EFTA: travel time is working time

EFTAEFTA. Efta.org

The EFTA Court confirms that travel time is working time

Have you been on an assignment outside your usual workplace? Then travel time is considered part of the work, no matter how little you get done en route according to EFTA ruling.

 

The EFTA Court confirmed this on Monday.

The court has examined the matter of a Norwegian police officer that usually work at Gaular Länsmannskontor in Sogn og Fjordane. In several cases where he was sent on assignments elsewhere in the region, travel time was not approved as being working time.

Last year The Supreme Court asked the EFTA Court for assistance in interpreting EEA legislation on this matter.

The EFTA Court now states that travel time is to be regarded as working time when an employee is ordered by his employer to perform tasks outside his permanent or regular workplace.

How relaxing or strenuous the journey is, does not matter. As long as the journey is required to perform the mission, the employee is by definition at work.

It also does not matter how often the employee is sent on assignments outside his normal workplace.

 

©  NTB Scanpix / Norway Today