Your rights as a domestic worker in Spain (2026)

The statutory minimum wage applies to domestic work exactly as it does to any other job. For 2026 it is set by Royal Decree 126/2026, and these are the gross amounts:

That minimum has to reach you as money. Board and lodging is salary in kind: it counts as part of your salary, but at most 30% of the total, and the minimum wage still has to be paid in cash (Royal Decree 1620/2011, art. 8.2). A 40% or 50% deduction “for board” is not lawful, however it was agreed.

6.40% is deducted from your gross for Social Security: 4.70% common contingencies, 1.55% unemployment and 0.15% MEI (Order PJC/297/2026). On a temporary contract unemployment rises to 1.60% and the total to 6.45%. No income tax is withheld, because a household employer is not required to withhold it (Personal Income Tax Regulation, art. 76.1) — which does not mean you are exempt from filing a return if your income is above the threshold.

Ordinary working hours are capped at 40 hours a week of actual work (Royal Decree 1620/2011, art. 9.1). Actual work is the time you spend doing your duties: cleaning, cooking, ironing, taking the children to school, caring for an older person.

On top of those hours, the family may ask you for on-call time: being in the house, available in case something comes up, without working continuously. It has three limits worth knowing by heart (art. 9.2): it must be expressly agreed, it cannot exceed an average of 20 hours a week over a month, and it is paid at no less than an ordinary hour — or swapped for the same amount of paid rest, if that is what you agree. On-call time is not a way of extending the working day without paying for it.

You are entitled to 30 calendar days of paid holiday for each year of service (Royal Decree 1620/2011, art. 9.7). If the relationship lasts less than a year, holiday accrues in proportion to the time worked, which is 2.5 days for every full month.

The dates are agreed between you and the family. If there is no agreement, the law splits them: the employer sets 15 days and you freely choose the other 15, and in that case the dates must be known at least two months in advance. Holiday can be split into two or more periods, and at least one of them must be a minimum of fifteen consecutive calendar days.

Days you have accrued and not taken are paid when the contract ends, as part of the final settlement. They are also contributed for separately, as if you had stayed registered on those days: they show up in your Social Security record and count towards unemployment benefit and your pension.

Every month they must give you a salary receipt — the nómina — showing what you earned, what was deducted and the net amount you receive (Royal Decree 1620/2011, art. 8.6, which refers to art. 29 of the Workers' Statute). Keep every one of them, along with the transfer receipts: they are your evidence of what you were paid on the day you have to claim a settlement or apply for unemployment benefit.

Registration with Social Security is arranged and paid for by the family, and it must be done before you start working. Since 2023 that holds however few the hours: the option for the worker herself to register when she did under 60 hours a month in one household was removed, and the employer is now always responsible (Royal Decree-Law 16/2022). If you work in several homes, each one has to register you separately.

1. 1. Check it yourself, free

   Request your working-life report (informe de vida laboral) from Social Security — through the Import@ss website or the app, using Cl@ve, a digital certificate or an SMS code. It shows whether you are registered, from which day and for how many hours. That is the fact that counts, not what you are told verbally.

2. 2. Ask in writing

   A WhatsApp message will do: “Can you confirm that I am registered, and from what date?” Keep the conversation. The point is not to argue, it is to leave a record of the date on which you asked.

3. 3. Report it to the Labour Inspectorate

   It is done online, it is free and you do not need a lawyer. The Inspectorate does not tell the family who filed the report. You can do it while still in the job.

4. 4. Without registration you still have rights

   Working unregistered erases nothing: salary, holiday, the final settlement and severance are still owed to you. What is lost along the way are the contributions towards unemployment benefit and your pension, and those can be claimed. The more evidence you have of days and hours, the better.

If you want to see what your payslip should look like — gross, contribution base, deductions and net — the same payslip calculator families use generates it as a PDF with the 2026 figures.

It helps not to conflate them, because both are often called the finiquito. The final settlement is what you have already earned and not yet been paid, and it is paid in every case, including when you are the one leaving. Severance is separate money added on top of it, and it exists only when the family ends the contract.

The final settlement has three parts: the days you worked in your last month; the proportional share of the extra payment for the current half-year, which accrues by half-years and not by calendar year (Royal Decree 1620/2011, art. 8.4); and any holiday you accrued and did not take (art. 9.7).

When the family ends the contract for a justified cause they have to give you notice: 20 days if you have worked there more than a year, 7 days if less (Royal Decree 1620/2011, art. 11.2). They may replace the notice by paying you those days. During the notice period — whether it is the 20-day one or the 7-day one — if you work full time you are entitled to 6 hours a week of leave, without loss of pay, to look for another job.

Signing the settlement does not waive your right to claim. If you disagree, you can sign adding “no conforme” by hand, or not sign at all. There are two different deadlines and they are easy to confuse: to challenge the dismissal you have 20 working days from the end date to file the conciliation request, and that one lapses for good (Workers' Statute, art. 59.3); to claim money — the final settlement, unpaid severance or back pay — the deadline is one year from the end of the contract (art. 59.1). The 20-day one is very short and does not stop on its own.

When it ends, the family must deregister you with Social Security within 6 calendar days of your last day (Royal Decree 643/2026, in force since 1 August 2026) and hand you the certificado de empresa, the document with your dates and contribution bases that the SEPE will ask you for.

If you are the one leaving, give notice in writing and keep a signed copy: it proves the date and that you did not simply walk out. We have a generator that leaves it ready as a PDF, with your details and the two signature boxes.

Domestic work has paid unemployment contributions since 1 October 2022, when Royal Decree-Law 16/2022 introduced them. Before that date the benefit did not exist for the sector; it is now a right like any other employee's, with the same requirements (General Social Security Act, arts. 266 to 270).

• At least 360 days of unemployment contributions in the last six years.
• Being legally unemployed: ending for a justified cause, a dismissal, the end of a fixed-term contract and the employer's death, retirement or incapacity all count (General Social Security Act, art. 267.1.a). Resigning does not.
• Registering as a jobseeker and signing the activity commitment.
• Not having reached the ordinary retirement age with entitlement to a contributory pension.

Days count however few the hours, and they add up across every household: each family contributes separately and it all accumulates in your Social Security record. That is why insisting on being registered for a few hours a week is insisting on unemployment benefit and a pension.

While you are registered you are entitled to temporary incapacity benefit. In domestic employment the split is particular, and it is worth knowing before you need it:

If the leave follows a work accident or an occupational illness there are no unpaid days: the subsidy runs from the day after the leave begins (General Social Security Act, art. 173), and the family pays your full salary for the day the leave starts. Domestic work does pay occupational-risk contributions, so a fall while cleaning or a back injury from lifting a dependent person falls under this.

During sick leave you stay registered and the family keeps contributing for you. Being on sick leave does not end your contract: if they tell you the contract is over while you are on leave, it still has to be in writing and with a cause — and if there is none, what applies is the section above.

What usually happens is not an open conflict but something that does not add up: the payslip never arrives, the hours are not the ones agreed, the registration is nowhere to be seen. Acting early and in writing almost always settles it before it becomes a problem.

1. 1. Keep everything, starting today

   Payslips, transfer receipts, the contract if there is one, the messages where the hours or the pay were agreed, and a note of your own with the days and hours you work. A WhatsApp conversation counts as evidence. With no paperwork, any claim is your word against theirs.

2. 2. Check your working-life report

   Go to Import@ss or the Social Security app and download your informe de vida laboral. It is free and takes a minute. It shows your registration and deregistration dates and the hours you are contributing for, which is what later determines your unemployment benefit and your pension.

3. 3. Ask in writing for whatever is missing

   The contract, the outstanding payslips, the certificado de empresa. A polite message is enough: what matters is that the date on which you asked is on the record.

4. 4. Talk to someone before signing anything

   Trade unions and domestic workers' associations give free guidance whether or not you are a member. Every province's bar association runs a free legal-orientation service, and if your income is low you can apply for legal aid. Never sign a document you do not understand, or a settlement on the spot if you have doubts: take it away with you.

5. 5. The Labour Inspectorate

   For registration that never happens, pay below the minimum, or hours that go unpaid. The report is filed online, it is free, you do not need a lawyer, and its origin is confidential: the Inspectorate does not tell the family who filed it.

6. 6. If you have been dismissed, the clock is running

   You have 20 working days from your last day to file the conciliation request with your region's mediation body (Workers' Statute, art. 59.3). It is free and needs no lawyer. Filing it is what stops the clock, even if you never end up going to court.

7. 7. If you are in danger

   For an emergency, 112. For gender violence, 016: it is free, answers in several languages and leaves no trace on your phone bill. Working in a private home changes none of this.