds contributions to nationals of countries that would do the same for Koreans, plus the visa categories it has agreed to cover. That is why a social security agreement is not automatically enough. Ireland, Denmark, Spain, Sweden, Finland, New Zealand and Norway all have agreements with Korea and are explicitly excluded from the refund. Switzerland is the reverse case: an exemption-only agreement that does pay it.
Your last tax settlement happens early
If you are leaving, your year-end settlement does not wait for next February. It happens when your final month’s salary is paid. Any deduction paperwork you have not handed your employer by then simply does not count, and you get only the basic personal deduction.
Why is that? Your employer settles the tax year for you at your last payslip, so the deadline for your receipts is earlier than you expect. If you have income beyond a normal salary (freelance work, a business, rent), the rule is stricter still: that return is due the day before you depart, not the following May. Leave between January and May with last year still unfiled, and both years fall due before your flight.
Three loose ends that can still cost you
Three smaller items, each with its own way of going wrong. Health insurance settles on your final payslip and can just as easily bill you as refund you. The housing deposit depends on you staying a registered resident until it is returned. And the bank account you are about to close is the only place the rest of this money can land.
Why is that? When employment ends, your employer recalculates the health-insurance premiums for the year and settles the difference. A final payslip can carry an extra charge rather than a refund. Overpaid premiums can be reclaimed for three years. And if you leave for a month or more but return within six months, the gap can still be billed: a trip home does not pause your premiums.
If the money does not come
Unpaid severance is a criminal matter in Korea, not a private dispute. The complaint process is open to foreign workers, including those without valid status. You file with the Ministry of Employment and Labor, an inspector summons both sides, and non-compliance goes to prosecution.
Why is that? Wage and severance protection attaches to being a worker, not to immigration status. The Supreme Court settled that. So you have a real route even in the worst case, and it does not close when you board the plane. Severance claims stay alive for three years, and a worker who has already left can pursue them through a representative or free legal aid.
Common terms
Questions people ask
Yes. The pension refund can be claimed from abroad, and the claim stays open for five years. You have three years to claim severance, and departure guarantee insurance for E-9/H-2 workers is designed to be paid after you fly. Leaving does not cost you the money you are owed. It just gets slower to chase.
Until everything has landed, yes. Severance, the final payslip, a health-insurance refund and a deposit return can all arrive weeks apart, and re-opening an account from abroad is not realistic. Close it last, once the balance stops moving.
Your employment certificate, final payslips, the tax withholding certificates (원천징수영수증) for both salary and severance, your lease and deposit-return record, and your NPS contribution record. These are the documents people ask you for once you are abroad, and they are much harder to get after you have left.