It is important to distinguish between standby duty and on-call duty as there are significant differences in how the different types of working hours are regulated, despite their similarities. During on-call duty, the employee must be on-site, whereas during standby duty, the employee can be at home or elsewhere. In this article, we will go through the most important aspects to keep track of - both for employers and employees.
If necessary due to the nature of the work, you may be required to be available to your employer outside of regular working hours, which is called on-call work. This means that you should normally be present at the workplace and ready to start working at any time. On-call work is therefore a form of waiting time at the workplace. It is common in healthcare, corrections, police, and firefighting, but can also occur in other workplaces. On-call work is only allowed where it is absolutely necessary to have staff available in case of unforeseen events and should not be used more than necessary.
You are not allowed to have more than 48 hours of on-call time in a four-week period or 50 hours per calendar month. If you start working during on-call time, those hours should be counted as regular working hours, overtime, or additional hours and not as on-call time. Therefore, on-call time should not be used for supervision or surveillance work, where the work primarily involves being available.
Your employer must keep records of on-call time. You have the right to access these records, and the same applies to trade unions representing you in the workplace.
It is possible to negotiate a different amount of on-call time in a collective agreement. If there is no collective agreement, the Swedish Work Environment Authority can grant an exemption in individual cases.
Standby duty means that you are available to your employer outside of the workplace. You must be ready to travel to the workplace and start working within a specified time frame. During standby time, you can be at home or elsewhere, but you must be reachable so that your employer can contact you and you can quickly arrive at the workplace. Usually, there is an agreed-upon time within which you should be present. Standby time is not considered working hours and is outside of your regular working hours. There is no legal limit to how many hours of standby time you can have. It is allowed to have standby time during daily rest, and if specified in the applicable collective agreement, also during weekly rest.
If necessary due to the nature of the work, you may need to have staff available outside of regular working hours, which is called on-call work. This means that your employees should normally be present at the workplace and ready to start working at any time. On-call work is therefore a form of waiting time at the workplace and is common in sectors such as healthcare, corrections, police, and firefighting, but it can also occur in other workplaces. On-call work is only allowed where it is absolutely necessary to have staff available in case of unforeseen events and should not be used more than necessary.
You are not allowed to have more than 48 hours of on-call time in a four-week period or 50 hours per calendar month. If an employee starts working during on-call time, those hours should be counted as regular working hours, overtime, or additional hours and not as on-call time. Therefore, on-call time should not be used for supervision or surveillance work, where the work primarily involves being available.
You as the employer must keep records of on-call time. Your employees have the right to access these records, and the same applies to trade unions representing them in the workplace.
It is possible to negotiate a different amount of on-call time in a collective agreement. If you do not have a collective agreement, the Swedish Work Environment Authority can grant an exemption in individual cases.
Standby duty means that your employees are available to you outside of the workplace. They must be ready to travel to the workplace and start working within a specified time frame. During standby time, they can be at home or elsewhere, but they must be reachable so that you can contact them and they can quickly arrive at the workplace. Usually, there is an agreed-upon time within which they should be present.
Standby time is not considered working hours and is outside of the employees regular working hours. There is no legal limit to how many hours of standby time they can have. It is allowed to have standby time during daily rest, and if specified in a applicable collective agreement, also during weekly rest.
