in the United States. Europe has very strict rules about surveiling employees.
Example: In Austria we are not allowed to use some of the functions that Azure-AD joined computers would be capable of because employers _might_ push remote control software the user hasn't agreed to
Companies are not homogeneous blocks of matter and there is always information some people at the company may need to know that others have no business dealing with. Tax, banking and health related information are some of the things that I can think of that would be shared on a need to know basis with people at work and have no business to be seen by people outside of the intended audience.
I am against workplace surveillance, but why would people receive this information to their work email address?
I'm not aware of any EU wide laws that prevent what you're talking about here. In the UK an employment contract will state that the employer can monitor your activity if they need to and this is completely legal.
Source: https://www.gov.uk/monitoring-work-workers-rights
In some countries (Germany springs to mind) there are much stricter rules. A blanket statement like the one you've made here is not correct unless you're being very specific about where you're talking about.
Every job I applied to, even the most liberal ones mandates at least 2 day per week at the office in the best case, with some SW companies having max 1 day per week WFH because "we're more efficient at the office" lol. Every time I ask at an interview if they let me work 100% from home, so I don't waste 2h/day commuting, they look at me like I asked them to let me f*ck their mom.
Also, many Austrian companies keep rigid track of your time and breaks at the office via electronic card punch in/out systems which are a government mandated legalized forms of workplace surveillance, meaning I have to spend 8h per day at the office regardless of my work being done in 5 and unable to do anything remotely productive for the remaining 3 because my brain is fried, while some companies even make you punch out for coffee breaks so you're not taking a break on your employer's dime, meaning you need to spend even more time at the office what's beyond your legal allowed 30 min lunch break which is also not included in your 8h closely-recorded workday.
So IMHO, it's not all as progresive as you make it sound. It feels like an archaic system designed to keep unionized factory workers strictly in line to their mandated 30 min lunch breaks and making sure no overtime occurs on their shift, but is severely out of place in the world of digital knowledge work where it's used in some companies to keep employees at the office glued for 8 hours to their chairs.
This sort of thing backfires on the employer in my opinion. It's quite easy to stretch a task to fill 8 hours if you have to be there anyway. But maybe you'd be happy to clock out after 5 hours one day and take a few extra unpaid hours for yourself. If your work is done, the employer should be happy to save a little money and let you do that.
All work time is tracked by law in Austria, it's just that all-in is less invasive on the time tracking because it doesn't care for overtime because it's not paid.
You write down when you started working and you write down when you stop. Some employers automatically subtract your legally required break time, some want you to enter it manually.
> Is there a concept equivalent to US, salary employee?
Yes. It’s called full-time employee. This encompasses anyone and everyone who does not work as an independent contractor.
> If so what are they expected to work?
40 hours per week.
With mandated minimum lunch time and breaks, paid minimum vacation, paid medical leave, paid maternity/paternity, govt mandated lunch allowance, govt mandated transportation allowance based on commute distance, and many other “perks” that US companies use as negotiation tactics.
If you work more than 40 hours per week, you can request overtime pay. Many employees waive the overtime thing for various reasons. In some industries because they’re exploited (restaurants and such), in other industries because they’re Mission Driven and want to work more (startups and such).
The law is there to protect you, but in practiceit comes down to your relationship with your boss.
edit: Personally, I don’t like this paternalistic/maternalistic attitude from either approach (as laws or as perks). Just pay me a shitload of money and let me figure out the rest. I’m old enough to buy my own lunch thank you.
Salary = exempt = no overtime for you, sucker. Over time, more and more people have fallen under that category in the US.
Is there something like that in the EU, where you don't have max hours or overtime eligibility at all?
At least in Germany, managerial employees (mostly defined through hiring and firing authority) are traditionally exempt though this might be in conflict with the relevant EU regulations. We’ll see.
What I’m seeing commonly today is that your contracts will say the work week is 40 hours but x hours of overtime a month are already compensated.
No, the EU is pretty strict about those things. Only way you can be ineligible for overtime is if you own the business. And even then you’re technically eligible, but I’ve never heard of anyone paying themselves overtime.
In practice the “exempt” part happens in a grey area: The boss and the employee shake hands to “make things simpler” and write down 40h every week in whatever tracking thingy. Worked less than 40? Great, you get 40. Worked more? Great, you get 40. wink wink
Or you can request TOIL - Time Off In Lieu. That is a system designed to allow flexibility. Some jobs can't simply clock off when doing certain tasks. Provided it is agreed upon at contract negotiation time (ie the hiring process) then TOIL/overtime rates can work well for everyone.
Our (UK for me/EU) Employment Tribunals have a lot of power and a lot of law that generally favours the employee but also strives towards equitability. For the last 20+ years I hire but I still recall what being hired is like. I have found time and time again that being fair and open pays back in absolute spades. A pissed off employee is simply a burden and a cost. You can't please everyone all of the time but if you are known for fairness, that goes a long way.
I won't give you a shitload of money until you earn it for me 8) I too buy my own lunch and all other meals as required to live. I sometimes (always) need to be forced (cough reminded) to claim when we are contracting on a job that has allowances built in.
Some top tips for employees (EU/UK - perhaps others too): Do make sure you get things ironed out at the hiring stage. At the very least some things defined, written down and signed: Get place of work defined eg town/city - in the event of TUPE you may be required to move but if you have a defined place of work then you have all the aces! Get rates defined and a formal process for review. Hours of work. Responsibilities. Industry specifics. Read up on HR and how it works: you will be sat across the table with an expert in the law and how to err get the best out of you for the company which may not match up with your ideas. Do read up on all your govt provided advice - the GOV.UK stuff is pretty decent.
Basically: you have a duty to yourself to do your own due diligence, so please do it! You can expect to be treated reasonably fairly but you may not like the outcome so get the pack stacked fairly or at least not against you.
Basically you shouldn't lose your job for refusing to work more hours than are defined in the regulations, if you do there is a tribunal process. But, if the employee is willing there are ways around it.
They say you can opt in or out at any point by providing a written request to HR, but defaulting to opt out at the point when all the power is with the company (the candidate is signing the initial contract, and may not want to rock the boat) seems wrong IMO.
The legal limit in Germany is 10 hours net, pkus whatever break time is applicable. One exception are mainly surveilling duties, e.g. monitoring security cameras, where the limit is 12 hours. One theoretical "work around" is declaring Saturdays normal working days, as they legally are. Those 10 hours are (used to be, not surw if that changed) calculated on the average of 5 days, by using Saturday as working day on which people are not working the average is calculated based on six days with one day adding 0 hours to tje total. Not sure if that was ever tried in court so.
Disclaimer: The above applies to Germany.
Fun fact: If employees violqte those limits, the line manager is liable personally. That liability includes fines, I know of one case where said fine was 10k Euro, and theoretically even jail time.
The only thing that annoy me is the software my employer chose can only be accesed from inside the corporate network and do not provide a rest api. Otherwise I'd setup a large physical button with a led light connected to a pi zero so I can just hit it on starting and stopping my work.