PLMJ
  November 20, 2003 - Lisbon, Portugal

Organisation of Working Hours
  by Nuno Vaz

Many amendments have been made by the Labour Code in the area of working hours. One of the most relevant is the possibility of regular working hours being established in terms of an average, subject to an agreement being reached between the employer and the employee. In these cases, a maximum of two hours may be added to the number of working hours per day, provided the number of working hours per week does not exceed fifty, the hours worked for reasons of force majeure not being included in this limit. To be noted however is that the above-mentioned agreement can only be made should the company in question not be covered by a collective bargaining agreement regulating this issue. The definition of regular working hours in terms of average may still be the object of collective agreements. In these cases, working hours may be increased by up to four hours a day, although the total number of working hours per week cannot be of more than sixty, the hours worked for reasons of force majeure not being included in this limit. Another interesting amendment is that concerning the different forms of exemption from working hours schedules, which are now permitted by the Code. Accordingly, in addition to the form currently permitted by law that consists of not being subject to the maximum number of regular working hours, the Code provides for the possibility of working a given number of hours per day or per week and, as a third option, the possibility of exemption from working hours schedules, nonetheless in observance of the regular working hours. Also to be noted is that despite the Code not having introduced amendments to the situations foreseen in the law relating to exemption from working hours schedules, it admits the possibility of other situations being envisaged by collective bargaining agreements. Moreover, exemption from working hours schedules has ceased to require authorisation from the Labour Inspectorate-General. Two final notes, the first on night work, the definition of which the Code supplements by setting forth that this work must be understood as taking place between 10.00 p.m. of one day and 7.00 a.m. of the next, leaving the parties the possibility of establishing, pursuant to the relevant collective bargaining agreement, a different concept of night work, comprising a minimum of seven hours and a maximum of eleven hours, which compulsorily includes the period between midnight and 5.00 a.m.. The second note has to do with the yearly limits of overtime, the definition of which the Code also supplements by setting forth that differentiation must be made according to the size of the company and establishing that a limit of one hundred and seventy five hours applies to companies employing fifty or less workers, the limit for larger companies being of one hundred and fifty hours. However, these yearly limits may be increased up to two hundred hours per year by the relevant collective bargaining agreement. Nuno Guedes Vaz ([email protected])