Following a Supreme Court ruling earlier this year, former employees of Samsung's affiliates are increasingly filing lawsuits against the companies for unpaid severance pay. The January ruling determined that certain portions of performance bonuses provided to employees should be considered as wages and included in the calculation of severance pay. A group of 38 former Samsung Electronics employees filed a lawsuit on June 12, seeking adjustments in their severance pay calculations to include these bonuses, bringing the total number of claimants to 164.

Another group of 13 former employees of Samsung Electronics Service has also initiated a separate lawsuit on the same grounds. They argue that performance bonuses should be counted as part of the average wage for retirement pension calculations, thus warranting payment for the unpaid severance amounts. The legal actions are driven by a desire for equitable compensation based on the recent court decision, which emphasized that the established criteria and regularity of payment for these bonuses imply they are indeed part of the wage structure.

However, the classification of performance bonuses as wages is a contentious issue, with differing judicial opinions across various companies. In a recent ruling, the Supreme Court did not recognize the performance bonuses as wages in a case involving 972 former employees of Hanwha Ocean, stating that there was insufficient direct correlation between the bonuses and the work provided. Similar rulings have emerged in other cases, indicating a lack of uniformity in how courts in South Korea interpret performance bonuses in the context of wages and severance pay calculations.