Statutory Minimum Wage
Statutory Minimum Wage (SMW) has come into force since 1 May 2011. With effect from 1 May 2023, the SMW rate is raised to $40 per hour. Concurrently, the monetary cap on the requirement of employers keeping records of the total number of hours worked by employees is also uprated to $16,300 per month.
Please find details on the Guidelines and Calculator on the website of Labour Department. Statutory minimum wage does not apply to the following student employees:
- student interns; and
- work experience students during a period of exempt student employment
For any university student who is eligible to work in Hong Kong, before confirming any employment, please observe the following steps:
- Check with your respective academic department/school/faculty/academy on whether the employment or internship is arranged or endorsed by the programme; and forms a compulsory or elective component of it.If this is the case, you will be exempted from SMW under the category of Student Intern. There is no restriction on age or duration for student intern in taking up the internship. Your department/school/faculty/academy shall issue the documentation to you that is necessarily to be presented to your employer.
If Step 1 is negated, that is, the work is not arranged or endorsed by the programme; and is not curriculum-related; students may still be exempted from SMW under the category of Work Experience Student during a period of exempt student employment. He/She has to fulfill the following:
- Be under the age of 26 years at the beginning of employment;
- Has agreed with his/her employer to treat a continuous period of up to 59 days as exempt student employment; at most one period of exempt student employment may commence in the same calendar year (whether under the employment of the same employer or not);
- Has obtained the student status verification from the Academic Registry; and
- Has made a statutory declaration (through any district office under the Home Affairs Department , a justice, notary, commissioner or other person authorized by law to administer an oat) verifying the above and provide the declaration (or copy) to the employer.
For more detailed information, please check with the following guidelines:
- Statutory Minimum Wage : Notes for Student Employees and Employers (Text Alternative)
- 《法定最低工資：學生僱員及僱主須知》 (文字版本)
- Specimen Content of statutory declaration made by a work experience student for a period of exempt student employment (Text Alternative)
- Specimen Confirmation of "student intern" status (Fillable PDF Form) (Text Alternative)
- Specimen Confirmation of student status for "work experience student" (Fillable PDF Form) (Text Alternative)
*counting of a continuous period of 59 days is based on calendar days and not working days. A calendar year runs from 1 January to 31 December.