Implementation of summary calculation of working time by the employer

The needs of a number of economic sectors and industries require organization of the work process, in which employees work in different parts of the day, on weekends or with different duration for specific working days. The need for such organization of work in the company may be a fact when hiring, but could also arise in relation to already employed staff whose employment contracts establish a fixed daily duration of work and/or only on working days.The only lawful choice for the employer in such cases is to introduce the summary calculation of working time, regulated in the Labor Code.

Esentially, it is a system of organization and reporting of labor, in which the normal length of working time is calculated and reported not for each day, but in general for a longer period of time (week, month, quarter). The most significant advantages of such a step could be summarized as follows:

    •  it is introduced on the basis of a unilateral order by the employer, without the consent of the employee to be needed;

    •  allows most categories of employees to be assigned to work at all hours of the day, on weekends and public holidays;

    •  working time of various duration and/or on different working days could be assigned to the employees

It is hardly surprising that the Bulgarian labor law associates the introduction of the summary calculation with dozens of specific rules, which are regularly subject of control by the Labor Inspectorate. In order to minimize the risk of sanctions and fines for the employer, we recommend in-depth and thorough legal preparation to precede the implementation of the summary calculation of working time.

We, the team of Turnaliev Law Firm, could both organize the whole process of implementing summary calculation of working time and reply to your specific questions and hesitations.