Question 105: Are salary scale, payroll and CLA required to be registered with the local labour management agency?



Pursuant to the Labor Code, Employers are not required to conduct the procedures for registering salary scales, payrolls and CLAs, instead only send them to state management agencies, immediate senior trade unions or Employers’ representative organisations. The procedure for submitting salary scales, payrolls and collective labour agreements is as follows:

1.Regarding CLAs:

Within 10 working days of signing CLAs, Employers must[1]:

  • Submit 1 copy of CLA to provincial-level state labour management agencies as the DOLISA, specifically;
  • Submit 1 copy of the same to Employers’ representative organisation where the Employer is a member. Specifically, the representative organisations for Vietnamese Employers include: (i) Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI)[2] and (ii) Vietnam Cooperative Alliance (VCA)[3]; and
  • Submit 1 copy of the same to immediate senior grassroots trade unions. Specifically, for enterprises, immediate senior grassroots trade unions may include[4]: (i) labour confederation of the district, town or provincial city (collectively referred to as the district labour union); (ii) local branch trade unions; trade unions of industrial parks, export processing zones, hi-tech parks and economic zones (collectively referred to as trade unions of industrial parks); (iii) trade unions of corporations under the Vietnam General Confederation of Labor; (iv) trade unions of corporations under provincial labour confederation, central branch trade unions; (v) some other specific immediate senior grassroots trade unions considered and decided for establishment by the Presidium of the General Confederation of Labor of Vietnam; (vi) occupation-specific trade unions.

2. Regarding salary scales and payrolls

Upon formulating salary scales and payrolls Employers, shall submit salary scales and payrolls to district-level state labour management agencies where their production and business establishments are located[5]. Particularly, the district-level state labour management agency is the Office of Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs under the People’s Committee of the suburban district/district[6].

Although the Labor Code only regulates Employers’ submission of CLAs to state management agencies, immediate senior grassroots trade unions and Employers’ representative organisations, the DOLISA has the right to send a written letter requesting the People’s Court to declare CLAs as invalid and concurrently notify the CLA signatories of the same if within 15 days of receiving CLAs, it finds CLAs contain unlawful contents or are signed beyond the signatory’s competence. If CLAs have not yet come into force, the state management agency will, through its official letter, require the parties to negotiate, amend and supplement such CLAs and send them to the state management agencies as regulated[7].

In fact, in order to avoid the situation that a CLA is declared as invalid by the Court, the DOLISA will: (i) issue a receipt of the submitted CLA and set a date for its return; and (ii) then issue an official dispatch to require the enterprise to pay attention to amending any CLA content in noncompliance with the law, if any and acknowledge the service of such CLA by the enterprise.


[1]Articles 83.2 and 75.1 Labor Code

[2]Article 2 Charter of the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry promulgated together with Decision 2177/ QDTTg dated 11/11/2016

[3]Article 2 Charter of the Vietnam Cooperative Alliance promulgated together with Decision No.105/2016/ QDTTg of January 24, 2017

[4]Article 7.3 Guideline 238/HD-TLD dated 04/03/2014

[5]Article 93.2 Labor Code

[6]Article 4.1 Joint Circular 37/2015 / TTLT-BLDTBXH-BNV dated 02/10/2015

[7]Article 19 Decree 05/2015/NĐ-CP dated 12/01/2015