Who is to be considered a Part-time Employee?
A part-time employee is one whose normal hours of work, calculated on a weekly basis or on an average over a period of employment of up to one year, are less than the normal hours of work of a comparable whole-time employee and who is not a whole-time employee with reduced hours.
In this regard, an employer should ensure that the total number of hours worked by a part-time employee over a period of one year, do not reach or exceed the total number of normal hours (excluding overtime) worked by a comparable whole-time employee over the same one year period.
If the total number of hours worked by the part-time employee equal or exceed those of a comparable whole-time employee, then that employee shall thenceforth be considered as a whole-time employee.
Pro-rata entitlements for Part-timers
All part-time employees, irrespective whether their employment is their principal employment or not should enjoy all the entitlements due to comparable full-time employees, on a pro-rata basis calculated on the weekly hours worked. Pro-rata entitlements include statutory bonus and weekly allowance, all public holidays, vacation leave, sick leave, birth leave, bereavement leave, marriage leave, injury leave and any other leave in terms of law.
Calculating the Pro-rata Entitlement
The pro-rata is calculated as the proportion that the number of weekly hours worked by the part-time employee bears to the number of the normal weekly hours worked by a full-time employee performing same work.
(The vacation leave of a full timer working 40 hours per week is 192 hours. If the part-timer works 25 hours a week, the pro-rata vacation leave entitlement is 25/40x192 hours = 120 hours.)
In case where the working hours of a part-timer are based on irregular weekly working hours, the pro-rata is calculated over the average of hours worked over a period of 13 weeks (Quarterly:- January to March; April to June; July to September; October to December).