Why Does Payslips Show a Statutory Health Insurance Fund If I Have Private Insurance (PKV)?

Modified on: Thu, 5 Feb, 2026 at 6:24 PM

If you are privately insured in Germany (PKV), you may notice that your payslip still lists a statutory health insurance fund (gesetzliche Krankenkasse). This often causes confusion but it’s expected and does not mean we ignored your private insurance.

Here’s why this happens:

A statutory health insurance fund is required for payroll processing.

Even with private health insurance, employees in Germany must still pay:

Pension insurance (Rentenversicherung – RV)
Unemployment insurance (Arbeitslosenversicherung – AV)

Private health insurance only covers health and long-term care. It does not replace these mandatory social security contributions.

Because of this, payroll must use a statutory health insurance fund as a collection agency (Einzugsstelle) to submit and settle pension and unemployment contributions with German authorities.

This is purely a technical requirement.

What you’ll see on your payslip

Payroll displays a statutory health insurance fund so Horizons can report and pay your RV and AV contributions correctly.
Horizons pays your private health insurance subsidy separately, usually together with your salary.
Your actual private insurance (PKV) remains unchanged.

In some cases, this statutory fund is your previous public insurer. If you were never publicly insured, Horizons assigns a standard fund for administrative purposes.

In short

The statutory health insurance fund shown on your payslip is only used for social security reporting.
Your private health insurance stays active.
Horizons pays:
- Pension and unemployment contributions via the statutory fund
- Your private insurance subsidy directly to you

This is standard German payroll practice.

In this article...

Germany

Why Does Payslips Show a Statutory Health Insurance Fund If I Have Private Insurance (PKV)?

Here’s why this happens:

What you’ll see on your payslip

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