52-hour per Week Work System – Various Issues through Solution Management > Insight

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Before and after implementing the 52-hour per Week Work System 

Before implementing the 52-hour per week work system, more companies advance their conventional time and attendance system or introduce a separate management solution. 

Companies with more than 300 employees began to apply a new time and attendance system since the year before last year. Companies with less than 300 employees have been reorganizing the working system and operating process suitable for the business from the end of last year until this year and they have been introducing appropriate systems. 

The existing time and attendance system mainly focuses on managing the exceptions other than the planned working hours. Therefore, many companies manage annual leave and vacation with it. In this system, overtime was approved by application. Therefore, even if an employee works more than that, the accurate working hours cannot be calculated accurately, which is a loose management. Moreover, the blanket wage system made an expedient of avoiding the obligation of paying overtime exercised commonly. Although the blanket wage system is a strict and limitedly accepted system based on the condition when it is hard to calculate working hours, there have been many cases that, even when it is possible to calculate working hours and an employee works overtime, the employee was not paid for the overtimes. 

Various types of systems and solutions have been introduced and used for supporting the fundamental purpose of the 52-hour work system in order to shorten working hours, change the work and life balance, and modify the way of working. It can calculate working hours accurately and the time and attendance management is given to each department, rather than central control. As a result, systems and operation systems actively utilizing the flextime and the compensation leave system are emerging. 

Accurate Working Hour Calculation  

Accurate working hour calculation has become more important to manage the working hours below 52 hours.  The time and attendance management is conducted by calculating and confirming working hours in-real time through electronically recording the coming and leaving the work, excluding breaks and vacations from working hours, and adding business trips and hours working away from the office. Hours are calculated by following procedures: break time is automatically excluded, vacations are reflected through application/approval, business trips and outside work are considered as agreed (application/approval) working hours, and working overtime above the basic working hours must be approved by the department head. 

Professional time and attendance solutions are commonly used, and utilizing mobile solutions is much easier, because it requires immediateness. Needless to say, it is better for sales or production workers, who cannot use PCs easily.

Attendance can be recorded using access control devices. In this case, it can increase the workload of attendance workers because they have to compare and determine it by comparing the application of groupwear and work plans. However, it does not cause many problems if the most of employees don’t work overtime often and work at a fixed time and place.

It is also possible to forcibly restrict the use of the PC through the PC-OFF solution. However, if only PC-OFF is managed, because it only controls the time when a PC is turned off, unlike the PC-ON-OFF system, it can create an odd situation such as employees come to work at dawn when there is no turn-on time restriction and an employee has to work at an internet café or a cofe after OFF to complete the task. Nevertheless, it can be a clear and easy prevention method for a company and a person in charge of it.

Decentralization of Time and Attendance Management

The main difference of the 52-hour per week work system is that the time and attendance management authority is given to each department. 

On-site time and attendance management was performed only at the chief foreman, the conventional time and attendance system used to manage it centrally (people in charge of the time and attendance manage the time and attendance of all employees). However, to surely control working hours below 52 hours a week, a department head must manage the actual workload and working method of the department members. Moreover, it is necessary to manage it closely because the introduction of the flexitime system allows each employee to control hours on according to the preference of the employee. Therefore, pre- and post-approval for overtime work and judgment on comp time leave have become the important roles of the department head.

Department heads will be given the authorities to check and manage the work schedule, actual work record, approval and payment of overtime, and warning signals. Although they are quite stressed due to the abruptly increased workload and the company policy that time and attendance management will be reflected on evaluation, it is possible to hear the voice of a pleasant worry because they have more conversation with neglected department members, can encourage vacation that could not be given due to various factors, and can find solutions.  

Selective Working Hour System  

The selective working hour system is a work system that allows an employee to select 40 basic work hours per week on average and below 12 hours of overtime per week on average within a payment period (within 1 month). It can be divided into partially selective work with core time and fully selective work without core time, which allows employees to work more freely. Many companies choose the partially selective work system due to collaboration between departments.

Even companies that have recorded commuting times using the access control system often consider recording work hours using PCs and mobile devices for more accurate time management when introducing the selective working hour system. Additionally, it allows more free working and to record actual working hours by recording “non-working hours” even if it is within working hours such as tea time and trips to a bank or a doctor’s office. 

This system can generate defective workers who don’t satisfy mandatory working hours. Moreover, it should be wisely managed for settling down the new system. It is necessary to prepare a tool for members to trust and check each other by sharing the time and attendance of team members all together. Moreover, department heads shall have management ability to encourage department members.

Flexible Working Hour System  

The system allows employees to work more than 40 hours per week within a unit period (within 2 weeks or within 3 months) and to work less than 40 hours per week in other weeks in order to make it 40 hours per week on average.

Even if an employee can work over 40 hours per week, the employee shall not work more than 48 hours per week for 2-week unit flexible working hour system and 52 hours per week for 3-month unit flexible working hour system. If an employee works 12 hours of overtime per week, the employee can work up to 64 hours per week within 3 months. Of course, in this case, the overtime pay should be made for 12 hours over the planned basic 52 hours.

Although it is a very flexible working system, daily working hours must be decided in advance for 3-month unit flexible working hour system and written agreement with the worker's representative is required. Therefore, it is practically hard to operate unless it is easy for the position to plan working hours in advance or it is possible to precisely plan when there will be more work to do. It is because it is not practically easy to make a written agreement whenever the work schedule is changed.

Manufacturers with large fluctuations in periodic working hours are the most suitable for operating the flexible working hour system. However, it is difficult to introduce it to order production manufacturers because it is hard to estimate working hours in advance. However, it is useful for the operations of manufacturers, which cannot empty lines and employees need to work over 52 hours per week due to shifts. 

Although it is not used widely, as mentioned above, it should not plan only the beginning and end of working hours because daily basic working hours can vary in the system and employees may work including overtime. Moreover, the work plan shall be established by dividing basic work hours and overtime hours. 

Comp Time and Holiday Substitution  

It is needed to pay overtime if an employee works overtime. However, a company needs to face the problem of increased labor costs, compared to prior to the implementation of the 52-hour per week work system. 

As a result, companies introduce and implement similar but different systems such as comp time, holiday substitution, and substitution holiday. Comp time is to grant a holiday instead of paying overtime or holiday pay. Holiday substitution is, by notifying or obtaining consent from an employee, to work on a day specified as a holiday and give a break on a different day. It is not needed to pay holiday pay for the original holiday, but the company is obligated to pay the holiday pay if the employee works on a substitute holiday. 

In the case of comp time, it is often settled monthly and used as an annual leave within a specific period (e.g., 3 months). It should be able to calculate working hours after excluding the fixed extension time of the blanket wage system in the overtime (including nights and holidays). It is recommended to run a system that allows employs to apply on an hourly basis. Additionally, if it is forced to use comp time first when utilizing an annual leave, extra pay for overtime may barely occur. In some cases, the period of use can be extended as long as possible (within a year) to exhaust it. 

Utilization of Appropriate Solutions for System Settlement

Since the 52-hour per week work system was implemented in the year before last, we have received various inquiries about the time and attendance management and solutions. Moreover, we have met many companies. Some companies have been using their own system while managing 52-hour per week faithfully by operating a time and attendance system suitable for them for a long time. On the other hand, some other companies were expectedly required to supplement and improve their operations systemically or operationally.

Since one-year transition period is given for the system, which will be extended to workplaces with 50 or more employees from this year, it will be needed to prepare a utilization plan for each organization considering the nature of the system and reality, rather than focusing on a system just for a system. 

Let's check the working system suitable for your company and define detailed requirements for management. Let’s establish appropriate management scope and prepare and share a process that can be operated flexibly. If it is needed to improved work productivity and achieve a desirable work and life balance by reducing work hours and changing the way of working, we need to prepare a time and attendance system suitable for a company. 

However, no matter how good a solution is, it is unavoidable for employees who need to apply, learn, and use and managers who need to train and support employees to feel tired. Additionally, if people use a solution while emphasizing on the mission of doing it perfectly from the beginning, it will rather cause inconvenience to both users and administrators and it may leave a lot of homework to do.

Technologies and solutions shall be used for our convenience.

Written by Yu-Kyung YIM, Managing Director, JaDE Biz Unit (ykyim@e-hcg.com)