Quick answer: resigning at exactly five years of service earns one third of the end-of-service benefit. The two-thirds share only begins once your service is more than five years — so even one extra day roughly doubles your payout. If you are anywhere near a threshold, check the date before you hand in your resignation.
The three thresholds of Article 85
When you resign from an open-ended contract, your share of the Article 84 benefit depends on total service:
| Service | Share |
|---|---|
| Less than 2 years | Nothing |
| 2 years up to and including 5 years | One third |
| More than 5 and less than 10 years | Two thirds |
| 10 years or more | Full benefit |
Notice the wording: the five-year point itself still belongs to the one-third band. The law grants two thirds only to service exceeding five years.
One day, double the money
The benefit grows slowly, but the share jumps. On a 10,000 SAR wage:
| You resign at | Full benefit earned | Your share | You receive |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 years exactly | 25,000 | 1/3 | 8,333.33 SAR |
| 5 years + 1 day | 25,027.40 | 2/3 | 16,684.93 SAR |
One more day of service is worth 8,351 SAR here. The same cliff exists at ten years, where the share rises from two thirds to the full amount: at 9 years 11 months you would receive 49,444 SAR, while at 10 years exactly it becomes 75,000 SAR — more than 25,000 SAR for one more month.
Our calculator warns you automatically: when you are close to a threshold it shows a note like “in 1 day your share rises to two thirds”.
Which date actually counts
- Service runs from your actual start date to your last working day, counted in days (a year is 365 days). Check both dates in your contract and on Qiwa — the registered dates govern.
- What matters is when the employment ends, not when you submit the letter. With a 30-day notice period, a resignation submitted a few weeks before your five-year anniversary can still cross the threshold by the time your last day arrives.
- Unpaid leave periods may be excluded from service, so don’t cut it to the exact day if long unpaid absences are in your history.
When waiting is not the answer
Timing only matters for an ordinary resignation. Your share is the full benefit regardless of service length when:
- the employer ends the contract (or doesn’t renew a fixed term);
- you leave for an Article 81 reason — the employer broke its core obligations;
- the contract ends under Article 87 (force majeure, or a woman resigning within six months of marriage or three months of childbirth);
- you reach retirement age or the end is by mutual agreement.
In those cases there is nothing to time — see resigning before 2 years for the full list of exceptions.
Practical checklist before resigning near a threshold
- Confirm your registered start date and planned last working day.
- Enter both dates in the calculator’s dates mode — it counts the days for you.
- If the threshold note appears, consider whether your notice period already carries you past it.
- Keep the resignation letter’s dates consistent with what you calculated.
The full rules and all worked examples are on the How we calculate page.