Retroactive pay, more often shortened to retro pay, is a type of compensation. Typically, retro pay is owed to an employee for any work commenced from a previous pay period, such as the month before. It essentially defines a shortfall in an employee's pay history.

Who gets retroactive pay?

A retroactive pay increase occurs when an employee receives a pay raise but the new pay rate is not reflected on the appropriate paycheck. For example, let's say an employee currently earns $60,000 per year and they recently got a raise.

What retroactive pay means?

The definition of retro pay (short for retroactive pay) is compensation added to an employee's paycheck to make up for a compensation shortfall in a previous pay period. This differs from back pay, which refers to compensation that makes up for a pay period where an employee received no compensation at all.