South Africa's BCEA: Working Time, Overtime, and Records

South Africa's Basic Conditions of Employment Act 75 of 1997 (BCEA) has an unusual feature at its centre. Most working-time statutes apply to everyone and then carve out narrow exemptions for senior managers. The BCEA draws a line by salary: earn above a threshold the Minister sets each year, and the entire working-time chapter simply stops applying to you.

That single number decides whether an employee is entitled to overtime pay, meal intervals, rest periods, and Sunday premiums, or to none of them. It moved on 1 May 2026.

#Quick Reference

#The Earnings Threshold

Start here, because it determines whether the rest of the Act applies.

Under section 6(3) the Minister of Employment and Labour sets an annual earnings threshold. From 1 May 2026 it is R269,600.90 per year, roughly R22,466.74 a month, up from R261,785.45.

Employees earning above the threshold are excluded from:

• section 9 (ordinary hours of work)
• section 10 (overtime)
• section 11 (compressed working week)
• section 12 (averaging of hours)
• section 14 (meal intervals)
• section 15 (daily and weekly rest periods)
• section 16 (pay for work on Sundays)
• section 17(2) (night work allowances)
• section 18(3) (public holidays not ordinarily worked)

"Earnings" means regular annual remuneration before deductions such as tax, pension, and medical aid, but excluding the employer's own contributions, and excluding subsistence and transport allowances, achievement awards, and overtime pay. That last exclusion matters: you cannot lift someone over the threshold by paying them a lot of overtime.

Everything else in the BCEA still applies above the threshold, including annual leave, sick leave, notice, and, importantly, the record-keeping duty in section 31.

#Working Time Below the Threshold

#Ordinary Hours

Forty-five hours a week. Within that, 9 hours a day if the employee works five days a week or fewer, and 8 hours a day if they work more than five days.

#Overtime

Overtime is only lawful by agreement, and it is capped at 10 hours a week. The rate is one and a half times the ordinary wage, or an agreed combination of pay and time off. No day may exceed 12 hours in total including overtime.

South Africa is stricter than most on the weekly overtime ceiling. Ten hours is a hard limit, not an average.

#Compressed Weeks and Averaging

Two escape valves exist for employers with uneven demand:

• Compressed working week (s 11): by written agreement, an employee may work up to 12 hours a day without overtime pay, provided they stay within 45 ordinary hours a week, 10 overtime hours a week, and 5 days a week.
• Averaging (s 12): by collective agreement only, hours may be averaged over up to four months, to an average of 45 ordinary and 5 overtime hours a week.

Averaging requires a union agreement, which is why the compressed week is the more common arrangement in practice.

#Rest and Meals

• Meal interval (s 14): one continuous hour after five continuous hours of work. It may be reduced to 30 minutes by written agreement, and dispensed with entirely if the employee works fewer than six hours a day.
• Daily rest (s 15): 12 consecutive hours between ending and starting work.
• Weekly rest (s 15): 36 consecutive hours, which must include Sunday unless otherwise agreed.

#Sunday, Night, and Public Holidays

• Sunday (s 16): double the ordinary wage, or 1.5x if the employee ordinarily works Sundays.
• Night work (s 17): work between 18:00 and 06:00 requires an allowance or reduced hours, plus available transport. Section 17(2) adds duties where an employee regularly works after 23:00, including a health assessment.
• Public holidays (s 18): twelve a year. Work on a public holiday the employee would ordinarily work is paid at double.

#Leave

• Annual leave (s 20): 21 consecutive days per 12-month leave cycle, which for a five-day worker is 15 working days.
• Sick leave (s 22): during each 36-month cycle, an employee is entitled to the number of days they would normally work in six weeks. For a five-day worker that is 30 days across three years, not per year, which surprises employers used to an annual allowance.
• Family responsibility leave (s 27): three days a year for employees who have worked four months and at least four days a week.

#Record-Keeping: Section 31

Every employer must keep a record containing at least:

• the employee's name and occupation
• the time worked by each employee
• the remuneration paid to each employee
• the date of birth of any employee under 18
• any other prescribed information

The record must be kept for three years from the date of the last entry. It may not be used for any purpose other than compliance with the Act.

Two things follow that employers regularly miss.

First, section 31 sits outside the threshold exclusions. An employee earning R400,000 is exempt from ordinary hours, overtime, and rest periods, but their employer must still record the time they worked. The exemption removes the entitlements, not the record.

Second, "time worked" means actual time. A roster showing intended shifts is a plan, not a record. In a dispute at the CCMA or the Labour Court, an employer with no contemporaneous record of hours is arguing against the employee's diary with nothing of its own.

#Inspection and Penalties

The Department of Employment and Labour enforces through labor inspectors, who may enter workplaces, question staff, and demand records. The usual sequence is:

1. an inspection and a request for records
2. a compliance order where a contravention is found
3. referral to the Labour Court to make the order an order of court if it is ignored

Separately, individual disputes about hours and pay run through the CCMA or a bargaining council. The National Minimum Wage Act 2018 sits alongside the BCEA and is enforced the same way.

Common findings:

• no record of hours actually worked, only rosters
• overtime above the 10-hour weekly cap
• Sunday and public holiday premiums not applied
• meal intervals reduced below 30 minutes without written agreement
• treating an above-threshold employee as exempt from section 31 as well

#Practical Compliance Checklist

1. Identify who sits above and below the threshold, and re-check each May when the figure changes.
2. Record time worked for everyone, including above-threshold staff. Section 31 does not follow the exclusions.
3. Get overtime agreements in writing and track the 10-hour weekly cap per employee.
4. Apply Sunday and public holiday rates correctly, which requires knowing what each employee ordinarily works.
5. Keep records for three years and be able to retrieve a single employee's window on request.
6. Document any compressed-week or averaging arrangement, since both need an agreement to be lawful.

#Common Questions

Does the threshold mean high earners have no working-time rights? It means sections 9 to 18(3) do not apply to them. They keep annual leave, sick leave, family responsibility leave, notice, and the protection of their contract. Many employers reinstate hours and overtime terms contractually for senior staff.

Is the threshold gross or net? Gross regular remuneration before deductions, excluding employer contributions, subsistence and transport allowances, achievement awards, and overtime.

Can an employee agree to work more than 10 hours of overtime? No. Agreement makes overtime lawful up to the cap; it cannot raise the cap. A ministerial determination or a bargaining council agreement is the only route beyond it.

How does sick leave really work? The cycle is 36 months, not 12. The full entitlement is available from the start of the cycle, subject to a limit of one day per 26 days worked during the first six months of employment.

Do these rules apply to remote workers? Yes. The BCEA attaches to the employment relationship rather than the premises, so time tracking for remote employees is subject to the same section 31 record duty as on-site work.

#Summary

• Ordinary hours are 45 a week, with 9 or 8 hours a day depending on the number of working days
• Overtime needs agreement, is capped at 10 hours a week, and is paid at 1.5x, with a 12-hour daily ceiling
• The earnings threshold is R269,600.90 from 1 May 2026, and above it sections 9 to 18(3) do not apply
• Section 31 record-keeping applies to every employee regardless of earnings, for three years
• Sunday work pays 2x, or 1.5x for those who ordinarily work Sundays
• The Department of Employment and Labour enforces by compliance order; disputes run through the CCMA

#Sources

• Basic Conditions of Employment Act 75 of 1997 on gov.za
• Department of Employment and Labour
• Werksmans: understanding the 1 May 2026 BCEA earnings threshold adjustment
• National Minimum Wage Act 9 of 2018

#Where to Go Next

• UK Working Time Regulations 1998: employer guide for the other common-law system built on an opt-out
• Working hours in Australia under the Fair Work Act for a comparable 7-year record duty and instrument-driven detail
• FLSA overtime in the USA for the closest parallel to an earnings-based exemption