More than 36.6 thousand wage arrears were recorded at the beginning of 2026, according to the Unified Register of Debtors. The number of debts increased by 6% over the year. Almost 2 thousand cases date back to 2017. A record 9.1 thousand proceedings on wage arrears were opened last year. This is 30% more than in 2024. More than a quarter of the debts are owed by companies operating in the chemicals industry. Dnipropetrovs’k region is among the anti-leaders with more than a third of all wage arrears.
As of the beginning of 2026, there were 36,629 active proceedings for non-payment of wages in Ukraine. Over the year, the number of wages not paid on time increased by 6%.
Overall, Ukrainian companies set an anti-record last year: 9,174 proceedings on wage arrears against 488 companies. This is 30% more than in 2024 and the highest figure in the last 5 years.
56% of the wage arrears proceedings initiated last year have not yet been settled.
Cases where employees have been unable to get their money for a long time are not uncommon. Among these cases, there are outright “long-lived” ones. The oldest proceeding found in the register of debtors at the time of writing stretches back to 2017 – the state-owned enterprise Poliskgeodeskartografiya owes money to its employees. It should be noted that this company is currently in a state of liquidation. In total, almost two thousand active cases were opened in 2017.
Companies producing chemical products were the most likely to fail to pay their employees last year: more than 2,600 proceedings, or 29% of all. Electricity and gas supply companies also owe almost as much (27%).
More than a third of all proceedings opened last year were in Dnipropetrovs’k region – 3.2 thousand cases. Businesses from Ivano-Frankivsk (1,100), Sumy (897), and Lviv (770) regions follow the negative example by a significant margin.
At the same time, only 1 case was recorded in Luhansk region, 4 more in Chernivtsi region, and 12 proceedings on wage arrears in Volyn.
Mostly, the money is withheld by private companies: 62% of all debts in 2025.
Another quarter of cases involve utility companies and more than 13% involve state-owned companies. Most often, limited liability companies, municipal and joint-stock companies are involved.
The absolute leader in the number of wage arrears was the utility company Teplocomunenergo of the Oleksandriya City Council, against which 1,446 cases were opened in 2025. This is followed by Karpatnaftochim (1,059), Dniproazot (630), Svitlovodskpobut (491), and Odesa Port Plant (469). Some companies were able to close most of their cases by the end of the year, while hundreds of proceedings remained active.
Several companies included in the Opendatabot 2025 Index also had arrears. Recovery of unpaid salaries was found in relation to Ukrzaliznytsia, Ukrnafta, Ukrtransgaz, the network of laboratories Esculab, the Gas Transmission System Operator of Ukraine, and DTEK Pavlohradvuhillya. In most cases, the companies closed their debts by the end of the year.
https://opendatabot.ua/analytics/salary-debts-2025-12
The level of wages in 2024 plans to increase 72% of surveyed companies, almost the same number of companies (74%) feel the shortage of staff, these are the results of a study of the labor market in Ukraine from the European Business Association (EBA).
According to the published data, 39% intend to increase wages by 11-15%, and 28% – by 6-10%, while plans to increase it by 16-20% – reported 13%, and above 21% – 2%.
It is also specified that the shortage of personnel has significantly increased since the fall survey, when 55% of respondents complained about it, while today only 7% of respondents do not feel it at all, while 17% feel it partially.
Within the survey, 79% of respondents reported a salary increase in 2023, 46% reported an increase in functionality and hiring new employees, and 36% reported an increase in budgets for staff development, training and maintenance.
In addition, 27% informed about increasing bonuses and bonus payments, while 10% of respondents reported staff reductions.
As for 2024, survey participants noted that companies are planning to increase salary levels (72% of respondents), increase training and development budgets (39%), increase the number of employees (35%), and enter other markets and find new partners (32%).
54% of survey participants indicated that their companies offer the opportunity to work remotely, but not for all categories of workers. 28% of respondents indicated that remote working is possible for all workers and only 17% reported that it is impossible to work remotely.
“Accordingly, there is a gradual dynamic of workers returning to offices. For comparison, in January 2023, only 4% of companies did not have the possibility of working remotely,” states the EBA.
The association also added that 52% of respondents have employees abroad, but their share does not exceed 5% of the total staff of the company, while 19% of respondents have 6-10% of employees abroad.
It is noted that 32% of respondents have all employees of the company now live and work in Ukraine, which is higher than in previous periods. At the same time, some companies use formats of temporary contracts abroad, upon completion of which employees can return to Ukraine.
Poland, Germany, Czech Republic, Romania, Great Britain, Spain, Israel, Netherlands, Slovenia, Austria, Norway, Belgium, USA, Switzerland, Canada, Latvia, Italy, Luxembourg were named among the countries where most of the companies’ employees live.
It is emphasized that 41% of respondents do not plan to return workers to the office in the near future, 12% said that the company plans to return all workers to the office in the near future, and 20% of respondents said that the company plans to return not all categories of workers.
To tear away vacancies in companies, 67% of survey participants intend to do so, with 48% of respondents not planning to change the number of employees in 2024, and 26% will increase staffing by ≥5%.
Also, 7% said that the number of employees will increase by 6-10% and 5% of respondents wrote that their companies plan to reduce the number of employees.
109 HR professionals (49% department heads, 24% middle managers, 26% top management, 3% junior staff) participated in the study, it lasted from February to April 2024 and covered the period August 2023 – April 2024.
More than 60% of the participants in this study will represent international businesses. 50% of companies are from large businesses, 43% from medium-sized businesses and 7% from small businesses.
Spending on the payment of salaries in the public sector has been reduced by 10%, Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal has said.
“We have already reduced the total cost of wages in the public sector, except for the budgetary sector, meaning civil servants, not teachers and not doctors, by 10%. We have reduced costs by 10% in the Cabinet of Ministers, the President’s Office, the Verkhovna Rada,” Shmyhal said in an interview on the air of the national telethon on Friday morning.
The prime minister noted that the authorities intend, if necessary, to continue the trend to reduce the cost of wages in the public sector.
He also added that expenditures directly on the functioning of the government, parliament and the President’s Office have also decreased.
“Everything that can be abandoned, we do away with, and we redirect everything to the needs of the army and the Armed Forces,” Shmyhal said.
As reported, the Cabinet of Ministers has canceled the payment of labor intensity bonuses for the prime minister, ministers, their deputies and heads of regional and Kyiv state administrations until 2024.
At a meeting of the National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) on Friday, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky set the task to ensure the greatest possible increase in salaries of nurses, NSDC Secretary Oleksiy Danilov has said.
“Danilov said that further measures to reform the health system should be focused on adjusting the reform, taking into account the priority of solving the problematic issues that the situation with the spread of COVID-19 pandemic has revealed. According to Danilov, the President of Ukraine also set the task of ensuring the greatest possible increase salaries of nurses,” the NSDC press service said, following the results of the meeting in Kramatorsk.
It is noted that at the meeting the issue of the state of the national health system and urgent measures to provide citizens of Ukraine with medical care was considered, and an appropriate decision was made.
Since October, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine has lifted restrictions on the salaries of managers, members of executive bodies and remuneration to members of supervisory boards of state-owned companies, according to a government resolution dated October 26, posted on the government’s website.
“To establish that in October 2020 and in the future, the salary of managers, members of executive bodies and remuneration of members of supervisory boards of economic entities in the public sector of the economy are determined in accordance with the terms of contracts …” the government said in the document.
Thus, the Cabinet of Ministers used Paragraph 4 of Section 2 of the Final Provisions of the law dated September 17, 2020, with amendments to the national budget for 2020.
Minister of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine Dmytro Dubilet has said government intends to publish monthly salaries of top officials.
“We will officially publish every month all the income that our top officials receive. This information is not a secret. This will be another step so that we become more transparent and honest with the community,” Dubilet said at a briefing on the results of a government meeting on Thursday in Kyiv.
According to him, this information will be published on the government website. It will include the salaries of ministers and their deputies.
