The company from Bern dares to try: 38 hours a week instead of 42 hours – with the same salary!

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Happy New Year to the employees of Schwendimann AG from Münchenbuchsee. Bern waste disposal company introduced 38-hour week with the same wages since the beginning of the year! Previously, weekly working hours were 42 hours. Now the company’s nearly 100 employees work about one hour less per day.

The announcement may come as a surprise to outsiders, but not to employees described as “thinkers” on the company website. “We gave the teams the opportunity to develop their own plans to reduce working hours in the workshops,” managing director Demian Schwendimann (32) explains to Blick.

A successful three-month test run with reduced working hours has already been carried out at the Werkhof department. The company is currently testing the 38-hour week companywide for a year. “But we will probably know within six months whether this will work or not,” says Schwendimann.

Interdepartmental work for non-essential work

From a purely operational perspective, it is already clear that workload can be reduced. Without any more stress for employees. Schwendimann expects productivity to increase thanks to a better quality of life for employees: “Thanks to the reduced working hours, there is much more input from the team on improving productivity,” notes the boss. It is also important that the work is carried out between departments.

Administratively, everything has not yet been sorted out, such as contract amendments where new working hours are recorded. For this to work, there would need to be “a lot of re-planning” in all areas. In addition to its garbage collection and disposal depot, Schwendimann AG also offers a cart service, customs clearance service and event disposal services.

“I also hope that there will be less absence due to illness or injury thanks to better work-life balance,” says Schwendimann. But this is not the expectation of the employees: “It will happen if it stays the same as before.”

Different needs depending on the team

By the way, this is not a reduction at all: “The dispatch team was previously allowed to go home after completing their work and sometimes worked significantly less than their weekly working hours,” says Schwendimann. But the team put themselves under pressure to have the extra free time. When employees finish their work early, they now ask whether there is still work to be done in other areas, such as the factory floor, the landfill or general daily tasks.

The situation was different with the Werkhof team: They regularly worked overtime. However, Schwendimann did not increase headcount: “Interdepartmental working allows employees in other areas to do non-essential work flexibly.”

Schwendimann emphasizes that despite the different requirements placed on teams, everyone should enjoy the same benefits. But a four-day week is not a problem: “This is not feasible due to our customers’ specifications.”

Financially quite possible

At least there is no need for financial hardship to implement this: “We are sticking to the proposed price increases in the Astag index and do not need any additional adjustments,” concludes Schwendimann.

The process is also hassle-free from a legal perspective. According to the labor law, the maximum weekly working time for employees in industrial companies, office personnel, technical and other employees, and sales personnel in large retail companies is 45 hours per week. The following is the responsibility of the employer.

The normal weekly working hours for full-time workers in Switzerland was 41.7 hours in 2022, according to the Federal Statistical Office. The 42-hour work week remains the norm in most companies.

Employers and employees disagree on benefits

The number that the TravailSuisse employee association wants to reduce. “Some employers allow working hours to be reduced to make themselves look attractive in times of shortage of skilled labour,” confirms Adrian Wüthrich (43), boss of Travailsuisse. However, as the recent FIS negotiations have shown, there is still little understanding of such measures on the employer side. Wüthrich spontaneously points to Schwendimann AG as an example of how things could be done differently.

Employers’ association spokesman Stefan Heini disagrees, saying everyone is free to work part-time and every company is allowed to reduce working hours. However: “A legally prescribed four-day working week with 35 or 36 working hours, combined with full wage compensation for all, would be equivalent to a large wage increase for employees.” These high wage costs are putting many companies under pressure, and this measure is worsening the acute labor shortage.

More and more companies are looking at things differently. Schwendimann AG is not the only company breaking new ground. For example, the Hornbach hardware store in Switzerland has been working 39 hours a week since the beginning of 2023. The most recent example is the healthcare provider Siloah Prissag AG from Gümligen BE. The annual holiday entitlement has now been increased by up to 5 days, depending on the age category.

However, the majority of companies are still hesitant to take the step taken by Schwendimann AG.

Source :Blick