Mr. T.T. N is currently a freelance teacher, registered to be a business household owner, specializing in teaching talents to secondary school students, paying taxes according to the declaration method, with revenue below 1 billion VND/year. Mr. N wondered, does he have to pay compulsory social insurance or not?
Regarding this issue, Vietnam Social Security said: According to the provisions of point m, clause 1, Article 2, clause 2, Article 27 and clause 2, Article 28 of the 2024 Law on Social Insurance, clause 2, Article 3 of Decree No. 158/2025/ND-CP dated June 25, 2025 of the Government detailing and guiding the implementation of a number of articles of the Law on Social Insurance on compulsory social insurance, from July 1, 2025, business households of business households registered to pay taxes according to the declaration method are subject to compulsory social insurance participation, business households can register and submit dossiers to participate in social insurance by one of two methods: submitting through business households or submitting directly to the social insurance agency.
According to the provisions of Article 3, Article 4, Clause 1, Article 8, Article 10 of Decree No. 68/2026/ND-CP dated March 5, 2026 of the Government stipulating tax policies and tax management for business households and individual businesses; Clause 1, Article 1, Article 3 of Decree No. 141/2026/ND-CP dated April 29, 2026 of the Government amending and supplementing a number of articles of Decree No. 68/2026/ND-CP stipulating tax policies for business households and individual businesses and Decree No. 320/2025/ND-CP detailing a number of articles and measures to organize and guide the implementation of the Law on Enterprise Income Tax;
Clause 1, Article 4, Clause 1, Article 5 of Circular No. 40/2021/TT-BTC dated June 1, 2021 of the Minister of Finance guiding value-added tax, personal income tax and tax management for business households and individual businesses;
Clause 1, Article 4 of Circular No. 18/2026/TT-BTC dated March 5, 2026 of the Minister of Finance regulating tax management dossiers and procedures for business households and individual businesses; Article 3 of Circular No. 50/2026/TT-BTC dated May 13, 2026 of the Minister of Finance amending and supplementing a number of articles of Circular No. 18/2026/TT-BTC:
From July 1, 2025 to before January 1, 2026, business households of business households registered to pay taxes according to the declaration method are subject to compulsory social insurance; in which, business households pay taxes according to the declaration method (value added tax, personal income tax) as prescribed in Clause 1, Article 4, Clause 1, Article 5 of Circular No. 40/2021/TT-BTC.
From January 1, 2026, all business households must declare revenue to the Tax authority; the declared taxable revenue of business households from over 500 million VND/year according to the provisions of Clause 2, Article 3, Clause 2, Article 4 of Decree No. 68/2026/ND-CP is raised to over 1 billion VND/year to pay value-added tax, personal income tax according to the provisions of Clause 1, Article 1, Article 3 of Decree No. 141/2026/ND-CP (business households of business households registered for business that declare annual revenue over 1 billion VND must pay value-added tax, personal income tax belonging to compulsory social insurance participants).
Business households that self-determine annual revenue from production and business of goods and services from 1 billion VND or less, business households shall notify the tax authority of actual revenue generated in the year no later than January 31 of the following calendar year.
From July 1, 2029, business households of registered business households (the rest) are subject to compulsory social insurance participation.
Thus, from January 1, 2026, business households with annual revenue declarations of over 1 billion VND specified in Decree No. 141/2026/ND-CP submit applications for compulsory social insurance participation to the social insurance agency.
In case the business household owner has a declared annual revenue of less than 1 billion VND, they can register to participate in voluntary social insurance to accumulate time to participate in social insurance, ensuring social security regimes (birth, retirement, death benefits) for themselves later when they meet the conditions.
