[Credit image Gerd Altmann from Pixabay]
As a reminder, the standard working week in France is 35 hours, but different working time arrangements are available under certain conditions. One of these working time arrangements is the global working day arrangement, whereby the employee’s working time is not counted in hours but in days.
The validity of such an annual global working time arrangement in days is only available to employees meeting certain criteria, and is subject to several strict conditions, such as the obligation for the employer to:
- Maintain a monitoring document indicating the number and date of days or half-days worked and unworked (i.e.: timesheets);
- Ensure that the employee’s workload is compatible with respect to the minimum mandatory daily rest between 2 days worked (i.e.: 11 consecutive hours minimum) and to the minimum mandatory weekly rest (i.e.: 35 consecutive hours minimum (24H + 11H)).
- Organize a meeting with the employee once a year (or more, depending on the applicable collective bargaining agreement (CBA) to discuss his/her workload (which must be reasonable), the organization of his/her work, the work-life balance and remuneration.
To do so, the CBAs often requires that meetings to control the workload must be organized every year (sometimes twice a year, for example, for the collective bargaining agreement applicable to the personnel of Technical Studies Offices, Consultant engineers Offices and Consulting Companies (SYNTEC)) with the employees whose working time is an annual global arrangement in days. Also, additional and specific meetings may be required in certain exceptional circumstances (e.g. unusual difficulty in managing the workload).
During these meetings, the employee’s workload, work organization, the balance between the employee’s professional activity and personal life as well as the remuneration must be discussed. This interview must be documented in writing, in French or in a bilingual version and must comply with the CBA’s requirements.
Please note that in case of non-compliance with that requirement, the employee may be entitled to ask the judge to declare the global arrangement in days as null and void and ask for payment of the overtime performed beyond 35 hours per week for the 3 previous years (subject to certain elements of proof).
Do not hesitate to contact us if you require assistance in developing a bilingual tool that you can use for complying with the Workload Monitoring Interview(s)’ obligation.