Working time

What it means

Working time is the time an employee is at the employer’s disposal performing work. The basic week is 40 hours, less in two-shift and three-shift operations.

The employer schedules working time in advance and announces the roster at least a week ahead. A meal and rest break does not count towards working time.

The boundary of working time is not always obvious. The commute does not count; training ordered by the employer does. For standby duty the place decides: standby at the workplace counts as working time in full, while standby elsewhere counts only for the time the employee actually works.

How it works in practice

Besides a fixed roster, flexible time with core and optional bands or uneven scheduling with a balancing period can be used. Both must be agreed and written down, not merely tolerated.

Every regime requires records and respect for continuous daily and weekly rest. Those limits are the ones most often broken during seasonal peaks.

Employees working from home office are subject to the same rules on the length and scheduling of working time as in the office. We therefore advise smaller companies to keep simple records for home working too, such as logging start and finish in the attendance system, so that pay and premiums are calculated the same way as for work on site.

What to watch out for

Unrecorded extra hours resurface later as overtime with premiums for three years back. In a dispute the burden of proof rests on the employer, not the employee.

Under a work activity agreement the law caps the hours per week. If a part-timer regularly works more, the labour inspectorate will treat it as a breach carrying a fine, and the back payments can cost more than a regular employment contract. Hours on agreements are therefore watched as closely as overtime of permanent staff.