Turkey Law No. 7566 Explained: What Changed in Your 2026 Payroll

Your Turkey office CFO called last week. The January 2026 payroll run came in 8% higher than the 2025 monthly average. No new hires. No bonuses. Three changes from Turkey Law No. 7566, all effective January 1. Your global HR team did not know they were coming. That is not an edge case. It is exactly what happens when turkish law for foreigners goes unmonitored between annual reviews.

Law No. 7566 amends Turkey’s core social security statute in three places: the Turkey SGK (Social Security Institution) earnings ceiling, the employer MYO (invalidity, old-age, and death insurance) rate, and the Treasury-funded teşvik (incentive) discount. The changes are not complex once explained clearly, but their combined effect on turkey payroll 2026 budgets is material. Datassist’s mevzuat team analyzed the law the week it was published and updated every client cost model before January payroll ran. Below is the same analysis, including a 2025 vs. 2026 cost table and a five-step compliance checklist.

Table of Contents

• What Law No. 7566 Actually Changed (The Three Numbers)
• Change 1: The SGK Earnings Ceiling Raised to 9x Minimum Wage
• Change 2: The MYO Employer Rate Increased from 11% to 12%
• Change 3: The Treasury Incentive Cut from 4 Points to 2 Points
• What This Means in Real Numbers: 2025 vs. 2026 Employer Cost Table
• How to Claim Turkey’s SGK Teşvik: Common Mistakes Foreign Employers Make
• Your 2026 Turkey Payroll Compliance Checklist
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Key Takeaways
• Turkey Payroll in 2026: The Bottom Line

What Law No. 7566 Actually Changed (The Three Numbers)

Law No. 7566 was published in Official Gazette No. 33112 on December 19, 2025. It amends Law No. 5510, Turkey’s Social Security and General Health Insurance Law, in three distinct areas. All changes took effect January 1, 2026. These are sometimes called the mevzuat 7566 changes in Turkish regulatory databases.

Regulation Note: Law No. 7566 was published in Official Gazette No. 33112 (December 19, 2025). The three amendments apply from the first payroll period of January 2026 onward. Every employer running Turkish payroll is affected. The degree depends on sector classification and salary levels.

Foreign companies that budget Turkey payroll annually are most exposed. If your Q4 2025 budget assumed 2025 rates and ceiling, your 2026 actuals will not match. The shortfall is predictable once you know which three numbers changed.

Change 1: The SGK Earnings Ceiling Raised to 9x Minimum Wage

What the Earnings Ceiling Is

The SGK earnings ceiling caps the monthly wage amount on which social security contributions are calculated. Premiums apply only up to this threshold. Earnings above it are contribution-free.

Turkey’s 2026 gross minimum wage is TRY 33,030 per month. Under the new SGK ceiling 9x rule introduced by Law No. 7566, the ceiling is TRY 297,270 per month. The 2025 ceiling was 7.5x minimum wage, which sat at approximately TRY 195,038 per month using 2025’s lower base wage.

Who This Affects

The ceiling change matters most for employers with senior or expatriate staff earning above the old threshold.

A senior manager earning TRY 250,000 per month previously had contributions calculated on earnings up to the TRY 195,038 ceiling. Under the new 9x ceiling of TRY 297,270, the full TRY 250,000 in monthly earnings falls within the contribution base. Every point of employer social security premium now applies to a higher earnings figure.

For minimum-wage workers, the ceiling change has no direct premium calculation impact. They sit far below both old and new thresholds. The ceiling change compounds most significantly with the rate increases described in the next two sections.

Expert Take: Foreign employers with a mix of local and expatriate staff face a double effect from the ceiling change. Expatriate salaries commonly run TRY 150,000-300,000 per month. Under the new SGK ceiling 9x threshold, more of those earnings now carry full employer premium rates. Combined with the MYO rate increase, the cost delta for each senior expatriate employee can reach TRY 3,000-6,000 per month.

Change 2: The MYO Employer Rate Increased from 11% to 12%

MYO stands for Malullük-Yaşlılık-Ölüm: invalidity, old-age, and death insurance. It is one branch of Turkey’s social security system under Law No. 5510. Law No. 7566 raised the employer’s MYO premium from 11% to 12% of covered monthly earnings effective January 1, 2026.

Combined with the unchanged employee MYO share of 9%, total MYO premium moves from 20% to 21%.

The full 2026 Turkey SGK employer contribution schedule is:

For a minimum-wage employee: the employer pays 23.75% of TRY 33,030, which equals TRY 7,847 per month in social security premiums before the Treasury support offset is applied.

The 1-point MYO increase sounds small in isolation. For a single employee earning TRY 100,000 per month, it adds TRY 1,000 per month (TRY 12,000 per year) in employer cost. Across a 50-person team with average earnings of TRY 80,000, that is TRY 480,000 per year in additional cost from this one change alone.

Change 3: The Treasury Incentive Cut from 4 Points to 2 Points

What the Treasury Incentive Is

Turkey’s government partially subsidizes employer MYO premiums through a direct Treasury-funded discount, called the teşvik. Eligible employers pay a lower effective employer rate.

Before Law No. 7566, the treasury incentive turkey employers relied on gave non-manufacturing businesses a 4-point Treasury discount and manufacturing employers a 5-point discount. From January 2026, the non-manufacturing discount dropped to 2 points. Manufacturing employers (classified under NACE Rev. 2 Section C) retain the 5-point discount through December 31, 2026, with the possibility of presidential extension to December 31, 2027.

The practical effective employer rates after applying the incentive:

What “NACE Code” Means for Your Company

The applicable incentive is determined by your workplace’s NACE (Statistical Classification of Economic Activities in the European Community) code registered with SGK. This is not self-declared for each payroll period. It is the code on your SGK workplace registration document.

If your company’s primary business activity is classified as manufacturing under NACE Rev. 2 Section C (food production, textiles, chemicals, machinery, electronics, and similar categories), you retain the 5-point incentive through end of 2026. Every other sector moved from a 4-point to a 2-point Treasury discount on January 1.

The Treasury Support Amount

Separate from the point discount, eligible employers also receive a direct Treasury support amount of TRY 1,270 per eligible employee per month for 2026. This amount is deducted automatically from your monthly SGK debt through the e-Bildirge declaration system. There is no separate application, but the deduction only appears if your SGK filings are current and your employees are correctly registered.

Risk: Foreign employers often assume the Treasury incentive applies to all employees automatically. It does not. Eligibility depends on the workplace’s NACE code, the employee’s SGK registration status, and timely monthly premium filings. A single month of late filing can cost you the Treasury support for that period. There is no retroactive recovery.

What This Means in Real Numbers: 2025 vs. 2026 Employer Cost Table

Understanding the combined cost impact requires looking at salary levels separately, since the ceiling change only matters above the old threshold.

Minimum-Wage Employee

The minimum-wage employer cost increase is largely driven by the 27% minimum wage rise. Law No. 7566 adds a further 2-3% on top for non-manufacturing employers via the reduced incentive.

Senior Employee (TRY 150,000 Gross Per Month, Non-Manufacturing)

Data Point: A non-manufacturing employer with 20 employees at average TRY 80,000 per month salary can expect approximately TRY 40,000-60,000 in additional annual payroll costs attributable to the three Law 7566 changes, independent of the minimum wage increase.

For accurate, audit-grade payroll calculations across all salary tiers and incentive scenarios, Datassist’s payroll outsourcing service handles SGK declaration, Treasury support tracking, and teşvik optimization as part of every monthly payroll cycle.

How to Claim Turkey’s SGK Teşvik: Common Mistakes Foreign Employers Make

SGK teşvik optimization is one of the areas where foreign HR teams and MENA payroll buyers consistently leave money on the table. Based on Datassist’s experience across 500+ active clients, here are the five most common mistakes:

1. Assuming the teşvik is automatic across all employees. The incentive applies at the workplace registration level. Each SGK workplace must have the correct NACE code and the employer’s SGK account must be in good standing. A workplace registered under the wrong sector code gets the wrong incentive tier.
2. Not verifying your NACE code. When a foreign company registers an SGK workplace in Turkey, the NACE code is assigned based on the declared primary business activity. If your company provides services but was registered under a manufacturing code (or vice versa), your incentive tier may be incorrect. Correcting this requires a formal SGK registration amendment.
3. Letting SGK premium filings run late. A single month of late premium payment disqualifies the employer from Treasury support for that month. Delinquent accounts lose the TRY 1,270 per employee per month direct offset with no retroactive recovery.
4. Not tracking the TRY 1,270 Treasury support monthly. Some payroll systems display it as a line item in the SGK reconciliation. Others net it silently. If you cannot identify TRY 1,270 per eligible employee appearing as a reduction in your SGK debt each month, your system may not be applying it correctly.
5. Not rebuilding the cost model after Law 7566. If your payroll vendor or EOR platform did not send a client-specific Law No. 7566 impact analysis before January 2026, your Q1 2026 actuals are running against a 2025 budget baseline. You need a revised model.

Expert Take: Datassist’s team monitors teşvik eligibility monthly across all client workplaces. Our government incentives consultancy applies the correct incentive tier automatically, tracks the TRY 1,270 Treasury support offset, and flags eligibility changes before they affect payroll. The effective employer rate can drop from 23.75% to 18.75% with full manufacturing incentive, or 21.75% with the 2-point non-manufacturing teşvik. Across 100 minimum-wage employees, the difference between optimized and unoptimized rates is approximately TRY 2,400,000 per year.

Your 2026 Turkey Payroll Compliance Checklist

Five steps to verify your Turkey payroll is Law 7566 compliant as of January 2026:

1. Confirm your NACE code. Check your SGK workplace registration. Manufacturing (NACE Section C) gives you the 5-point incentive. Everything else gives the 2-point incentive.
2. Verify the MYO rate update. Your payroll system or EOR provider should reflect employer MYO at 12%, not 11%, from January 2026 onward.
3. Verify the earnings ceiling. Contribution calculations should use TRY 297,270 as the monthly ceiling (9x minimum wage), not the 2025 figure.
4. Verify Treasury support of TRY 1,270 per eligible employee is being deducted from your monthly SGK debt. This should appear in your e-Bildirge reconciliation.
5. Reconcile Q1 2026 SGK cost against 2025 budget. The delta should map clearly to the three Law 7566 changes. If it is larger than expected, your teşvik may not be applied correctly. If it is smaller, your rate update may be incomplete.

Datassist’s social security consultancy team handles SGK registration, e-Bildirge compliance, and audit defense, including retroactive correction of prior-period misfilings.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Turkey Law No. 7566?

Law No. 7566 is a Turkish legislative amendment published in Official Gazette No. 33112 on December 19, 2025. It amends Law No. 5510 (Turkey’s Social Security Law) in three ways: it raises the SGK earnings ceiling from 7.5x to 9x minimum wage, increases the employer MYO premium rate from 11% to 12%, and reduces the Treasury-funded employer incentive from 4 points to 2 points for non-manufacturing workplaces. All changes took effect January 1, 2026.

What is the SGK earnings ceiling in Turkey for 2026?

The SGK earnings ceiling for 2026 is TRY 297,270 per month (9x the 2026 gross minimum wage of TRY 33,030). Social security contributions are calculated only on earnings up to this ceiling. The 2025 ceiling was approximately TRY 195,038. Employers with high-salary staff, including managers and expatriates, are most affected because more of their employees’ earnings now fall within the contribution base.

What is Turkey’s employer SGK contribution rate in 2026?

The total employer SGK employer contribution rate 2026 is 23.75% of covered earnings before incentives. After applying the Treasury teşvik, the effective rate is 21.75% for non-manufacturing employers (2-point discount) or 18.75% for manufacturing employers (5-point discount). An additional TRY 1,270 per eligible employee per month is deducted from SGK debt as direct Treasury support.

Does Turkey still offer a Treasury incentive for SGK in 2026?

Yes, but at a reduced rate for most employers. Law No. 7566 cut the non-manufacturing Treasury incentive from 4 points to 2 points effective January 1, 2026. Manufacturing employers (NACE Rev. 2 Section C) retain the 5-point incentive through December 31, 2026. Eligibility requires correct NACE code registration and current SGK premium filings.

How does the Law 7566 MYO rate increase affect my payroll budget?

Law No. 7566 raised the employer’s MYO premium from 11% to 12% of covered earnings. For an employee earning TRY 100,000 per month, this adds TRY 1,000 per month in employer cost. Combined with the ceiling expansion and reduced incentive, the total Law 7566 impact for non-manufacturing employers with senior staff can reach TRY 3,000-6,000 per employee per month above 2025 levels.

When should my payroll have been updated for Law 7566?

All three Law 7566 changes were effective January 1, 2026. Your January 2026 payroll should reflect the new 12% MYO rate, the 9x minimum wage ceiling, and the 2-point (or 5-point) Treasury incentive. If your payroll provider or EOR platform did not update these before January 2026, you may have underpaid or incorrectly calculated SGK premiums. Late or incorrect SGK filings carry statutory interest and penalties. Corrections must be submitted through SGK’s e-Bildirge system.

Key Takeaways

• Law No. 7566 made three simultaneous changes to Turkish social security effective January 1, 2026: higher earnings ceiling, higher MYO employer rate, and lower Treasury incentive for non-manufacturing.
• The SGK earnings ceiling increased from 7.5x to 9x minimum wage, now TRY 297,270 per month.
• The employer MYO premium increased 1 percentage point (11% to 12%), raising total employer SGK to 23.75%.
• Non-manufacturing employers lost 2 incentive points (4-point teşvik cut to 2-point). Manufacturing employers retain the 5-point discount through December 2026.
• Foreign employers who budget Turkey payroll at the headline 23.75% rate without teşvik optimization pay 2-5 points more than necessary. Law 7566 makes correct optimization more important, not less.

Turkey Payroll in 2026: The Bottom Line

Three simultaneous changes on January 1 make Turkey’s 2026 payroll cost materially different from 2025. The total impact depends on your sector and salary mix. For a non-manufacturing employer with a mixed local and expatriate workforce, Law No. 7566 adds 2-8% to total employer payroll cost above the minimum wage increase, depending on where salaries sit relative to the new 9x ceiling.

The employers most exposed are those running payroll through a generic SaaS platform or an EOR (Employer of Record) that does not track Turkish regulatory changes in real time. Law 7566 was published in December 2025 and took effect January 1. Clients who had a named payroll specialist tracking their account had updated cost models before January payroll ran. Clients relying on a platform dashboard found out in their payroll variance reports.

Datassist has managed Turkish EOR and payroll outsourcing since 1999. Our SGK compliance team, backed by ISO 27001 and ISAE 3402 certified processes, updated every client cost model before January 2026. If you want a free 2026 payroll compliance review covering your NACE code, teşvik tier, ceiling calculations, and MYO rate, talk to our team.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. For up-to-date Turkish regulations, consult official sources or contact a qualified advisor.

Related Reading

• Payroll Outsourcing in Turkey – How Datassist manages SGK calculations, e-Bildirge filings, and teşvik optimization for foreign employers.
• Government Incentives Consultancy – Maximize SGK teşvik eligibility and reduce your effective employer rate below 23.75%.
• Social Security Consultancy – SGK registration, e-Bildirge compliance, dispute resolution, and audit defense in Turkey.