When is travel time working hours?
Time spent on business travel is generally working time. Learn more about the rules, limits, and compensation for travel time.
In short: Travel time is working time
- Time spent on necessary travel to perform assigned tasks outside your permanent place of work is generally working time.
- Some employers still maintain that travel time outside normal working hours is not working time in the sense of the law. This is incorrect.
- Both the Supreme Court and the EFTA Court have established that travel time is working time regardless of whether the journey is continued during or outside normal working hours.
What are working hours and what are non-working hours?
In order to be able to say what is working time, we must also be able to define non-working time.
- The Working Environment Act defines working hours as the time the employee is at the disposal of the employer.
- Non-work is the time the employee is not available to the employer.
- There is no separate category for travel time.
Travel time must therefore either be working time or non-working.
During work-free periods, you must have complete time off from work obligations so that you can dispose of your time as you wish. You usually can't do that on business trips. The necessary travel time and waiting time during such a journey will therefore generally be working hours. However, free time at the place of assignment can be considered non-working.
The Working Time Directive: What is required for travel time to be working time
As an EEA member, Norway does not have the opportunity to define working hours in a different way than the EU's Working Time Directive. Case law from the EU and the EFTA Court will therefore have a direct impact on how the Working Environment Act's concept of working hours is to be understood.
From the case law of the Supreme Court and the EU/EFTA Court, we can draw the following conclusions about when travel time is working time:
- As a general rule, travel to and from a permanent place of work is not considered working time.
- Travel to and from another meeting place is working time if the travel is necessary/essential to be able to perform mandatory tasks.
This applies regardless of whether:
- you have a fixed place of work or not
- You work or are contactable during the trip
- The journey takes place within or outside the normal working day
- the trip takes place within or outside the EU/EEA as long as the employment relationship is regulated by Norwegian law
Payment for travel time
Neither the Working Environment Act nor the Working Time Directive provide rules on pay for working hours, with the exception of the Working Environment Act's rules on overtime.
If there are no agreements on payment for travel time, NITO believes that travel time should be compensated like other working hours.
Consequences for the calculation of working hours
Travel time and other working hours must be kept within the Working Environment Act's rules on maximum working hours and minimum time off work.
The time spent travelling must be registered as working hours and is included in the calculation of total working hours.
Union representatives or trade unions centrally can enter into agreements to extend the framework for maximum daily working hours, so that it is possible to carry out long journeys in an appropriate manner.
It may also be possible to enter into an agreement with a trade union centrally that allows for hours of travel time, within a prudent framework, to be compensated with salary instead of time off in lieu.
It is important to emphasise that all employees who are covered by the Working Environment Act's working hours provisions must have an unconditional right to time off in lieu of accrued travel time if they so wish. The employer is not allowed to dispose of the employees' time beyond the agreed full-time equivalent plus any overtime.
What should you do if you do not agree with the employer?
If your employer believes that travel time outside normal working hours should not be counted or compensated as working time, we recommend that you ask for a written justification for this.
Feel free to contact the NITO lawyers for an assessment of the case.
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