Chemical industry tariff: Lower Saxony
Wage table, working hours and special payments for the Lower Saxony chemical-industry bargaining region.
Table of Contents
Niedersachsen is one of the larger chemical-industry bargaining regions by area in this calculator. One notable feature: for pay groups E6 through E13, the figures in Niedersachsen and neighboring Bremen are identical except for one disclosed position below - while E1 through E5 differ slightly between the two.
That very match helped uncover a genuine data inconsistency in the source, covered in its own section below.
Pay groups E1 through E13
E1 sits at 3,084 EUR in Niedersachsen, E6 (entry after training) at 3,542 EUR, rising to 4,109 EUR after six years. The top commercial group E13 sits at 7,200 EUR - well above Hamburg (6,740 EUR) and Schleswig-Holstein (6,774 EUR), but identical to Bremen.
This match with Bremen at the upper groups but not the lower ones is a plausible pattern: the two regions appear to follow a shared line for more qualified work (from E6 up), while the entry groups for simpler tasks (E1 through E5) are negotiated independently.
| Pay group | Occupational variant | ab 18. Lebensjahr | Anfangsstufe | nach 2 Jahren | nach 3 Jahren | nach 4 Jahren | nach 6 Jahren |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| E1 | einheitlich | 3,084.00 € | – | – | – | – | – |
| E2 | einheitlich | 3,253.00 € | – | – | – | – | – |
| E3 | einheitlich | 3,325.00 € | – | – | – | – | – |
| E4 | einheitlich | 3,388.00 € | – | – | – | – | – |
| E5 | einheitlich | – | 3,465.00 € | – | 3,552.00 € | – | 3,638.00 € |
| E6 | einheitlich | – | 3,542.00 € | 3,755.00 € | – | 3,932.00 € | 4,109.00 € |
| E7 | einheitlich | – | 3,668.00 € | 3,888.00 € | – | 4,108.00 € | 4,328.00 € |
| E8 | einheitlich | – | 3,790.00 € | 4,017.00 € | – | 4,283.00 € | 4,548.00 € |
| E9 | kaufmaennisch | – | 4,000.00 € | 4,378.00 € | – | 4,810.00 € | 5,405.00 € |
| E10 | kaufmaennisch | – | 4,454.00 € | 4,864.00 € | – | 5,333.00 € | 5,860.00 € |
| E11 | kaufmaennisch | – | 4,924.00 € | 5,366.00 € | – | 5,745.00 € | 6,313.00 € |
| E12 | kaufmaennisch | – | 5,281.00 € | 5,755.00 € | – | 6,228.00 € | 6,770.00 € |
| E13 | kaufmaennisch | – | 7,200.00 € | – | – | – | – |
What the pay groups describe
E1 covers tasks needing only brief introduction, E6 marks entry after completed vocational training, E13 covers independent commercial or technical work requiring extensive experience and specialist knowledge. This structure is nationally consistent in substance, with only the euro figures negotiated per region.
Working hours
The contractual week is 37.5 hours, with a divisor of 163.1. At 25 weekly hours (about 67% of full-time), a full E6 entry wage of 3,542 EUR would come to roughly 2,361 EUR of part-time base pay.
The 2026-2028 settlement
Niedersachsen follows the same national steps: unchanged through end 2026, then 2.1% (January 2027) and a further 2.4% (January 2028), with an optional three-month early adoption at company level. No region-specific published table exists for these steps, so the calculator shows them as derived.
A corrected data inconsistency: E10 after four years
A systematic check of every table for a consistently rising step sequence flagged position E10, "after 4 years", for Niedersachsen: the source figure (4,333 EUR) was lower than the preceding step "after 2 years" (4,864 EUR) - a step backward that doesn't occur anywhere else. Since Bremen's table is otherwise exactly identical for E6 through E13, its figure for the same position (5,333 EUR) served as the correction: it restores the expected, consistently rising sequence, and was adopted in place of the internally contradictory source figure.
This correction is openly documented, not made silently - unlike a gap left open for lack of a reliable second source (as with Westfalen's E11), this value could be restored with reasonable confidence here.
Special payments
No independently confirmed source exists for Niedersachsen's own holiday pay or annual bonus - the calculator shows Nordrhein's confirmed figures as the nationwide default pattern instead. The nationally-set Zukunftsbetrag (23% of a month's pay) is available too, but only counts as cash once you explicitly select that usage.
The annual view
Twelve monthly salaries at E6 entry level (3,542 EUR) total an annual gross of 42,504 EUR in Niedersachsen. At E13 (7,200 EUR, identical to Bremen), that's 86,400 EUR a year - well above Hamburg (80,880 EUR) or Schleswig-Holstein (81,288 EUR).
The corrected E10 "after 4 years" position (5,333 EUR instead of the internally contradictory 4,333 EUR) directly affects an annual view of that group: 63,996 EUR instead of an uncorrected 51,996 EUR a year - a 12,000 EUR difference that shows how much the correction matters for realistic planning.
Frequently asked questions
Why do Niedersachsen and Bremen match exactly from E6 to E13?
That's a finding from the source itself (WSI Tarifarchiv), not yet explained by a dedicated document. E1 through E5 differ between the two regions, which argues against a plain copy and for an independent, only coincidentally similar negotiation at the upper groups.
Why was the E10 figure changed at all?
Because the original source figure (4,333 EUR) was lower than the preceding step - a step backward that occurs nowhere else. Bremen's identical table for this group served as the basis for the correction, openly disclosed in this calculator.
Who this page is for
This table applies to the Chemische Industrie Niedersachsen bargaining region. Open the interactive calculator for a full calculation including working hours and an optional net-pay estimate.
Sources
- https://www.bavc.de/presse/pressemitteilungen/2492-pi-25-03-26 (BAVC press release - 2.1%/2.4% increases, Jan 2027/2028, agreement duration, 300 EUR/year demographic-fund contribution)
- https://igbce.de/igbce/chemie26-faq-zum-abschluss-269474 (IGBCE FAQ - Zukunftsbetrag 23% national framework confirmation, early-adoption option)
- WSI Tarifarchiv, Chemische Industrie workbook: https://www.wsi.de/data/p_ta_tarife_chemische_industrie_2026.xlsx (sheet "NI | E", April-2025 wage step)