Vietnam rewrote its foreign worker rules with effect from 7 August 2025, and the changes are genuinely in employers’ favour. Fewer steps, shorter waits, wider exemptions.
If you are working from a guide written before that date, or from one that simply was not updated, the procedure you are planning around no longer exists. That is not hypothetical. While researching this article we found a guide published in mid-2026 still describing the previous framework as current.
Here is what actually applies now, and the one thing that still causes most of the delay.
What changed
The recruitment announcement shrank. Under the old rules an employer had to advertise the role domestically for at least 15 days before applying. That requirement has not disappeared, despite what some summaries claim, but it has been cut to at least 5 days before submission.
The two procedures became one. Previously employers went through a labour needs determination of up to 10 working days, then a separate permit issuance of up to 5 working days, so 15 working days in total. Both are now handled within a combined 10 working days.
The filing window moved. Applications are now due at least 10 days before the intended start date, rather than 15.
Exemptions widened. The new rules expand the exempt categories, including roles certified by ministries or provincial authorities in finance, science, technology, innovation, digital transformation and priority development sectors.
A re-issuance route was added. Where an exemption confirmation is still valid but lost or damaged, or where a name, nationality, passport number, workplace or employer name changes without a change of tax code, re-issuance takes 3 working days rather than a full new application.
Taken together, a process that realistically consumed a month of elapsed time before any documents were gathered is now considerably shorter.
What did not change
The permit still lasts a maximum of 2 years. It can be extended once, for up to a further 2 years. After that a fresh application is required, not another extension. Four years is the ceiling on a single permit lineage, and it is worth planning long assignments around that rather than discovering it in year four.
The under-90-days exemption, and its catch
Foreign nationals working fewer than 90 days in total per calendar year, counted from 1 January to 31 December, do not need a work permit.
The catch is that this is not a free pass. The employer must still notify the competent local authority at least 3 days before the work starts, providing the person’s full name, date of birth, nationality, passport number, the name of the foreign employer, the place of work and the duration.
Companies flying people in for short advisory visits routinely miss this, because “no work permit required” gets remembered and the notification obligation does not. It is a small administrative step attached to an exemption most people think has no steps at all.
Note also that the 90 days are cumulative across the calendar year, not per visit. Three separate month-long trips exhaust it.
The step that still delays everything
None of the above is usually what holds up a start date. Document legalisation is.
Foreign qualifications and employer verification letters must be apostilled or consular legalised, and translated and notarised into Vietnamese. That process happens in the country the documents came from, on that country’s timetable, and it is entirely outside the Vietnamese authority’s 10 working days.
Two supporting documents also carry their own clocks:
- The criminal record check must have been issued within the last 6 months
- The health certificate must have been issued within the last 12 months, by a hospital specifically licensed for the purpose
The failure pattern is consistent. An employer starts the Vietnamese steps promptly, then discovers that a degree certificate from a decade ago needs legalising in a third country, or that a criminal record check obtained eight months ago has gone stale and has to be requested again from scratch.
The fix is unglamorous. Start the document chain before you start the application, not alongside it.
What to do
Re-read your internal process against the August 2025 rules. If it still describes a 15-day advertisement or a two-stage approval, it is describing a procedure that no longer applies.
Begin legalisation first. It is the only part of the timeline you do not control, so it should start earliest.
Check the validity dates on the criminal record and health certificate before submitting, not after. Six and twelve months respectively, counted back from the application.
Track the 90-day exemption cumulatively, and file the 3-day notification every time. The exemption is from the permit, not from telling anyone.
Plan assignments against the four-year ceiling. Two years plus one extension of two years, then a fresh application.
Where this sits in our work
People Profilers Vietnam handles work permit and visa filings for employers hiring here, through People Profilers Services Vietnam Company Limited, under Recruitment Licence 6208/2024/20/SLĐTBXH-VLATLĐ.
What we commit to is filing quality: an honest eligibility check before anything is submitted, a realistic view of the document chain, and complete submissions. Approval decisions themselves always rest with the authorities.
If you want the position checked before you make an offer, that is what our work permit and visa service in Vietnam is for. If you are hiring Vietnamese nationals rather than bringing someone in, employer of record is the relevant starting point instead, and our article on what it really costs to employ someone in Vietnam covers the statutory side.
Sources
Verified September 2026. Immigration rules change, so confirm before relying on any of this for a live application.
- The 2025 decree taking effect on 7 August 2025 and replacing the previous decree, the recruitment announcement reducing from at least 15 days to at least 5 days before submission, the combined 10 working day processing replacing the former 10 plus 5 split, the application deadline moving from 15 days to at least 10 days before the start date, and the new 3 working day re-issuance procedure: Apolat Legal
- The exemption for fewer than 90 cumulative days per calendar year, the requirement to notify the local authority at least 3 days beforehand with the specified details, the expanded exemption categories, and the maximum 2 year validity with a single extension of up to 2 years: Viet An Law
- Document requirements including apostille or consular legalisation of qualifications and employer verification letters, the criminal record check issued within 6 months, and the health certificate issued within 12 months by a specifically licensed hospital: Indochina Link
