Korea Expressway Corporation is introducing a "fair allowance" system ahead of the government's mandated timeline to improve conditions for non-regular workers.
Korea Expressway Corporation said Thursday that it will preemptively introduce the fair allowance for fixed-term workers retiring on or after July 1 this year, in order to improve conditions for non-regular workers. This is six months earlier than the mandatory implementation date under the government's non-regular worker measures.
The fair allowance is a system designed to compensate for the employment instability of fixed-term workers with contracts of less than one year, who are not eligible for severance pay. With the implementation of this system, more than 1,500 workers a year, including short-term staff during Korea Expressway Corporation's snow-removal period, are expected to benefit.
In May this year, the Ministry of Employment and Labor announced its "Guidelines for Improving Conditions of Non-Regular Workers in the Public Sector," requiring all public institutions to pay the fair allowance to fixed-term workers retiring on or after January 1, 2027.
The fair allowance is calculated by multiplying 118% of the minimum wage (the average of the living wage) by the compensation payment rate and the average working period for each bracket. The compensation payment rate by working period is set at 10% for less than one to two months, 9.5% for less than three to four months, 9% for less than five to six months, and 8.5% each for less than seven to eight months, less than nine to 10 months, and less than 11 to 12 months. Based on this, the fair allowance is paid on a graduated scale according to working period, ranging from 382,000 won for less than one to two months to 2.488 million won for less than 11 to 12 months.
Along with introducing the fair allowance, Korea Expressway Corporation plans to pursue measures to strengthen employment stability and ensure transparency in hiring. These include restricting labor contracts of less than one year in principle, except in unavoidable cases such as short-term snow-removal work, and expanding the proportion of external members on its non-regular hiring pre-screening panel to 40% or more.
"Including this introduction of the fair allowance, we will continuously improve discriminatory factors that may exist across the entire working environment," a Korea Expressway Corporation official said. "We will continue to do our best to bring about tangible improvements in the treatment and rights of non-regular workers."
