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Earning less than S$2,500, 'disguised executives' call for overtime compensation

SINGAPORE — During busy periods, working overtime up to four days a week was the norm for former hotel events coordinator Ms Seng, 24.

SINGAPORE — During busy periods, working overtime up to four days a week was the norm for former hotel events coordinator Ms Seng, 24.

Earning a monthly wage of S$2,000, she put in up to two hours beyond her regular work hours each day to complete her tasks.

Ms Seng, who declined to provide her full name, did not receive overtime payment or other forms of compensation for the extra hours worked.

"They should have given us overtime pay, as the basic salary is really quite pathetic (for) the effort and time we put in," said Ms Seng, who remained in the role for a year before switching to the banking industry last year.

She is among a pool of workers given inflated executive positions by their employers, possibly to skirt around labour laws to avoid overtime payments.

Describing these workers as "disguised PMEs (professionals, managers and executives)" in a blog post earlier this week, National Trades Union Congress (NTUC) assistant secretary-general Patrick Tay said inflated titles are the reason why some workers are not compensated for working beyond official work hours, even though they are not in substantive positions of authority.

This includes the authority to hire and fire, being in charge of business units and functions, or managing and running a business directly.

Under the Employment Act, workmen performing manual labour who draw a basic salary of up to S$4,500, as well as employees earning a basic wage of up to S$2,500 a month, are entitled to payments for extra work rendered. The provision excludes managers and executives.

Writing on the NTUC's blog, Mr Tay, who is also a Member of Parliament for West Coast Group Representation Constituency, said workers in such situations have approached the labour movement for help, most recently in May.

Executives approached by TODAY had mixed views on whether they should be paid for working overtime.

An associate producer who wanted only to be known as Ms Yong, 26, puts in a full month of overtime on occasion and sometimes works overnight on production shoots.

According to her, it is not the practice of production companies to offer overtime compensation, although there are "lull" periods in which she gets to start late and knock off early.

Owing to the nature of work in the industry, it is "tricky" for firms to calculate overtime payment, she said. "As long as the employers know how to genuinely take care of their staff members and ensure that they have some work-life balance, I'm okay to overlook the overtime compensation," she said.

Ms Sam, 25, a hotel employee working in sales and events, said hotels should compensate staff members in departments like banquet who "work massive amounts of overtime". They include entry-level degree holders earning less than S$2,500.

Hotel employees are dogged by a low starting wage, she noted.

Mr Tay said the cases he has come across could just be the "tip of the iceberg", as there may be more than 30,000 PMEs here who earn less than S$2,500 monthly.

He urged the tripartite partners — comprising the Government, unions and employers — to better articulate the law's position on who a PME is.

National Trades Union Congress assistant secretary-general Patrick Tay, speaking after the MOM Workplan Seminar 2018 on May 28, 2018. TODAY file photo

In a recent judgment involving a Bangladeshi site supervisor and a China-headquartered construction firm, the High Court noted that the "executive position" was not defined in the Employment Act.

Justice George Wei said a supervisory role does not, in itself, make someone an executive or remove his status as a "workman".

The judge ruled that the site supervisor's tasks do not go beyond on-site routine administrative work. He also did not have the direct authority to hire, fire, promote or discipline other workers – and was thus entitled to overtime pay under the Employment Act.

Mr Tay noted that the share of PMEs in the workforce as well as those with specialised qualifications have increased.

"Qualifications do not guarantee bargaining power, as many low-earning employees with specialised qualifications are not deployed to jobs with managerial duties or decision-making powers," he said.

Calling for workers to be assessed on job scope and not job titles, Mr Tay said the Ministry of Manpower's (MOM) definition of a manager or executive on its website may also have to be tweaked to exclude "professionals with tertiary education and specialised knowledge".

The MOM also states that managers and executives are generally employees with executive and supervisory functions, and their duties and authority may include influencing or making decisions on issues like recruitment, discipline and termination of employment.

TODAY has contacted the MOM for comment.

Alternatively, the Employment Act's provisions covering rest days, hours of work and other conditions of service should be tweaked to cover all workers earning S$2,500 or less, Mr Tay said.

He has raised this with the tripartite partners during discussions on a review of the Employment Act.

Union members seeking recourse on these issues can approach the unions and the NTUC, Mr Tay told TODAY. Workers can also approach the MOM or the Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management.

LAWS, DEFINITIONS NEED RELOOKING: EXPERTS

Human resource experts agreed the Employment Act should be relooked, as jobs have been redesigned and redefined over the years.

"In the past, it was very clear-cut that people involved in manual work are classified as rank-and-file, and entitled to provisions like overtime pay," said Mr David Ang, corporate services director with continuing education and training centre Human Capital Singapore.

This is no longer the case. "Some of the work done by (those classified as) executives and professionals have sort of become 'manual' in nature (and) more so at the lower rungs of the job ladder."

Employers should give workers earning S$2,000 or less — particularly those in operational roles needing to work at certain hours to perform their tasks — benefits such as overtime pay no matter how they are classified, he said.

Some companies already do so.

A senior human-resource leader in a large Singapore-based company said her company is among those that pay employees below a certain income threshold for overtime hours worked.

"So long as you're covered under the union, even if you earn S$3,000, we also provide overtime," said the woman, who declined to be named because she is not authorised to speak to the media.

But she does not think the law should be amended to cover all employees earning S$2,500 or less for overtime pay, unless there is widespread abuse. "We'll be much better off educating companies on who a manager is, and who is not," she said.

Singapore Human Resources Institute president Erman Tan said it was "high time" for staff benefits and entitlements to be more clearly spelt out. "It's good to redefine the nature of jobs, rather than job titles. We see this as a mature move, especially with the changing workforce demographics."

Mr Tay said there is a need to find out the magnitude of the problem. "Moving ahead, we should find ways to remove the rank-and-file and PME dichotomy, due to our changing workforce profile," he said.

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