Are housewives entitled to maternity benefits?

Social insurance policy is a main pillar of the national social security system, including two types of compulsory social insurance and voluntary social insurance. Of which, voluntary social insurance policy is a type of insurance in which employees voluntarily participate, choose the contribution level and payment method suitable to their income to enjoy the prescribed regimes.

With this policy, freelance workers have the opportunity to participate in the social security system, enjoy retirement benefits when they retire, and limit financial dependence on their children when they are no longer able to work. To encourage people to participate, the State supports a portion of voluntary social insurance contributions.

However, voluntary social insurance is still not attractive enough for workers. The reason is that voluntary social insurance participants are only entitled to pension and death benefits. Meanwhile, compulsory social insurance participants are also entitled to sickness, maternity, work accident and occupational disease benefits.

Therefore, in the draft of the new Social Insurance Law that is being consulted by the people, the Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs proposes to add maternity benefits to the voluntary social insurance policy. With this policy, female workers who do not have a formal job or are housewives at home but participate in voluntary social insurance are still entitled to maternity benefits.

Phụ nữ ở nhà nội trợ có được hưởng trợ cấp thai sản? - 1 — Housewives have the opportunity to receive maternity benefits (Illustration: Getty Images).

Maternity benefits for voluntary social insurance participants are regulated in Section 1, Chapter VI with 5 Articles (from Article 99 to Article 103) in the draft of the new Social Insurance Law.

According to Article 100 of the draft law, employees participating in voluntary social insurance are entitled to maternity benefits when they fall into one of the following cases: female employees giving birth; male employees participating in social insurance whose wives give birth.

The condition to receive maternity benefits is that the employee must have paid social insurance for at least 6 months within 12 months before giving birth.

According to Article 101 of the draft law, the maternity allowance for female workers when giving birth and male workers whose wives give birth is 2 million VND for a newborn child.

In case only the mother participates in social insurance and the mother dies after giving birth, the father or the person directly raising the child is entitled to maternity allowance.

In case both father and mother participate in social insurance and are eligible for maternity benefits, only the father or mother will receive the benefits.

The draft law also clearly stipulates the documents for receiving maternity benefits in Article 102. Specifically, the documents are a copy of the child's birth certificate or birth certificate.

In case the child dies, the file is a copy of the child's death certificate. In case the mother dies after giving birth, the file is a copy of the mother's death certificate.

In case the child dies after birth without being issued a birth certificate, the file is a copy of the mother's medical record or hospital discharge papers.

Article 103 of the draft law also clearly stipulates that within 45 days from the date of birth, employees are responsible for submitting documents to receive maternity benefits.

Within 5 working days from the date of receiving the complete application as prescribed, the Social Insurance agency is responsible for processing and organizing payment to the employee. In case of non-processing, a written response must be provided stating the reason.

The Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs is drafting the Law on Social Insurance, including a proposal to supplement maternity benefits for voluntary social insurance participants as stipulated in Articles 99, 100, 101, 102 and 103. Employees and people interested in this policy can contribute their opinions HERE .

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