Lunch break excuse hides staff
management flaw, says labour expert
SO MUCH for the commercialisation of Portnet, when lunch-breaks come before productivity (FTW February 2, 2001).
There's no way that private sector companies - those under the rulings of the Basic Conditions of Employment Act (BCEA) - would allow themselves to be caught in such a situation, according to Sean Snyman, c.e.o. of the National Employers Forum.
It's a simple matter of staff time management, he added.
This in response to last week's story from Cape Town where two of the largest container liners on the SA sea trade were held up for a total of four hours, while the pilot and his boat crew had lunch.
Portnet's apologetic excuse was strict adherence to the BCEA where no lunch-break would have infringed workers' rights under the act.
That's absolute nonsense, said Snyman. Oh yes, after five consecutive hours of work, the employee is entitled to a one-hour break.
But the law in the act is flexible enough to allow you to fix that break at your choice of time of the day - provided that the five consecutive hours work-period is not exceeded.
Snyman also suggested that you don't need to be a rocket-scientist to have heard of staggered lunch-breaks - where the different work periods overlap the lunch break.
But, where you don't have the staff numbers to accommodate this, there's also an out, he added.
In a genuine emergency, you can insist that the employees work over their lunch-break - provided that they are reimbursed with an hour of extra overtime, said Snyman.
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