Dominican Severance Pay Calculator

Preaviso, cesantía, vacation and Christmas bonus — with the right divisor

Reference table

Ordinary monthly salary	Total you are owed	Preaviso (notice pay)	Auxilio de cesantía (severance)
1,000	5,072.88	1,174.99 — 28 days	2,643.73 — 63 days (21 per year)
2,000	10,145.75	2,349.98 — 28 days	5,287.45 — 63 days (21 per year)
2,500	12,682.19	2,937.47 — 28 days	6,609.32 — 63 days (21 per year)
5,000	25,364.39	5,874.95 — 28 days	13,218.63 — 63 days (21 per year)
7,500	38,046.58	8,812.42 — 28 days	19,827.95 — 63 days (21 per year)
10,000	50,728.77	11,749.9 — 28 days	26,437.26 — 63 days (21 per year)
12,500	63,410.97	14,687.37 — 28 days	33,046.58 — 63 days (21 per year)
15,000	76,093.16	17,624.84 — 28 days	39,655.9 — 63 days (21 per year)
20,000	101,457.55	23,499.79 — 28 days	52,874.53 — 63 days (21 per year)
25,000	126,821.93	29,374.74 — 28 days	66,093.16 — 63 days (21 per year)
30,000	152,186.32	35,249.69 — 28 days	79,311.79 — 63 days (21 per year)
40,000	202,915.09	46,999.58 — 28 days	105,749.06 — 63 days (21 per year)
50,000	253,643.87	58,749.48 — 28 days	132,186.32 — 63 days (21 per year)
75,000	380,465.8	88,124.21 — 28 days	198,279.48 — 63 days (21 per year)
100,000	507,287.73	117,498.95 — 28 days	264,372.64 — 63 days (21 per year)

📋 The days the Labour Code sets

Preaviso, 3 to 6 months7 days
Preaviso, 6 months to 1 year14 days
Preaviso, from 1 year on28 days — and there it stops
Cesantía, 1 to 5 years21 days for each year
Cesantía, past 5 years23 days for each year

What changes the result

The daily wage is the salary divided by 23.83, not by 30. That is the average number of working days in a month on the 44-hour week, and using 30 cuts the whole settlement by 20%.
Preaviso does not grow with seniority. From one year on it is 28 days and it stays there, whether you served two years or twenty. Cesantía is the one that grows.
Once you pass the fifth year, cesantía rises from 21 to 23 days per year, and it applies to every year you worked. Six years means 138 days, not 128.
Even if you resign, unused vacation and the regalía pascual are still owed to you. All you lose is preaviso and cesantía.

Why your figure does not match your lawyer's

It is almost always the divisor. The Dominican daily wage does not come from dividing your salary by 30; it comes from dividing it by 23.83, the average number of working days in a month under the 44-hour week. The gap looks small and it is not: with 30 the entire settlement comes out about 20% low, and because the divisor feeds all four items at once, there is no way for the number to land anywhere near right. The second common mistake is treating preaviso — the notice the employer owes you — as if it piled up year after year. It does not. Article 76 sets fixed days, and from one year on it is 28 forever, whether you served two years or twenty. The third is using 21 days per year in every case, when article 80 says 21 up to the fifth year and 23 after that, applied to all your years and not only to the ones past the fifth.

The four items

Preaviso compensates the notice you never got: 7 days between three and six months, 14 between six months and a year, and 28 from one year on. Auxilio de cesantía — the seniority-based severance — is the big item and the only one that grows: a flat 6 or 13 days in the short brackets, and from one year on 21 days for each year worked, or 23 once you pass the fifth. Unused vacation is 14 days a year, and 18 from the fifth year on. The regalía pascual, the Christmas bonus, is one twelfth of the ordinary wages you earned during the calendar year, under article 219. Preaviso and cesantía are exempt from income tax and pay no social security (TSS) contributions; the regalía is exempt too under article 222, with the paragraph added by Law 204-97. Vacation pay is ordinary salary and is taxed.

What to keep in mind

The reason you left decides two of the items, not all four. In a resignation or a dismissal for just cause you lose preaviso and cesantía, but vacation and the regalía are still owed to you.
Dimisión justificada — you resign because the employer breached the contract — pays exactly like a desahucio. It is a figure in the Labour Code, not a technicality: if you left over something the company did, claim it.
The base salary is the average of what you earned over the last year, not last month's payslip. If you had raises or commissions, the average is higher than you think.
Severance must be paid within ten days of the termination. After that deadline a penalty accrues for every day of delay.
Preaviso and cesantía cannot be garnished and are exempt from income tax.
This calculation leaves out the bonificación (profit sharing), which is paid separately between 90 and 120 days after the company's fiscal year closes.

Where this calculator stops

It does not compute the bonificación of article 223, which depends on the company's net profits and on its caps of 45 or 60 days.
It does not build the real average of your last year: it uses the salary you type in. If your pay varied, work the average out first.
It does not cover fixed-term contracts or contracts for a specific job, which have their own rules.
It ignores collective agreements that improve on the legal minimum, which some companies do have.
It does not compute the late-payment penalty, which is counted in days of delay from the moment the deadline passes.
It is no substitute for legal advice or for the Ministry of Labour's own calculation. Use it to tell whether the offer on the table makes sense.

Worked examples

The same salary, two ways of leaving

Desahucio after 3 years on RD$40,000

Daily wage = 40,000 / 23.83 = 1,678.56
Preaviso = 28 days × 1,678.56 = 46,999
Cesantía = 3 years × 21 days × 1,678.56 = 105,749
Vacation = 14 days × 1,678.56 = 23,500
Regalía (full year) = 40,000

Total: RD$216,248. With a divisor of 30 it would come to RD$180,000: about 36,000 less

Resigning after the same 3 years, 8 months into the regalía year

Preaviso = 0 — not owed when you resign
Cesantía = 0 — not owed either
Vacation = 14 days × 1,678.56 = 23,500
Regalía = 40,000 × 8 / 12 = 26,667

Total: RD$50,167. Not zero: vacation and the regalía are always owed

Frequently Asked Questions

Why divide by 23.83 and not by 30?

Because the Dominican daily wage is worked out on working days, not calendar days. With the 44-hour working week, the average number of days worked in a month is 23.83, and that is the divisor used by employment lawyers and by the Ministry of Labour. Dividing by 30 gives a daily wage about 20% lower, and since that number multiplies all four items, the whole settlement comes out short.

If I resign, do I lose everything?

No. You lose preaviso and auxilio de cesantía, which are the two big items, but unused vacation and the pro-rated regalía pascual are still owed to you, because you already earned them. Many calculators return a flat zero when you tick resignation, and that leaves out money the company owes you.

How much preaviso do I get after fifteen years?

Twenty-eight days, the same as after one year. The preaviso of article 76 does not accumulate: it is 7 days between three and six months, 14 between six months and a year, and 28 from then on, no matter how long you stayed. The item that grows with seniority is cesantía, not preaviso.

When do my cesantía days go from 21 to 23?

Once you pass five years, and the change applies to all your years, not just to the ones beyond the fifth. Six years means 6 × 23 = 138 days, not 5 × 21 + 1 × 23 = 128. Ten days of wages of difference, which on a salary of 40,000 is about 16,800 pesos.

Is severance taxed?

Preaviso and cesantía are exempt from income tax and cannot be garnished, and they pay no TSS social security contributions either. The regalía pascual is also exempt under article 222 of the Labour Code, and Law 204-97 clarified that the exemption holds even when the amount is above five minimum wages. Vacation pay is ordinary salary and is taxed as usual.

What is dimisión justificada?

It is when you leave for a reason attributable to the employer: they do not pay you, they change your terms unilaterally, they mistreat you. In law it pays exactly like a desahucio — full preaviso and cesantía. It is not an obscure technicality: if you left over something the company did, you have a case, and it is worth taking advice before signing anything.