Forty-Hour Week Convention, 1935 (No. 47) - Republic of Korea (Ratification: 2011)

Observation (CEACR) - adopted 2025, published 114th ILC session (2026)

The Committee notes the observations of the Federation of Korean Trade Unions (FKTU) and the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), received in 2024 and the Government’s responses thereto.

Article 1 of the Convention. Forty-hour week principle – application in practice. Further to its previous comments, the Committee notes that in its report the Government indicates that to facilitate the application of a 40-hour week, measures such as legislative amendments to the Labour Standards Act in 2018 (reduction of overtime hours and of sectors benefiting from special exemptions), awareness-raising campaigns, work–life balance job incentives and targeted inspections have been adopted.

In their observations, the KCTU and FKTU express concerns over continued long working hours in sectors still benefiting from exemptions under section 59 of the Act, and cases of fatalities due to overwork. The FKTU further indicates that authorizations for special overtime have surged, reaching 6,477 in 2021 compared to 15 in 2017; it also indicates that providing 11-hour consecutive daily rest periods is insufficient to protect workers from overwork-related health issues. The KCTU and FKTU further refer to new, ongoing reforms by the Government which, in their view, would erode the foundation of the forty-hour work week, including by increasing the reference period over which overtime is calculated. In response, the Government indicates that the increase in the length of the reference periods for overtime would be accompanied by safety and health measures and would not result in higher working hours. It also indicates that since June 2024, tripartite discussions on this issue have been held at the Committee for Work–Life Balance under the Economic, Social and Labour Council, aiming at reducing actual working hours, guaranteeing labour management choice and protecting workers’ health rights.

In this respect, the Committee notes with regard to the Labour Standards Act, as amended, that:

• Section 51(1) and (2) provides for the averaging of hours over two weeks in accordance with employment rules and over three months subject to a written agreement with the representative of employees, respectively, provided that working hours in any week do not exceed 48 hours.
• Section 51-2 provides for the averaging of hours over periods of three to six months, in certain circumstances and by agreement with workers’ representatives, provided that working hours in any week do not exceed 52 hours.
• Section 52 allows the averaging of working time over one or three months for certain categories of workers, subject to an 11-hour daily rest period but without defining a limit on any week.
• Section 53 allows for overtime, by agreement between the parties, of 12 hours per week or, in the case of an employer who regularly employs fewer than 30 employees, extended work hours, insofar as the work hours do not exceed eight hours per week, in addition to those 12 hours.
• Section 59 provides for further exemptions to certain businesses so that, with a written agreement with the workers’ representatives, employees can work more than 12 hours of overtime per week.

The Committee observes that the above-mentioned provisions of the Labour Standards Act: (i) foresee excessively long reference periods of up to six months for the working hours averaging, as well as weekly limits reaching 48 to 52 hours; (ii) provide for only an 11-hour daily rest period with no weekly limit to the hours of work for some categories of workers; and (iii) allow for a very high number of additional hours per week. The Committee recalls that these provisions may contradict the principle of a 40-hour week enshrined in the Convention.

Therefore, the Committee requests the Government to continue to take the necessary measures to secure, in law and in practice, the full application of the principle of a 40-hour week provided for by the Convention, and to continue to provide information on all developments regarding its ongoing legislative reforms.

Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2013, published 103rd ILC session (2014)

Article 1 of the Convention. Forty-hour week – Averaging of hours of work – Overtime. The Committee notes the information provided by the Government in its first report, and the comments of the Federation of Korean Trade Unions (FKTU). The Committee notes, in particular, that the principle of a 40-hour week is applied by section 50 of Labour Standards Act No. 5309 of 13 March 1997 as amended on 1 February 2012. It also notes that section 51(1) of this Act allows for the averaging of hours of work over a period of two weeks in accordance with rules of employment and the average of working hours should not exceed 40 hours per week, but the maximum weekly working time should not exceed 48 hours. However, there is no maximum daily working limit. It further notes that section 51(2) provides that averaging of working hours is allowed under certain circumstances over a maximum period of three months, and in this case daily working hours may not exceed 12 hours. In this respect, the Committee refers to Paragraph 12 of the Reduction of Hours of Work Recommendation, 1962 (No. 116) – adopted with a view to facilitating the application of the Convention – which provides that “the calculation of normal hours of work as an average over a period longer than one week should be permitted when special conditions in certain branches of activity or technical needs justify it”. Averaging arrangements should, therefore, be restricted to exceptional cases where the nature of the work, technical reasons or seasonal variations and periodic pressure of work make it necessary.

In addition, the Committee notes that section 53 of the Labour Standards Act permits overtime up to 12 hours per week if the parties concerned so agree. In this respect, the Committee refers to Paragraph 14 of Recommendation No. 116, under which the competent national authorities should determine the circumstances and limits in which exceptions to the normal hours of work may be permitted permanently, temporarily or periodically. The Committee refers, in this respect, to paragraph 79 of its General Survey of 1984 on working time in which it emphasized that “undue facilitation of overtime, for example, by not limiting the circumstances in which it may be permitted or by allowing relatively high maximums, could in the most egregious cases tend to defeat the Recommendation’s objective of a social standard of a 40-hour week and make irrelevant the provisions as to normal working hours”. The Committee requests the Government to provide additional information on any measures taken or envisaged with a view to limiting the circumstances under which the averaging of working hours, or the performance of overtime hours, are authorized so as to facilitate the application of the principle of the 40-hour week.

Moreover, the Committee notes the comments of the FKTU which were appended to the Government’s report. The FKTU indicates that that 40-hour week system is inapplicable not only to workers at workplaces with less than five employees but also to domestic workers. It further indicates that under section 59 of the Labour Standards Act, an employer who has reached agreement in writing with the workers’ representatives may be exempted from the application of the 40-hour week scheme. It further indicates that, due to the excessively broad scope of businesses that are subject to special provisions under section 59 of the Labour Standards Act, as many as 37 per cent of all Korean workers are not covered by the 40-hour work principle. In its reply, the Government states that applying the Labour Standards Act to domestic workers could cause confusion in enforcing the Act due to the vague concept of domestic workers, the risk of infringement upon individuals’ privacy and the question of whether a household can be considered to be a workplace. The Government further states that it will establish guidelines to ensure that the working conditions of domestic workers are protected voluntarily by their employers. Finally, the Government acknowledges that industries that are subject to special conditions are not bound by any limit on overtime work and this has given rise to problems of excessively long work hours. It intends, therefore, to introduce the necessary amendments to reduce the scope of such industries and set a limit on overtime work. The Committee accordingly requests the Government to keep the Office informed of further developments and to transmit a copy of any new text as soon as it has been adopted.