The Turkish Labour Code No. 4857 is the primary legislation of the Turkish Labour Law. The Law has regulated the working hours of workers.
According to the law, the working method is determined with its general elements and the principle of working full-time and indefinitely is accepted as base. In addition, normal working hours of an employee is determined as 45 hours per week within the scope of the Labour Code No. 4857.
On the other hand, the law has been content with determining the weekly working hours and has not imposed any obligations on which days of the week these working hours will be distributed. There is only a principle that daily working hours cannot exceed 11 hours and night work cannot exceed 7.5 hours.
Apart from this limitation, the parties to the employment contract have the freedom to distribute working hours to weekday workdays as they wish, provided that it is included in the written texts that determine working conditions such as the employment contract and workplace personnel regulations.
Let’s explain the distribution of working hours to days of the week with two examples:
Example 1: Let’s assume that a workplace has the following working order. While workers have weekly leave on Saturday and Sunday, they only work 1 hour on Friday. There is no night work in the workplace. The weekly working hour is 45 hours.
| Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Saturday | Sunday |
| 11 hours | 11 hours | 11 hours | 11 hours | 1 hours | OFF | OFF |
A working order as given in the example complies with the Turkish Labor Law and does not constitute any risk for the employer in a probable labour inspection.
Example 2: This time, assume that a workplace has the following working order. Workers have weekly days off on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. There is no night work at the workplace. Weekly working hours are 45 hours again.
| Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Saturday | Sunday |
| 12 hours | 12 hours | 12 hours | 9 hours | OFF | OFF | OFF |
A working order as given in the example is not in accordance with the Turkish Labor Law. In this working model, employees will need to be paid 3 hours of overtime as 50% increased hourly wage. Although the working hours do not exceed 45 hours per week, since it is not possible to work more than 11 hours per day, overtime wages must be paid for each working hour exceeding 11 hours.
In conclusion, despire that the distribution of working hours between the days of the week is up to the parties of the employment contract, this distribution must be in compliance with the limitation of the Labour Code No. 4857.
