Introduction
When looking at the accounting function of foreign-invested companies in Vietnam, a Chief Accountant (hereafter “CA”) going on maternity leave is by no means a rare event.
The problem is not the leave itself. The problem is a CA going absent for nearly six months while work and judgment remain concentrated on that one person.
Monthly close, tax filings, headquarters reporting, bank dealings, audit response — for work the CA normally handles as a matter of course, once they are absent, “who decides this,” “where are the documents,” and “how was this handled in the past” can suddenly become unclear.
On the other hand, unlike a sudden resignation, maternity leave is an absence you can prepare for. It is usually known months in advance, so the impact on the accounting function can be substantially reduced depending on how the company prepares.
This article organizes the basics of the system that managers should confirm when a CA goes on maternity leave in Vietnam, the practical accounting risks involved, and the preparation needed before and after the leave.
Please note that labor and social insurance rules can change with amendments and individual circumstances. When making specific decisions, we recommend confirming with current laws, guidance from the social insurance authorities, and labor and social insurance specialists.
1. What Tends to Stall When a CA Goes on Maternity Leave
The impact on a company differs between an ordinary accounting staff member going on maternity leave and a CA doing so.
For an accounting staff member, the main issue is handing over tasks. The focus is on the division of work — who does the bookkeeping, who checks invoices, who prepares payment requests.
For a CA, however, the issue is not just the work but a gap in “judgment” and “responsibility.”
Judgment stalls more than the work
Daily bookkeeping and payment processing can often be handled by other staff.
But tax treatment policies, the interpretation of arrangements with headquarters, explanations to auditors, and points previously raised in tax inspections are frequently held only in the CA’s head. For example, judgments like these:
- Is this expense deductible?
- Does foreign contractor tax (FCT) apply to this transaction?
- Under which account was the charge to headquarters processed?
- How was the same point explained in a past tax inspection?
- Which documents do the auditors check every year?
When this kind of information is not documented, the moment the CA is absent, the team can no longer make the call.
Key-person dependency surfaces all at once
Even at a company that runs smoothly day to day, the operation may in fact depend heavily on the CA’s individual experience and memory.
“Only the CA understands this treatment.” “The CA handles all of the bank communication.” “Final tax-filing checks are left entirely to the CA.” “The CA somehow pulls the headquarters report together every month.”
While the CA is present, none of this looks like a problem. But once they are absent for nearly six months on maternity leave, the key-person dependency surfaces all at once. Maternity leave is also a moment when the weaknesses of the accounting structure become easy to see.
It can overlap with peak periods
The timing of maternity leave is not something the company can decide on its own.
It can overlap with year-end close, audits, tax filings, tax inspections, and budget reporting to headquarters. In Vietnam especially, many companies have the CA covering a wide range — accounting, tax, social insurance, bank dealings — so when the CA is absent during a peak period, the team can struggle more than expected.
For that reason, when you hear about a pregnancy or planned leave from the CA, rather than thinking “there are still a few months,” you need to start confirming the structure early.
2. Maternity Leave Basics Managers Should Know in Vietnam
The detailed procedures should be confirmed with HR staff or specialists, but managers, too, are better off understanding the broad framework. Without knowing the premises of the system, it is harder to have conversations with the CA or to consider a coverage arrangement.
Maternity leave is, in principle, six months
In Vietnam, female employees are granted six months of maternity leave covering the period before and after childbirth. In the case of twins or more, one additional month is added for each child from the second onward.
There is a cap on how much leave can be taken before childbirth, and when the leave actually begins is adjusted based on the employee’s health, the expected due date, and the work situation.
Maternity allowance is, in principle, paid from social insurance
Income support during maternity leave is, in principle, paid not from the company’s payroll but as a maternity allowance from the social insurance system. It is a mechanism whereby social insurance provides benefits to female employees who meet requirements such as a certain period of social insurance contributions.
For that reason, the company’s main challenge lies less in bearing the salary during leave and more in how to keep the work running during the CA’s absence.
That said, the actual benefit requirements, benefit amounts, and treatment of social insurance contributions may change with regulatory amendments and the individual’s contribution status. In specific cases, confirmation with HR or labor staff and specialists is necessary.
Pregnant, on-leave, and child-rearing female employees are protected
Under Vietnam’s Labor Code, for female employees who are pregnant, on maternity leave, or raising a child under 12 months old, an employer’s unilateral termination of the labor contract or disciplinary dismissal is restricted.
The fact that a CA will be absent for a long period does not mean the company can casually end the contract for its own convenience.
This point relates to the expiry timing of fixed-term labor contracts discussed below. In particular, when the contract expiry date falls during pregnancy or the maternity leave period, careful judgment is needed.
3. The Overlooked Issues of “Contract Term” and “CA Structure”
What tends to cause practical trouble when a CA goes on maternity leave is not simply a matter of insufficient handover.
There are also points managers tend to overlook — the timing of contract expiry, the CA’s legal positioning, and the authority of the substitute.
When a fixed-term contract expires during maternity leave
Vietnam’s labor contracts come in fixed-term and indefinite-term forms. Fixed-term contracts have a limit on the number of renewals, and for long-tenured employees, conversion to an indefinite-term contract also comes into play.
What tends to become a problem is the case where the CA’s fixed-term contract expiry date falls during pregnancy or the maternity leave period.
Generally, the expiry of a fixed-term contract is treated as a separate matter from a unilateral termination by the company. On the other hand, if it is perceived that the contract was not renewed because of pregnancy or maternity leave, it can become a problem from the standpoint of anti-discrimination and the protection of female employees.
For example, if a company that had continuously renewed the contract suddenly decides not to renew it at the timing of pregnancy or maternity leave, the company may be asked for a reasonable explanation.
This point is hard to judge mechanically from the wording of the law alone. When the contract expiry date is likely to overlap with the period of pregnancy, maternity leave, or child-rearing, it is safer to consult a labor specialist early.
How to handle the responsibility structure during the CA’s absence
In Vietnam, depending on the company’s size and situation, you need to establish an accounting-responsibility structure that may include a Chief Accountant, an accounting lead, or external accounting services.
For that reason, when a CA goes on maternity leave, simply saying “a senior staff member will cover it” or “we’ll ask the accounting firm” can be insufficient. The points to confirm include:
- During leave, who makes the final accounting and tax check?
- Does that person have sufficient experience and authority?
- Does the internal approval route need to change?
- Who becomes the point of contact for banks, the tax office, auditors, and the accounting firm?
- Is there a need to confirm the legal positioning of a deputy or accounting lead?
Especially at companies where the CA single-handedly serves as the point of contact for bank transactions, tax filings, and audit response, putting this confirmation off means scrambling once the leave has begun.
4. What to Prepare Before the Leave
The most important part of handling a CA’s maternity leave is the preparation before the leave begins.
Trying to manage it during the leave only goes so far, since there is limited room to confirm things once the person is out. How you use the few months before the leave makes a large difference to the stability during it.
First, write out all of the CA’s work
The first thing to do is take an inventory of the work the CA currently handles.
Write out, in as much detail as possible, the work the CA is involved in — monthly, annual, tax, banking, payroll, social insurance, audit, headquarters reporting, contract review, internal approvals. Then sort it into categories:
- Work that can be handed to other accounting staff
- Work that can be outsourced to an accounting firm or external specialist
- Work that the GM or a foreign manager should decide
- Work that only the CA truly understands
- Work that must be documented before the leave
Without this sorting, simply asking “please prepare handover materials” rarely works in practice. What matters is that the company grasps what is being handed to whom.
Document the judgment-based work
In the pre-leave handover, what matters most is the rationale for judgments, more than the work procedures. For example:
- Treatments that have been problematic in the past from a tax standpoint
- Points the auditors check every year
- Reporting methods agreed with headquarters
- Special billing and payment terms with particular counterparties
- Past interactions with banks and the tax office
- The timing for consulting the accounting firm
- Whose approval is needed internally
For work procedures alone, those around can often manage by watching. But without understanding the background to a judgment, it is unclear whether to continue the same treatment or to change it.
The judgments held in the CA’s head need to be brought out as much as possible before the leave.
Decide the coverage arrangement early
There are several options for the structure during the CA’s leave:
- Temporarily elevate a senior staff member internally
- Have the accounting firm broaden its confirmation and review scope
- Hire a fixed-term accounting professional to cover the leave
- Ask the headquarters accounting and finance department to handle part of the confirmation
- Have a foreign manager temporarily take on more approvals and checks
Which is right depends on the company’s size, transaction volume, the capability of existing staff, and the degree of dependence on the CA.
What to avoid, though, is deciding by default to “just manage with the staff we have now.” That places excessive load on the current staff and can lead to errors or turnover.
The coverage arrangement is safer trialed a few months in advance rather than right before the leave.
Run the monthly close once under the coverage arrangement before the leave
If possible, while the CA is still in the office, we recommend running the monthly close once with the substitute at the center.
When you actually try it, problems surface: the location of documents is unclear, approvers are ambiguous, the way to request work from the accounting firm is unknown, the fine rules of headquarters reporting are unclear.
While the CA is still present, you can confirm these on the spot. If the same problems appear after the leave begins, confirmation takes time and places a burden on the person too.
5. Practical Handling During Leave and at Return
Even with pre-leave preparation, there are points to watch during the leave and at the return to work.
In particular, contact during leave, the post-return position, and the relationship with the substitute can affect the person’s motivation to return and the internal atmosphere, depending on how the manager handles them.
Don’t over-contact during leave
When the handover is insufficient, situations arise where you want to check with the CA during leave.
But asking an employee on maternity leave to handle work frequently should be avoided. It is not only a burden on the person’s health and child-rearing but can also lead to distrust toward the company.
Even when confirmation is unavoidable, decide the contact point and frequency in advance, and limit it to matters with genuine urgency.
The ideal is to create, before the leave, a state in which accounting runs without needing to contact the CA during the leave.
Be considerate of the post-return position
A female employee returning from maternity leave is, in principle, expected to return to the same work as before the leave.
Even when a substitute was placed during the leave, care is needed so that the returning CA’s position and treatment do not become disadvantageous.
For example, even if the substitute functioned better than expected, lowering the returning CA’s authority or treatment on that basis should be avoided. Beyond the legal issues, it affects trust in the company and talent retention.
Don’t return all the work at once right after the return
After the return, restoring the full prior workload all at once can place a large burden on the person.
In particular, as the balancing of work and child-rearing begins, overtime and ad hoc response can become difficult. For a while after the return, realistic adjustments may be needed — restoring work in stages, leaving peak-period support in place, confirming the feasibility of remote or shortened-hours work.
Of course, the company cannot always accommodate every wish. But rather than treating things on the same premises as before from the moment of return, the stance of aligning the person’s situation with the company’s work is important.
Don’t forget to sort out roles with the substitute
When a substitute was placed during the leave, roles can become ambiguous after the return.
Unless you sort out how much of the work the substitute temporarily carried returns to the CA, which work stays divided, and how approval authority is restored, internal confusion arises.
In some cases, the maternity leave can be a trigger to shift work that had been concentrated on a single CA into a structure shared by the team.
Rather than simply returning to the pre-leave state, it is also important to use this as an opportunity to review the post-return accounting structure.
6. How to Think About Hiring and External Support
Preparing for a CA’s maternity leave is not only about handling it internally.
Depending on the company’s size and workload, hiring a fixed-term accounting professional to cover the leave, or temporarily broadening the accounting firm’s review scope, also become options.
That said, even when hiring, simply “looking for someone with CA experience” does not always work. The points to confirm include:
- Do they understand the time-limited nature of a maternity-cover role?
- How far can they handle monthly close, tax filings, and headquarters reporting?
- Can they work in cooperation with existing staff?
- Will their role conflict with the returning CA?
- Are the compensation terms realistic for the level the company is asking for?
For a short-term hire, rather than searching for the perfect candidate, it is more important to clarify “which risk you want to cover.”
For example, whether the concern is tax judgment, headquarters reporting, or closing the monthly books changes the kind of person or external support you need.
Many companies end up considering a form that suits them by combining internal handling, the accounting firm, external talent, and recruitment platforms.
Closing Thoughts
A Chief Accountant’s maternity leave is not a small event for a company.
In Vietnam especially, many companies have the CA covering a wide range — accounting, tax, banking, headquarters reporting, audit response — so an absence of nearly six months can translate directly into instability in the accounting structure.
But unlike a sudden resignation, maternity leave is an absence you can prepare for.
Take an inventory of the CA’s work. Document the judgment-based work. Decide the coverage arrangement. Confirm contract terms and the CA structure. Sort out the contact rules during leave and the roles after return.
If you advance this preparation early, the confusion during the leave can be considerably contained.
A CA’s maternity leave should be considered not as “the problem of the person taking leave” but as “the problem of the company’s accounting structure.” Reviewing the work that had been concentrated on one person, and moving closer to an accounting structure that runs as a team — capturing it this way is, I think, an important point for managers.
FAQ
Q1. Does the company bear the Chief Accountant’s salary during maternity leave?
In principle, income support during maternity leave is paid not from the company’s payroll but as a maternity allowance from the social insurance system. Receiving it requires meeting requirements such as a certain period of social insurance contributions.
For that reason, the company’s main challenge lies less in bearing the salary itself and more in how to keep the work running during the CA’s absence.
That said, benefit amounts and requirements may change with regulatory amendments and the individual’s situation, so in specific cases we recommend confirming with the social insurance authorities or specialists.
Q2. The CA’s fixed-term contract expires during the maternity leave period. May we end the contract?
This judgment should be made carefully.
The expiry of a fixed-term contract may be treated as a separate matter from a unilateral termination by the company. On the other hand, if it is perceived that the contract was not renewed because of pregnancy or maternity leave, it can become a problem from the standpoint of anti-discrimination and the protection of female employees.
When the contract expiry date overlaps with the period of pregnancy, maternity leave, or child-rearing, rather than the company deciding on its own, we recommend confirming early with labor and social insurance specialists.
Q3. How should we secure a substitute during maternity leave?
It depends on the company’s size, workload, and the capability of existing staff.
There are several options — temporarily elevating a senior staff member internally, broadening the accounting firm’s support scope, hiring a fixed-term accounting professional, or asking headquarters to handle part of the confirmation.
What matters is not deciding in a rush right before the leave, but trialing the coverage arrangement while the CA is still in the office.
Q4. Is it acceptable to contact the CA with work matters during maternity leave?
In principle, asking an employee on maternity leave to handle work frequently should be avoided.
When confirmation is truly necessary, it is better to limit it to matters with genuine urgency and to decide the contact point and frequency in advance.
Ideally, the state in which accounting runs without contacting the CA during leave should be created before the leave.
