German pension refund for Vietnamese citizens: the clear non-treaty path.
Vietnam has no social security agreement with Germany, and that clears the refund path: your employee share is claimable regardless of how many months you contributed, once you live outside the EU and 24 months have passed since the last mandatory contribution. Average refund across 3,500+ cases: EUR 12,926.
“Got €16,400 back. Camilo kept me updated every step.”
James T. · Canada
What to check first
Country pages should narrow the likely route, not replace the full refund review.
The first job is orientation: current residence, voluntary contribution questions, waiting periods and document readiness still need to be checked together.
Current residence outside Germany still matters first
Country intent usually starts with residence context, because that can change which pension route is more realistic.
The 24-month rule and the broader contribution history remain core
A country page should never imply that nationality or current location alone decides the outcome.
Document and transfer details matter early in cross-border cases
Identity documents, current address details and payout handling often shape how smoothly a case can move after the fit is clear.
No agreement with Germany: the refund works at any month count.
Without a treaty, no periods combine between the two systems, and no voluntary-insurance right exists from Vietnam. The refund of the employee share is therefore possible regardless of contribution months, expressly including careers past the five-year mark. Conditions: residence outside the EU and 24 months since the last mandatory contribution — unemployment benefit months count as contributions and shift the start of that clock.
No agreement with Germany, and for once that works in your favour
Vietnam is not on Germany's list of social security treaty states. No agreement covers pensions between the two countries, no periods are added together, and nothing you paid in Vietnam counts in Germany or the other way round. That sounds like a disadvantage, and for a future German pension it is one. For the refund it is the opposite: as a citizen of a non-treaty country, you sit in the group with the clearest path back to your money that German pension law offers.
The mechanics are simple. A refund requires that you can no longer insure yourself in the German system, and a Vietnamese citizen living outside the EU never has the right to voluntary contributions. The Deutsche Rentenversicherung spells out the consequence: the refund is possible regardless of how many months you contributed, expressly including careers that passed the five-year mark that blocks citizens of many treaty states. Whether you worked in Germany for two years or twelve, the employee share of your contributions, 9.3 percent of every gross salary, is claimable once you live outside the EU and 24 months have passed since your last mandatory contribution.
A community with two generations of German payslips
Around a quarter of a million people of Vietnamese origin live in Germany, and the community's history with the German pension system runs deeper than most. Tens of thousands came to the GDR as contract workers before 1989; many returned to Vietnam in the years after reunification, often without anyone telling them what their insured months were worth. The new wave looks different: Vietnam ranks among the top countries of origin for German skilled-worker residence permits, nursing trainees have come through structured recruitment programmes since 2016, and roughly 7,000 Vietnamese students are enrolled at German universities.
Both generations share the same unclaimed asset. A nurse who trains and works for four years, an IT specialist who spends three years in Berlin, a former contract worker whose insured months date back to the 1980s: each has an account at the Deutsche Rentenversicherung, and none of it pays out on its own. With fewer than five contribution years, no German pension will ever form; without the refund, the money simply stays where it is.
The two conditions, and the clock most people misread
Condition one is residence: you apply from outside the EU, and a registered move back to Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City settles that. Condition two is the 24-month waiting period, and its start point is the detail people get wrong. The clock starts after your last mandatory contribution, not on the day of your flight. Months on German unemployment benefit count as mandatory contributions and push the start date back; a final salary payment in January starts the clock in February, wherever you are living by then.
The waiting time is collection time. Gather your German documents before or shortly after leaving: wage tax statements, your social security card, the insurance record, and the deregistration certificate from your municipality, the one paper that proves your German residence ended. Reconstructing any of these from Vietnam works, but it is the slow version, and a complete file is the difference between a clean process and half a year of extra letters.
Filing from Vietnam
The application reaches the Deutsche Rentenversicherung on German forms, by post, and the reply comes back in German. The final decision letter contains a response deadline that starts running in Germany while the envelope is still in transit, and the payout to a Vietnamese account can add up to two months after approval. The refund arrives in euros; your bank in Vietnam sets the conversion.
None of this requires you to speak German, if you hand it off. Fundsback has run the pension refund process since 2015, fully digital and in English, from the first eligibility check through the German correspondence to the transfer, and you pay nothing unless the refund lands. Across 3,500+ documented cases the average refund is EUR 12,926. For most Vietnamese returnees that number is the largest single payment their German years still owe them.
Common questions that usually come up on country pages
Who can claim a pension refund?
Pension refund is usually relevant for people who paid into the German pension system, may not fit the standard pension path and want to check whether reclaiming contributions makes more sense than waiting for regular retirement benefits.
ExploreDo I have to wait 24 months for a pension refund?
In many refund cases, the 24-month gap after your last mandatory contribution is part of the timing logic. The exact fit still depends on your insurance history and whether another pension route is more relevant, so it should be checked in context first.
ExploreReady to move from country-specific research into the actual refund path?
Use the country page to get the first orientation right, then continue into Pension Refund or contact if the case needs more human guidance.
