24x7x365 On-call: legal in Thailand?

[Na Fan]

Hi everyone

Is it legal to be put on-call every hour of every day of the year in Thailand?

Fan

[Paul944]

That really limits your vacations. Flying not possible. Destinations without mobile phone coverage not possible.

[bino]

"Legally" according to labour law, every employee is entitled regular days off and to certain minimum amounts of annual vacation time, which escalates with the number of years of service to the company.

[blackcab]

Are you an employee? Are you self employed? What nationality are you? If your are not Thai, do you have a work permit? If you do have a work permit, what does your job description say?

[innerspace]

Not sure on legalities but I am and yes with work permit.

But it's my own business and I charge for round the clock support to global customers so to be expected.

I don't ask employees to do the same, would hire more staff to do shifts on call instead if needed. If that is being asked from you just make sure the pay justifies it.

[Na Fan]

Are you an employee? Are you self employed? What nationality are you? If your are not Thai, do you have a work permit? If you do have a work permit, what does your job description say?

I fail to see how that's relevant to my question.

I want to know if by Thai law it is legal or not. That's it

[blackcab]

Without your answers to my questions I cannot answer you. I don't really need your nationality, but I do need answers to the other questions. An indication of your salary range would also help me reply.

Depending on your answers my reply could be either yes I believe it is legal or no I believe it is not legal.

I understand you fail to see the relevance of my questions, but I simply do not have the time to write every permutation of my answer.

Help me to help you

[Langsuan Man]

Are you an employee? Are you self employed? What nationality are you? If your are not Thai, do you have a work permit? If you do have a work permit, what does your job description say?

I fail to see how that's relevant to my question.

I want to know if by Thai law it is legal or not. That's it

Congratulations you are well on the way to being a Thai Visa Warrior and with only 37 posts to get this far

Ask a question and immediately start to argue with those who want to answer it for you

Here I will answer it without any information

Some times it is legal and sometimes it is not

[Na Fan]

Without your answers to my questions I cannot answer you. I don't really need your nationality, but I do need answers to the other questions. An indication of your salary range would also help me reply.

Depending on your answers my reply could be either yes I believe it is legal or no I believe it is not legal.

I understand you fail to see the relevance of my questions, but I simply do not have the time to write every permutation of my answer.

Help me to help you

The situation is somewhat complicated which is why I'd rather not go into it unless I have to.

- I am employed by a Thai company (with work permit and all)

- This job description doesn't include any oncall (and there is no such concept at this company, nor is there a requirement)

- Then, there is a services contract between that Thai company and a foreign company based in North America. The contract is for a full time position, call it a consulting contract.

- That contract also includes a job description, but at this point does not include the 24x7x365 oncall

- In reality, though, accepting that position outlined in that contract will come with a 24x7x365 escalation on-call

Edit: I'm not Thai.

Hope that helps you help me and doesn't raise 42 additional questions

Na Fan

Edited December 8, 2015 by Na Fan

[blackcab]

That helps a lot. I believe in this case that you cannot be made to work on call 24 X 7 X 365 as your job description does not include those terms.

The thing to consider is that you are employed by a Thai company. That company might have a services contract, but the services contact is an agreement between the Thai company and the US company. You are not a signatory to that contract. As such you remain an employee of the Thai company who would be assigned to a new job role.

That job role is governed by Thai labour law, which specifies that you are allowed annual leave, sick leave and also a maximum working week.

There is one point to consider, however, and that is whether being on call is actuality working. There is no definative answer to this question - however an employer would of course argue that being on call is not working. What your employer could do is to make you add up the total hours you work answering calls and make sure that these hours plus your standard hours do not exceed the maximum working time allowed under Thai labour law.

The situation would of course change drastically if you accepted a new job description with new terms and conditions.

Edited December 8, 2015 by blackcab

[mandylis]

I'm not sure of the legalities, but I do know that my Boss's wife is on such an arrangement with a prominent private hospital for her specialty.

She doesn't really have to be at the hospital and if she have to, it's normally for 2 hrs. Averaging 3 days out of a week and only sometimes twice on the same day.

Unsure what her specialty is, but it's related to the heart disease.

I do their personal tasks too and privy to the information. She takes in about 70k a month and as high as 90k.

For nursing, that's really a huge paycheck.