If the economy goes downhill, employers also come under increasing pressure. What if the company suddenly urges employees to reduce their working hours?
If there is a mood of crisis in the company, employees are often anxious to do everything they can to keep their job. Do they also have to reduce their working hours at the employer’s request? According to Peter Meyer, a specialist lawyer for labor law in Berlin, an employer can demand that working hours be reduced if there are corresponding provisions in the employment contract or in company agreements in economic crisis situations. “But it is precisely for these cases that the employment agency then pays short-time work benefits.”
Companies can register short-time work if at least ten percent of the employees have lost more than ten percent of their wages. The employees then receive 60 or 67 percent of their net wages as short-time work benefits.
In jobs that don’t always have the same amount of work, such as in seasonal companies, “you often work with working time accounts,” the lawyer continues. In times of peak activity, employees continue to be paid their regular salary, overtime is credited to their working time account. During the off-season, these plus hours can be reduced by taking time off while continuing to pay the regular salary.
In principle, the following applies: The employer is obliged to employ and pay the employee under the agreed conditions. And the employee is entitled to the agreed, remunerated employment.
Employees in Germany, on the other hand, are entitled to work part-time. This applies at least to everyone whose employer regularly employs more than 15 people and whose employment relationship has existed for more than six months. It is important that employees state their request correctly and in good time. The employer can only refuse a part-time request for urgent operational reasons – and the bar is very high there.
About the person: Peter Meyer is a specialist lawyer for labor law and a member of the executive committee of the working group on labor law in the German Bar Association (DAV).
