Equivalency hours in the private sector
Verified 19 April 2024 - Directorate for Legal and Administrative Information (Prime Minister)
Working hours longer than the legal duration may be introduced in certain professions and for specific jobs with periods of inaction. This specific mode of determining working time is called equivalence regime. The introduction of equivalent hours has consequences for the weekly working time and remuneration of the employee. We present you with the information you need to know.
The equivalent hours regime is a specific method of determining the actual working time.
The scheme is intended for sectors of activity where the employee has waiting time during which he does not work but which require its presence in the company or on a construction site.
In this case, the principle consists in imposing on the employee a period of presence in the company longer than the legal period of work but assimilate these periods of inaction the legal duration of working time.
Warning
the scheme is intended for the employee whose presence at the workplace is necessary even during the period in which it is inactive. It should not be confused with the periodic penalty payment which obliges the employee to remain at home or close to home.
Where a system of equivalent hours is introduced in the company, the employee's working hours shall be fixed by collective agreement or extended branch agreement or, in the absence of a convention or agreement, by a decree relating to the sector of activity concerned.
Please note
Each Order is directed to a professional branch and not a category of jobs: equivalence hours can only be used if the company’s activity belongs to a sector that is entitled to do so.
Equivalent hours apply only to certain employees.
Reminder
The employees concerned are those occupying posts comprising periods of inaction during working hours.
The equivalent hours regime applies in particular in the following sectors:
- Private hospitalization and medico-social service of a commercial nature (supervisors, registered nurses, certified nursing assistants and carers whose posts cover a period of work between 6 p.m. and 8 a.m.)
- Road freight transport (rolling stock)
- Social and family tourism (miners' supervisors, group guides and full-time guides in the social and family tourism sector)
- Retail fruit and vegetable stores, grocery stores and dairy products (full-time sales staff)
- Guarding
- Fire and rescue services
- Casinos
- Other sectors determined by collective agreement or extended branch agreement (or, in the absence of an agreement, by a decree relating to the sector of activity concerned).
The duration of the working time of an employee subject to an equivalent hours scheme shall be necessarily higher than the legal duration of 35 hours.
In addition, the employee may be required to work longer than the weekly hours fixed by the equivalent hours scheme.
In that case, those hours worked in excess of those provided for by the equivalent hours regime shall be considered as overtime.
Example :
A system of equivalent hours sets the weekly working time at 38 hours, i.e. 3 hours more than the legal weekly 35 hours. The counting of overtime starts from 39e time.
The remuneration of the employee shall take into account the remuneration of periods of inaction.
It is fixed by collective agreement or extended branch agreement (or, in the absence of an agreement, by a decree relating to the sector of activity concerned).
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Equivalence Hours
Number of overtime hours, remuneration, consideration on rest (scope of collective bargaining)