M.I.L
5

Dear Experts
Pls advice, if overtime hours exceed 50 hours per quarter on regular basis, do there is any legal provision exist that helps to avoid legal violations, (some sort of approvals, agreement, panality, spacial case considerations)
In our case we do working 10 hours a day, 12 hours overtime per week, which is complaint with factory act, but it violate 50 hours per quarter, We compensate overtime hours at double rate.
Pls advice, if there is any solution available

From India, Delhi
dixonjose02
118

There is apparently no legal remedy for escaping the provisions of FA, 1948 on this issue.
My suggestion is, instead of looking for loopholes in statutes, you may look at why OT is so high in ur org & take a target of becoming "Zero OT" company. There are many companies i know of like Mather & Platt, Hyundai, Cummins, etc, where manpower planning & work scheduling is done in such a way, so as to avoid any OT payment whatsoever. Hence, these companies have no legal headaches concerning OT.
Btw, why pay double OT, when u can get the same work done in single pay by adding a few heads more !?

From India, Mumbai
kknair
199

Dear M.I.L. You are clearly violating the Factories Act in working 10 hours per day and 60 hours per week. There is no mechanism to overcome the statutory obligation in this regard. As pointed out by Dixon, you may have to do some manpower planning and rearrage the manpower in shifts to get over the problem. KK
From India, Bhopal
M.I.L
5

Dear Mr.Dixon & Knair

thanks for your reply, I agree with Mr.Dixon on zero ot, but we have our geniun problem, hope you experts try to understand the situation

We put up a new manufacturing plant with limited machines & manpower, our strength is 50only. To retain manpower on minimum wage 4500 was very difficult so we start 2hours OT & pay them double rate for ot , by doing this worker get 1.5 & we get 2 extra hours of working on same machines. by doing this we manage to the retain manpower. In my opinion you experts belongs to & refer big concerns were manpower hiring & retaining is NO BIG DEAL, if they require 10 workers they have 100 applications.

( If you aware of working mechanism of other small scale units, you get to know ppl working 12 to 14 hours a day and night shifts extra.in those concerns workers are exploited from your point of view but those who working are happy there atleast they earn double, as according to their capability,Ability and govt provisions of minimum wage they cant survive & my dear friends money matters alot for labour class, if they work in xyz concern they get 5000,6000 per month, how they manage their families, they are not litrate/expert/skilled by vertue of their fate, so they only have one option to do extra work.I may not saying you are wrong or justify this working mechanism but there are other realities that need to be accepted. What we are doing now is to improve the working mechanism,first step towards it is compliance of govt regulations in true sense, so i comeup here to find some solution. )

I dont agree with Knair that 10hours a day crime, As per FA 2hours a day, 12 hours a week OT is allowed. Pls correct if i am wrong

From India, Delhi
M.I.L
5

i got one suggestion that " if we have mutual agreement with our workers welfare commity on 2 hours ot, on grounds of manpower retention, that wi
ll works, pls advice, Am sure there must be some wayout of our problem

From India, Delhi
subbarao.nv
40

if you are sure that work will continue, you may hire new workmen that too that working hours must be 8 hrs (in and out - including lunch with tea breaks) as per statutes.
As per your enging workmen, the company is working 24 hours cycle and hence it can run on shifts a,b,c shifts and one in general shift (who will be reliever) by increasing the manpower, offs. Hence, four heads required per day. If you calculate the amount that you are paying to two persons can be adjusted to three persons and only one person can be treated as excess, which is required to maintain zero ot as well as without deviation as per fa.
In case if management is not accepting, you can hire temporary workmen on off roll through contractors / outsourcing.
Regards==srao / hyd/9849562900

From India, Hyderabad
saswatabanerjee
2395

There is a provision in the factory act that allows the factory inspector to relax the limit of overtime for a Limited period of time and for certain reasons to be recorded. We have a client who got an exemption from overtime rule for 1 year as the factory is in a remote place where trained manpower was not readily available.
The maximum overtime allowed under increased limit will be 75 hours a quarter.
The talk of workers wanting overtime, etc is just a cover up for exploitation. How can a person working 10 or 12 hours a day survive in the long term. Including travel Time, he will be home less than 8 hours. Not enough to have food and rest.
The larger companies get candidates because they are willing to pay more than minimum wages. Considering the amount you are paying for overtime, i think you can afford to increase wage rate to match the market rate. You will also get better productivity from workers working 8 hour shifts

From India, Mumbai
V. Balaji
100

Overtime is a decease. To attract works and stay with organiztion the only way is to pay more, provide more benefits such as canteen, transportation, shoes and uniforms, etc. No worker in today's context will come forward to work with you for Minimum Wages wherein other industries offer them better salary. If they can earn the same wages or more by spending only 8 hours, why at all they should spend 12-13 hours a day to earn,
Don' t think that workers are illiterate. May be illiterate sometimes, but they are much more calculatives than you and I.
Exploiting workers in the disguise of "paying OT" is not seen as a healthy practice by the Law. Hence go for injecting more heads than paying OT.
V. Balaji

From India, Madras
Shailesh Parikh_HR Pro
300

I understand the concern is about "Genuine over Time" and not exploitation on either side. There are several and several companies, those running on continous chemical processes, where there is concept of Duty Post. which means 24 hours manning is essential (in A B C shifts) there OT generates on accounts of his reliever being absent.If his respective reliever takes more than nine leave in span of three months the OT even exceeds the permissible highest 75 hours- as exception. There they follow that in no case the workman is allowed to work for more than 16 hours. Pl. note here in most cases it is the manning of the plant and controlling the plant parameters either manually (operation of valves etc.) or through DCS panels.

The remedy may lie in informing Factory Inspectorate about such exceeding exceptions with justifications, the inspectorate give more emphasis to Safety of plant as no such chemical plant s can be left unmanned.

But be sincere to pay them twice the rate and other shift and OT allowances in addition to taking care for their food and rest period etc.

Regards

Shailesh Parikh

Vadodara, Gujarat

99 98 97 10 65

From India, Mumbai
kknair
199

Dear M.I.L., While empathising with your problem, let me point out that the Min. wages in Delhi, as per press reports is Rs.7722 for unskilled to Rs.9386 for skilled operators. I am unable to understand how you are able to operate at Rs. 4500/- wage level.
However looking to your problem, all I can say is that legally you are in an indefensible position. KK

From India, Bhopal
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