On 7 August 2025, the Government issued Decree No. 219\/2025\/ND-CP regulating foreign worker working in Vietnam (\u201cDecree 219\u201d) to replace previous regulations outlined in Decree No. 152\/2020\/ND-CP and the amending Decree No. 70\/2023\/ND-CP. In general, Decree 219 outlines relevant provisions to attract high-quality talent in priority sectors, and provide clear guidance for both employers and employees. Notable provisions are as follows:
\n1.\tStreamlined Work Permit Application Process: Decree 219 integrates the two-step process of (i) seeking approval for the demand to use foreign labor and (ii) applying for a work permit into a single, consolidated procedure. This significantly reduces administrative burden. As a result, the total statutory processing time for a work permit application is now 10 working days, a significant reduction compared to the statutory timeline of about 20 working days for the two steps before integration.
\n2.\tExpanded Cases for Work Permit Exemption: The new decree expands the list of cases where a foreign worker is exempt from a work permit. Notable cases include:
\n\u2022\tHigh-Value Capital Contributors: Owners or capital-contributing members of limited liability companies, and Chairpersons or members of the Board of Management of joint-stock companies, with a capital contribution of VND 3 billion or more.
\n\u2022\tPriority Sector Professionals: Foreign experts and workers confirmed by relevant ministries or provincial People’s Committees to be working in strategic fields such as finance, science and technology, innovation, and national digital transformation.
\n\u2022\tShort-Term Work: Foreign managers, executives, experts, or technicians entering Vietnam for short-term assignments of less than 90 days per calendar year are now eligible for exemption.
\n3.\tRelaxation of Requirements for “Experts” and “Technicians”: The conditions to qualify as an “expert” or “technician” have been eased as follows:
\n\u2022\tExperts: Now require a bachelor’s degree (or higher) and at least 2 years of relevant work experience (down from 3 years). For those in priority development sectors, only 1 year of experience is needed.
\n\u2022\tTechnicians: The required relevant work experience has been reduced from 5 years to 3 years.
\n4.\tDecentralization of Authority: The authority for issuing, re-issuing, extending, and revoking work permits and work permit exemption certificates is now transferred to provincial-level People’s Committees.
\n5.\tNew Rules for Work Permit Exemption Certificates: The decree introduces clear procedures for the re-issuance, extension, and revocation of work permit exemption certificates.
\n\u2022\tAn exemption certificate may be extended once for a maximum period of two years.
\n\u2022\tClear grounds for revocation have been established, including working outside the certified scope or termination of the work assignment.
\n***
\nPlease do not hesitate to contact Dr. Oliver Massmann under omassmann@duanemorris.com if you have any questions or want to know more details on the above. Dr. Oliver Massmann is the General Director of Duane Morris Vietnam LLC.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On 7 August 2025, the Government issued Decree No. 219\/2025\/ND-CP regulating foreign worker working in Vietnam (\u201cDecree 219\u201d) to replace previous regulations outlined in Decree No. 152\/2020\/ND-CP and the amending Decree No. 70\/2023\/ND-CP. In general, Decree 219 outlines relevant provisions to attract high-quality talent in priority sectors, and provide clear guidance for both employers and … <\/p>\n
Continue reading “VIETNAM – DECREE 219 – REGULATING FOREIGN WORKERS IN VIETNAM – WHAT YOU MUST KNOW:”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[1007],"class_list":["post-1766","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-vietnam-general"],"authors":[{"term_id":1007,"user_id":24,"is_guest":0,"slug":"omassmann","display_name":"Dr. Oliver Massmann","avatar_url":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/19\/2014\/08\/massmannoliver-125x150.jpg","author_category":"1","last_name":"Massmann","first_name":"Dr. Oliver","job_title":"","user_url":"http:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/olivermassmann.html","description":"Read Oliver's bio.<\/a>"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1766","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1766"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1766\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1766"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/vietnam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=1766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}