Salary & tax › UIF Calculator

UIF Calculator

Work out your UIF contribution and estimate the unemployment benefit you could claim, from your salary and how long you have been working.

Salary and work history

Gross monthly salary

Months worked and contributing in the last 4 years

EST. TOTAL UIF PAYOUT

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If you claim all your credit days

PAYOUT A MONTH

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During the first 238 days

CREDIT DAYS

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One day for every four days worked

Income replacement rate: —Your UIF a month: —Employer's UIF a month: —

Worked example

These are the calculator's starting values, so the results above match this example until you change an input.

Someone earning R 15 000 a month pays R 150 a month to UIF, and the employer adds R 150.

After four years of contributions they have 365 days of credit. Their income replacement rate is 39,08%, so UIF pays about R 5 862,07 a month for the first 238 days and 20% of their daily income after that: about R 58 394,72 in total if they are out of work for a full year.

How much is UIF?

Employees pay 1% of their gross pay to the Unemployment Insurance Fund every month, and the employer pays another 1%. Both are worked out on pay up to R 17 712 a month, so the most anyone pays is R 177,12 a month.

How UIF benefits are worked out

Your daily income is your monthly pay (up to R 17 712) times 12, divided by 365.
UIF pays a percentage of that, called the income replacement rate. It is close to 60% for the lowest earners and slides down to 38% at the earnings ceiling, using the formula in the Unemployment Insurance Act: 29.2 + 7 173.92 ÷ (232.92 + daily income).
You are paid at that rate for up to 238 credit days, and at 20% of your daily income for any credit days after that.

Monthly salary	Replacement rate	UIF a month (first 238 days)
R 4 000	48.89%	About R 1 955
R 6 000	45.88%	About R 2 753
R 10 000	41.97%	About R 4 197
R 15 000	39.08%	About R 5 862
R 17 712 or more	38.00%	About R 6 731

Credit days

You build up one credit day for every four days you worked and contributed, up to 365 days in the four years before you became unemployed. Four full years of work gives the maximum of 365 days. If you already claimed during that four-year period, the days you were paid are subtracted.

Before you claim

Unemployment benefits are paid when your job ended through no choice of your own, such as dismissal, retrenchment or the end of a fixed-term contract, not when you resign. Claim within 12 months of becoming unemployed, online through uFiling or at a Labour Centre, with the UI-19 form from your employer. UIF also pays maternity, illness and adoption benefits, which follow different rules.

How this calculator works

It uses the formula and credit-day rules above with the salary you enter. UIF works from the earnings your employer declared, averaged over your recent months of work, so the amount it pays can differ. UIF benefits are not taxed.

Sources and review note

Contribution rate and the R 17 712 monthly ceiling (unchanged since 1 June 2021) from SARS: Unemployment Insurance Fund. Benefit formula and credit days from the Unemployment Insurance Act 63 of 2001 (section 13 and Schedule 3), as amended in 2016. Checked 13 October 2026. This page is general educational information, not legal or financial advice.