EU Court: Commuting to Customer Sites Counts as Work

Joe_Dragon writes with news that the European Court of Justice has issued a ruling (PDF) saying that workers who have to commute to see customers, but don't have a "fixed or habitual place of work," must have their transit time at the beginning and end of the day count as working time. In other words, driving to your normal office every day doesn't count toward your paycheck, but leaving home in the morning to go visit a client or customer at your employer's request does. This added commute time also counts toward weekly labor limits — EU regulations for working conditions prohibit employers from making their employees work more than 48 hours a week on average. The court said, Given that traveling is an integral part of being such a worker, the place of work of that worker cannot be reduced to the physical areas of his work on the premises of the employer’s customers. The fact that the workers begin and finish the journeys at their homes stems directly from the decision of their employer to abolish the regional offices and not from the desire of the workers themselves.

Comments

What's going on?

[Hognoxious]

Someone literate appears to have hijacked Joe_Dragon's account.

Re:Self inflicted damage

[Le Marteau]

In the USA, generally, hourly employees whose travel is required for the job must be paid for their travel time, with the exception of home to work (and work to home).

http://www.dol.gov/dol/topic/w...