Alibaba (阿里) retools pay structure: '13th month' folded into renamed annual award, payout pushed to fiscal-year timing

Alibaba (阿里) has told staff it will fold the long-standing “13th-month” bonus into a renamed annual award and pay it together with the performance year-end bonus, it has been reported. The move, announced in an all-staff letter, renames the calendar-year 13th salary as the “Advancing Together Annual Award” (并肩前行年奖) and shifts its payout from the traditional December–January window to the company’s fiscal-year bonus schedule in April–May.

What changed

According to the internal guidance circulated and reported by IT之家, the Advancing Together Annual Award will be a fixed award equal to one month’s base salary, prorated by days on duty during the fiscal year and forfeited for employees dismissed for cause. Going forward the year-end payout will be shown as two line items: the Advancing Together Annual Award and a separate performance annual bonus (绩效年奖). The policy applies to mainland China employees; Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan and overseas staff will follow local laws or local company policies. Because the former 13th salary followed the calendar year, the first combined payout under the new schedule will arrive in the 2027 award payout month; a bridging rule means employees on duty from Jan 1, 2026 to Mar 31, 2027 would receive 1.25 months of the new award to smooth the transition.

Why it matters

Alibaba is one of China’s largest employers and a bellwether for compensation norms in the country’s internet sector. For many employees this is effectively a delay in cash flow — payments that used to hit in late December or January will now arrive 4–5 months later — even if the headline amount (one month’s base) is preserved and explicitly separated from performance pay. The change also makes clearer the split between a fixed retention-style award and variable, performance-linked compensation.

Broader context

This tweak comes against a backdrop of tighter regulatory oversight and cost discipline across China’s tech giants since 2020, and as companies balance talent retention with investor and regulator pressure on margins. Will aligning pay with the fiscal year improve budgeting and performance alignment — or will delayed payouts sap morale at a time when recruitment is competitive? It has been reported that Alibaba frames the move as a careful, company-wide decision; employees and market watchers will be watching how the change affects retention and recruitment in the months ahead.