How do you terminate an employee in Georgia in 2026?
In Georgia, paying less notice costs you more severance. Give 30 days written notice and you owe 1 month pay. Cut that to 3 days and the bill doubles to 2 months. The Labour Code ties the two together, so the speed of the exit sets the price.
· Georgia guide
Illustration · Tbilisi, Georgia
Georgia gives you two notice routes. Route one: 30 days written notice plus 1 month severance. Route two: 3 days notice plus 2 months severance. Less notice means more pay.
Severance is due within 30 days of the termination date. You pick the route. The law sets the price for each.
There is no statutory cap on an unfair dismissal award. If a court voids the dismissal, it can order reinstatement, an equal job, or compensation it sets itself. (Labour Code of Georgia, Article 48)
How much notice must you give a Georgia employee?
You have two routes. Give 30 days written notice and pay 1 month severance. Or give 3 days written notice and pay 2 months.
The shorter route costs more. Both are legal. The choice is about speed against cost. (Labour Code of Georgia, Article 48)
| Termination route | Written notice | Severance owed |
|---|---|---|
| Standard notice route | 30 days | 1 month remuneration |
| Short notice route | 3 days | 2 months remuneration |
Both routes sit in Article 48 of the Labour Code of Georgia. The employer notifies the employee in writing, then pays severance set by which route was used. Severance is owed on every employer-initiated termination on these grounds, not only on redundancy. Most countries make notice and severance separate calculations. Georgia welds them. Cut the notice and the severance rises.
Why the trade-off exists
The logic is plain. A longer warning gives the employee more time to find work, so the law asks for less cash. A near-immediate exit gives almost no warning, so the law asks for double. Decide which matters more, a quick clean break or a smaller payment, before you serve notice.
What grounds and procedure does Georgia require?
You need a valid ground listed in the Labour Code. Notify the employee in writing. Then pay severance by the route you chose.
Skip the written notice or the severance and the employee can ask a court to void the dismissal. There is no cap on what the court can award. (Labour Code of Georgia, Article 47)
Article 47 of the Labour Code of Georgia lists the grounds an employer can rely on to end an open-ended agreement. The grounds in Article 47(1) include economic and organisational change, an employee's poor performance, gross breach of duties, and long-term incapacity for work. Article 48 then sets the notice and severance route that goes with each ground.
The procedure in short
- Confirm a valid ground from Article 47 before you act
- Notify the employee in writing using the notice route you have chosen
- Pay severance within 30 days of the termination date, at the rate the route sets
- Settle accrued leave and any other sums due at the same time
When incapacity becomes a ground
An employer may end the agreement where temporary incapacity for work runs past 40 consecutive calendar days, or past 60 calendar days in any six-month period. Below those limits, incapacity suspends the relationship rather than ending it. There is no statutory employer-paid sick pay during that suspension, so the time off is unpaid unless the contract or other law says otherwise.
If the court voids the dismissal
If a court finds the termination decision void, it can reinstate the employee, place them in an equal job, or order compensation it sets itself. The Labour Code fixes no ceiling on that compensation, so a procedural slip on a senior salary can run well past the one or two months of severance you would have paid by doing it cleanly.
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Confirm a valid ground
Anchor the termination to a ground in Article 47 of the Labour Code, such as organisational change, poor performance, or gross breach. A termination without a valid ground can be voided by a court, with no cap on the award.
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Choose your notice route
Decide between the standard route and the short route. The standard route gives more notice and owes less severance. The short route gives almost no notice and owes double.
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Serve written notice
Notify the employee in writing under the route you chose. The notice must be in writing to count. Verbal notice does not start the clock.
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Pay severance in the window
Pay the severance the route sets within 30 days of the termination date. Settle accrued leave and any other sums due at the same time.
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Keep the record clean
Hold the Article 47 ground, the written notice, the route, and the payment dates on file. A documented exit is the defence against a void-dismissal claim.
How is severance pay calculated in Georgia?
Severance is a flat amount tied to the notice route, not a per-year accrual. Standard notice owes 1 month remuneration. Short notice owes 2 months.
Length of service does not change the figure. A two-year employee and a ten-year employee on the same route get the same severance. Only the notice route moves the number.
Georgia does not use the per-year severance formula common across Europe and Africa. There is no weeks-per-year or month-per-year accrual. Article 48 of the Labour Code of Georgia sets a flat figure that depends only on how much notice you gave.
Severance by route
| Notice given | Severance owed | Payment window |
|---|---|---|
| 30 days | 1 month remuneration | Within 30 days of termination |
| 3 days | 2 months remuneration | Within 30 days of termination |
Severance is calculated on the employee's remuneration, the same base the contract uses for monthly pay. It sits on top of any accrued leave you must pay out. The figures are floors. A contract can promise more, but it cannot go below 1 month on the standard route or 2 months on the short route.
Accrued annual leave on termination
Unused annual leave is paid out on exit. The law grants at least 24 days of paid leave a year. Any balance left on the last working day is a cash sum due alongside severance, whatever the reason for the exit.
Probation and severance
A trial period runs to a maximum of 6 months, agreed once and in writing. During the trial period the Article 48 severance routes do not apply in the same way, so a clean exit inside probation is far cheaper than one after it. That makes the 6 months window the single most important date to track on a new hire.
Are there extra rules for group exits in Georgia?
Georgia has no separate collective redundancy framework with fixed consultation windows. The Article 48 notice and severance routes apply to each employee individually.
There is no statutory threshold headcount that triggers a longer process. You handle each termination on its own grounds and route.
An employer ending an agreement gives written notice and pays severance set by the route. Standard route: 30 days notice and 1 month remuneration. Short route: 3 days notice and 2 months. Severance is due within 30 days of the termination date.
Source: Labour Code of Georgia, Legislative Herald of Georgia
Unlike the UK or France, Georgia sets no headcount trigger and no minimum consultation period in days for group exits. The Labour Code of Georgia treats each termination as a single case under Article 47 grounds and the Article 48 routes.
That does not make a group exit risk-free. Each individual still needs a valid ground, written notice, and the right severance paid within the 30-day window. Get the ground or the route wrong on several people at once and you face several void-dismissal claims at once, each with no cap on the award. The duty to document the ground for every person is where group exits actually go wrong in Georgia.
What to record for each exit
- The specific Article 47 ground relied on
- The written notice served and its date
- The notice route chosen and the matching severance figure
- The severance payment date, within 30 days of termination
- Accrued leave settled at the same time
Can you agree a mutual exit in Georgia?
Yes. An employer and employee can end the agreement by mutual written consent. A clean agreement records the date, the final payment, and any waivers.
A mutual exit lets both sides skip the notice route argument. You agree the figure between you, often around the 1 month to 2 months band the law would otherwise set.
Mutual agreement is a recognised way to end employment under the Labour Code of Georgia. The agreement should be in writing and should record the agreed last day, the full payment breakdown, and any mutual waivers.
Typical parts of a Georgia mutual exit:
- Agreed exit payment, often pitched between 1 month and 2 months remuneration so the figure feels fair against the legal routes
- Accrued annual leave, all unused days at the daily rate, drawn from the 24 days yearly entitlement
- Final salary, paid in line with the monthly pay cycle the law requires
- Waiver of claims, which stops the employee asking a court to void the exit later
- Reference wording, agreed in advance where useful
A mutual exit removes the void-dismissal risk because the employee consents in writing. That is its main draw on senior salaries, where an uncapped court award is the real exposure. Settle the figure and sign before the last day, and pay any severance within the same 30-day window the law sets for the statutory routes.
How Teamed runs Georgia terminations
Teamed is your legal employer of record in Georgia. The cost is from $599 per employee per month, with zero FX mark-up in any currency. Every Georgia termination runs through Teamed's operations team.
We model both notice routes, calculate the severance, settle accrued leave, and pay within the 30-day window. It all runs on one platform. The decision on who to let go, and which route to take, is always yours.
Real HR and legal experts handle your Georgia hires, from the first offer letter through every monthly payroll run and pension contribution. An actual person, not a chatbot or a pooled queue. There is no setup fee and no exit fee, and employer cost passes through at cost, itemised on every invoice.
The split of responsibilities under EOR for Georgia terminations:
| What Teamed handles | What the client decides |
|---|---|
| Modelling the 30 days route against the 3 days route | Whether to dismiss, why, and on what timeline |
| Severance at 1 month or 2 months, paid within 30 days | Which notice route fits the situation |
| Written notice and the Article 47 ground on the record | Performance standards and what counts as a valid ground |
| Accrued leave from the 24 days entitlement, calculated and paid | Whether to offer enhanced terms above the floor |
| Tracking the 6 months trial-period deadline on every hire | Reference wording and any waiver terms |
| Final payroll: severance, leave, income tax, and pension deductions | Commercial terms of any mutual exit |
Georgia has no collective consultation window, but a void-dismissal claim has no cap. Teamed keeps the Article 47 ground and the notice route documented on every exit, so a senior termination does not turn into an uncapped court award.
EOR, contractors, and entity employees all live on one platform. An employee hired through Teamed's Georgia network can graduate to your own Georgian legal presence when headcount makes entity formation the right call, until it isn't. Run the Crossover Calculator to see when the model flips. Start from the Georgia hiring overview.
Key sources: Labour Code of Georgia, Tax Code of Georgia, Article 81, and the Law of Georgia on Funded Pensions.
Frequently asked questions
How much notice must you give an employee in Georgia in 2026?
Georgia gives an employer two routes under Article 48 of the Labour Code. The standard route is 30 days written notice with 1 month severance. The short route is 3 days written notice with 2 months severance. Less notice means more severance, so the choice is speed against cost.
Is severance pay mandatory in Georgia?
Yes, on an employer-initiated termination on Labour Code grounds. The amount is a flat figure set by the notice route, not a per-year accrual. The standard route owes 1 month remuneration and the short route owes 2 months. Severance is due within 30 days of the termination date and length of service does not change it.
What happens if a Georgia dismissal is found unfair?
If a court declares the termination decision void, it can reinstate the employee, place them in an equal job, or order compensation it sets itself under Article 48 of the Labour Code. There is no statutory cap on that compensation, so a procedural slip on a senior salary can cost far more than the one or two months of severance a clean exit would have needed.
What is the maximum probation period in Georgia?
The Labour Code sets a maximum trial period of 6 months, which can be agreed only once and only in writing. A clean exit inside the trial period is far cheaper than one after it, so the 6 months deadline is the key date to track on a new hire.
Does accrued annual leave get paid out on termination in Georgia?
Yes. Unused annual leave is paid out on exit, whatever the reason. The law grants at least 24 days of paid leave a year. Any balance left on the last working day is a cash sum due alongside severance and final salary.
Is there statutory sick pay during a Georgia termination process?
No. Georgia has no statutory employer-paid sick pay. Temporary incapacity for work suspends the employment relationship and is unpaid unless the contract or other law says otherwise. An employer may end the agreement once incapacity runs past 40 consecutive calendar days, or past 60 calendar days in any six-month period.
The Georgia mistake we see most is treating short notice as the cheap option. It is the opposite. Three days' notice doubles the severance to two months. Employers who rush the exit pay for the speed, and a missing written ground can void the whole thing.
Georgia is the rare country where giving less notice costs you more. 3 days notice owes 2 months severance, double the standard route.
Most employers reach for the fast exit and never see the bill coming.
Pick the route on purpose, document the ground, and pay within 30 days.
Know the trade-off before you serve notice.
