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Discrimination against part-time employees with regard to pay

Labor law

Discrimination against part-time employees with regard to pay

In its decision of 5 December 2024 (8 AZR 370/20), the Federal Labour Court issued a much-noticed ruling.

It ruled that a provision in a collective agreement that requires overtime pay to exceed the regular working hours of a full-time employee, regardless of the individual's working hours, was discriminatory to the detriment of part-time employees and therefore void. A standard working time of 8 hours applied in the company in question. The full-time employee who worked more than his standard working time of 8 hours received an overtime bonus. The part-time employee who worked more than their standard working time of (for example) 4 hours did not receive a supplement. As there was no objective reason for this, there was discrimination.