Application of the Working Time Act and Definition of Working Hours

The Working Time Act is in principle applicable to all employment relationships. According to the main rule of the Act, working time consist of the time spent on performing the work and the time the employee is required to be at the employer’s disposal at the place of work. Working time is  not tied to a specific place, so working time also includes work done by the employee away from the actual place of work. In other words, working hours also include remote work or work that is performed at a client’s place.

The Working Time Act is not applied to all work tasks. The provisions of the law do not apply to the managing director of the company because managing director is not an employee of the company. The following tasks are left outside of the Act, but only if the so-called working hours autonomy actualizes in the work tasks:

·       managerial duties or other comparable work

·       mobile work undertaken outside the fixed place of work

·       tasks based on agreements between family members

The employer is not required to monitor the working hours or pay compensation for overtime or Sunday work to employees falling within one of the categories mentioned above.

People working in a managing position of a company or an independent part of the company are considered managers. In simple organisations this means that people usually working directly under the top management, who are independently responsible for a particular function or an entity and who work as the employees’ manager, are left outside the scope of the law. For so-called middle management, however, the Working Time Act applies. On the other hand, the law does not apply to such independent assignments that are considered directly comparable to managing assignments. Such positions may include employees who, by virtue of their duties and independent status, are comparable to managers, but who do not have any subordinates. The tasks include a fairly limited number of assignments that manage things and not people.

When evaluating managing positions or related positions, one must pay attention above all to the nature of the assignments, their organisational position, and the size of the company. The title of the position is not crucial, but one must consider person’s real chance to participate in the company's management, independent decision making, responsibilities, the independence and size of the part of the company’s operation, terms of employment and other similar factors. A person working in a managing position will only be left outside the scope of law if they have a so-called working time autonomy.  This means that their working hours or the use of those can’t be determined in advance nor monitored.

Outside the scope of law will also be left work, which is done entirely or almost entirely somewhere outside the fixed place of office and outside the manager’s monitoring. Same goes for a naturally movable work as well as for when the working hours are determined mainly by meetings agreed based on clients’ own schedules. An example of such is Commercial Representative or Real Estate Agent’s work. To be left outside the scope of law, an employee must also have the previously mentioned working hours autonomy.

Time used for travelling is not counted in the employee’s working hours, unless the journey to work is considered as a work performance. If the employer is demanding the employee to work also during the journey to work, that time is counted towards the employee’s working hours.

Training time is considered to count towards the working hours if the employee is obligated to participate in the training. If the training is voluntary, it’s not necessary to count the training time towards the working hours.  

Usually, the employer provides a compensation for the employee from the time spent in the training. Several collective agreements include provision about course money or training compensation. These matters are not significant when considering whether the training is working time.

Social activities or other evening activities organised by the employer, do not count towards the employee’s working hours unless the employee undertakes work during such activities. In this case, the time used in representing tasks is counted as working time.

Medical examinations are part of the employee’s working hours. There are provisions in most of the collective agreements that include the employee’s right to get regularly medically examined or have laboratory or X-ray examinations taken during working hours. Without a separate provision in a collective agreement, the time spend on these examinations does not need to be considered to count towards working hours.