As a part of 2019 Workstyle reform bills, this regislation literally promotes the contents of the present Ministerial Notice to a mandatory law and adds legal biding power to them. It will set a regulatory limit that cannot be exceeded even in cases with consensus between labor and management on temporary and special situations. In other words, this revision will make the present notice stricter and add legal biding power by promoting it to a law.
(A Regulatory Limit on Overtime Work) We will define the maximum hours of overtime work permitted in principle over 40 hours per week as 45 hours per month and 360 hours per year. We will impose penalties for any violations other than the following special cases where the maximum hours of overtime work are defined as 720 hours per year (=60 hours per month on average) and cannot be exceeded even in cases with consensus on temporary and special situations between labor and management. In addition, within this upper limit of 720 hours per year, a minimal limit for a case of a temporary increase of the amount of work, which also cannot be exceeded, is established.
In regard to this minimal limit, we require the following conditions to be preserved. ① All of the 2-month, 3-month, 4-month, 5-month and 6-month means of overtime working hours including working on holidays must be within 80 hours. ② Overtime working hours of any single month including working on holidays must be less than 100 hours. ③ In addition, considering the maximum hours of overtime work permitted in principle over 40 hours per week are defined as 45 hours per month and 360 hours per year, we do not allow special exceptions, which exceed these principles, to be applied in more than half a year, which means the exceptions can be applied 6 times a year at maximum. On the other hand, considering both labor and management reached a consensus on their responsibilities of avoiding agreements with almost the maximum limits of overtime work, in order to further shorten the overtime working hours as possible, we will create new rules, which will set up guidelines, within the Labor Standards Act. Based on these guidelines, related administrative agencies will be able to offer advice and guidance for employers and labor unions.