Paying a foreign worker in Lithuania: the average wage threshold by sector

Article 62(5) of the Law on the Legal Status of Aliens sets a two step rule. Pay may not be lower than what the same employer pays a Lithuanian worker for the same work. Where no such worker exists, the national annual average monthly gross wage published by the State Data Agency applies instead.

The internal comparison comes first

The first step is internal and routinely skipped. The law requires a comparison with a worker of the same employer doing the same job. If a Lithuanian welder on the shop floor earns more than the national average gross wage, the foreign worker in the same position cannot be paid less than that colleague, even where the formal average wage threshold would sit lower. This line exists to stop downward wage pressure and is checked against the data the employer itself files.

The national figure applies only where no comparator exists. That is the common case when a company hires into an occupation it has never held, or staffs a new site. At that point a third rule takes over, and it is the one that costs the most inattention.

Where the average gross wage for the relevant economic activity (the NACE class) is higher than the general national figure, the sector line applies, not the general one. Construction, information technology and transport each carry their own line in the State Data Agency data, and an employer that budgets from the general average writes too small a number into the contract. The file is then refused over arithmetic rather than over the candidate.

The choice of activity class is what gets contested, more often than the figure itself. The NACE class follows the activity the worker will actually perform, not the first activity the company registered. A company registered in wholesale trade that builds its own hangar prices a welder on the construction line. For temporary work agencies the point is sharper still: what counts is the activity the worker performs at the user undertaking. The class chosen has to be visible in the file, because the Employment Service and the Migration Department both compare it against the job description and against the activity the employer declares.

Which threshold applies when

The last row matters for what it does not do. The article 62(5) salary requirement does not apply to a permit issued under article 44-1, because the EU Blue Card carries its own higher threshold. A highly qualified specialist is therefore priced on a different line from a production worker at the same company. The EU level logic of the Blue Card is set out in the EU Blue Card directive.

When to calculate, and what a mistake costs

The average wage figure changes every year, so the employer's undertaking must rest on the last published calendar year figure as at the date of the application, using State Data Agency data. A draft contract prepared in autumn and filed after a new figure is published can be wrong on the filing date while it was right on the drafting date. December and January files are checked twice for exactly this reason. The last published figure means the one public on the day the application is filed, not the one computed for the most recent quarter: the State Data Agency publishes the annual indicator separately from the quarterly ones, so the file has to show which number was taken and when.

The consequence is named in the law. Under article 63(1)(3), pay that does not meet the level set in article 62(5) is a standalone ground to refuse the work permit. This is not a deficiency curable by sending one more certificate; it is a refusal, after which the file restarts, and the employer loses both the fee and the queue position. A construction group that files ten cases on the general average instead of the sector line loses all ten the same way.

The cost is measured in time as well. The Migration Department examines an application in 3 months in the general procedure, and the state fee is 120 euros in the general procedure and 240 euros under urgency, set in the Government approved schedule of state fees and worth confirming on the day of filing. A refusal on the salary figure restarts those three months and the fee is not returned.

Three checks belong before the undertaking is signed: whether a comparator worker exists in the company, the current NACE sector average from the State Data Agency, and the remaining quota, since the balance decides whether the 1.2 multiplier applies. The quota mechanics are covered in the foreign worker quota, and the full procedure in the temporary residence permit for work.

The salary line in a Lithuanian file is a calculation from public data rather than the outcome of a negotiation. Get it right the first time and the rest of the procedure becomes a calendar question.