Labour Relations Act, 1995 (Act No. 66 of 1995)

Notices

Bargaining Council for the Furniture Manufacturing Industry

South Western Districts

Main Collective Agreement

Part l

B. Terms and Conditions of Employment

18. Hours of Work

Purchase

Normal Working Hours

(1)

Save as is otherwise provided in this Agreement, no employer shall require or permit an employee, other than one exclusively employed as a caretaker or a watchman or for the delivery of goods, or foremen; managers, sub-managers, senior managerial, professional, technical or administrative personnel in receipt of a salary of not less than R205'433.30 per annum as per Notice Number 531 of Government Gazette No. 37795 of 1 July 2014, or as amended from time to time.:—

(a)	to work for more than 44 hours normal time, excluding meal intervals, in any one working week, comprising of:—

(i)	Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.

(b)	to work more than ten(10) hours, excluding meal intervals on any one day;

(c)	to work continuously for more than five (5) hours without a meal interval of not less than one hour: Provided that:—

(i)	an employer may agree with his employee to reduce the period of such intervals to not less than 30 minutes, and in that event the intervals may be so be reduced; and

(ii)	periods of work interrupted by intervals of less than one hour, except where subclause 1(c)(i) applies shall be deemed to be continuous.

(2)	An employee shall be deemed to be working in addition to any period that he is actually working:—

(a)	during the whole of any interval in his work if he is not free to leave the premises of his employer for the whole of such interval;

(b)

during any other period during which he is on the premises of his employer: Provided that if it is established that any such employee was not working and was free to leave the premises during any portion of any period, the presumption provided for in this subclause shall not apply in respect of such employee with reference to that portion of such period.

(c)	The employer must decide on the firm's ordinary weekly working hours from a range of ordinary weekly working hours from 40 hours to a maximum of 44 hours per week.

(d)	The employer must inform employees and the Council of their firm's ordinary weekly working hours and to display them in a conspicuous place within the workplace.

(e)

Should an employer wish to change the firm's ordinary working hours from what they had notified the Council and their employees they would be required to apply for an exemption from the Council before implementing any change to their ordinary weekly working hours. The Council may require seventy five per cent of the firm's employees to support the proposed change to the firm's ordinary weekly working hours.

(3)	Every employer shall display in his establishment in a place readily accessible to his employees a notice in the form specified in Annexure B to this part of the Agreement, specifying the starting and finishing times of work for each day of the week and the meal interval.

(4)	The provisions of this clause shall not apply to a watchman whose employer grants him a day off work of at least 24 consecutive hours in respect of every week of employment: Provided that:—

(i)	the employer makes no reduction in the watchman's wage in respect thereof;

(ii)	in lieu of granting a watchman any such day off, an employer pays such watchman the wages he should have received if he had not worked on such day, plus an amount of not less than double his daily wage in respect of such day not granted.