Registering a minijob: steps and costs for employers

Registration is the employer’s job. The competent body is the Minijob-Zentrale at the German pension insurance Knappschaft-Bahn-See. It collects the levies for all minijobs, regardless of which health insurer the minijobber is with.

As a minijobber you therefore do not register yourself. You do give your employer the necessary details: your pension-insurance number, your tax identification number if individual taxation applies, a declaration about other jobs and, if you want one, the application for exemption from compulsory pension insurance.

First, the business needs an establishment number (Betriebsnummer). If it has none yet, it applies to the Federal Employment Agency’s establishment-number service. Second, the minijobber is registered electronically, via certified payroll software or the social-insurance reporting portal SV-Meldeportal. The deadline under section 6 of the Data Recording and Transmission Ordinance (DEÜV): with the next payroll run, at the latest within six weeks of the start.

In some sectors section 28a(4) SGB IV additionally requires an immediate report no later than the start of work, for example in construction, hospitality, building cleaning or transport and logistics. The business also registers the minijobber with its accident insurer (Berufsgenossenschaft).

After that the levies run monthly: the contribution statement has to reach the Minijob-Zentrale by the start of the fifth-last bank working day, and payment is due on the third-last bank working day of the month. When the minijob ends, a deregistration follows. Paying late means a late-payment surcharge of 1 percent for each month or part of a month.

On top of the wage come flat-rate levies that the employer alone bears. In a commercial minijob they total 31.17% in 2026, plus the accident-insurance contribution, which varies by accident insurer. At the €603 limit that is €187.95 in levies, €790.95 a month in total.

Two items depend on the case. The 13% health-insurance flat rate applies only if the minijobber has statutory health insurance; for the privately insured the total is 18.17%, so €712.56 at €603 pay. The same goes for the 5% in a private household: if the help is privately health-insured, the rate is 9.62% instead of 14.62%, so €661.01 instead of €691.16. The U1 levy is paid only by businesses with up to 30 employees; in return the Minijob-Zentrale reimburses them 80 percent of sick pay.

The 2 percent flat-rate tax is optional: the employer may instead run the minijob under the minijobber’s wage-tax characteristics. In practice it is usually chosen because it keeps the pay tax-free for the minijobber.

For minijobs in a private household, such as cleaning, gardening or childcare, there is a simplified procedure: the household cheque. You register the household help online or on a form with the Minijob-Zentrale. It assigns the establishment number, calculates the levies and also registers the help for accident insurance.

The Minijob-Zentrale collects the levies by SEPA direct debit twice a year: at the end of July for January to June and at the end of January for July to December of the previous year. You report pay changes with a new household cheque.

The benefit for private households: under section 35a(1) of the Income Tax Act, income tax is reduced by 20% of the costs, by at most €510 a year. The Minijob-Zentrale sends a certificate for this at the start of the year.

Minijobbers are employees with the same basic rights as full-time staff: minimum wage, paid leave, continued pay during illness and on public holidays. The essential working conditions must be recorded in writing (Evidence Act, Nachweisgesetz), and commercial employers must record working time (section 17 MiLoG).

If a minijob is not registered at all or too late, the social-insurance bodies claim the levies retroactively, and late-payment surcharges may be added. If you are unsure whether an activity qualifies as a minijob, ask the Minijob-Zentrale beforehand; it costs nothing and saves corrections later.