Swiss night-work compensation (ArG 17b)#
For: Admin You’ll need: A company whose country is Switzerland, permission to change work policies, and a work policy open — see How to manage work policies.
Switzerland’s Arbeitsgesetz (ArG, Swiss labor law) Article 17b requires that workers who do regular night work receive time compensation — not a pay premium — equal to 10% of the hours they work in the protected night band. Casual night workers get the 25% cash premium instead. This block on the work policy turns the time credit on and tells Shiftavo when to accrue it.
Note
This section appears on the work policy form whenever your company’s country is Switzerland — regardless of the policy’s own ‘Country’ field.
The fields#
‘Time compensation active’ — turn the accrual on or off for this policy.
‘Time compensation rate (%)’ — the share of night-band hours that accrues as credit. Swiss-seeded policies set 10.00.
‘Regular night-worker threshold (nights/year)’ — how many qualifying nights in a calendar year make someone a regular night worker. Swiss seed: 25.
‘Time compensation exemption (Art. 17b Abs. 3)’ — tick when an exemption applies; no credit accrues.
‘Ignore shifts before’ — shifts before this date never accrue (useful when adopting Shiftavo mid-year).
‘Night multiplier is the statutory 25%’ — declares the night premium as the statutory cash supplement rather than a contractual bonus (see below).
‘Randstunde cash supplement (Art. 17b Abs. 2 S.3)’ and ‘Randstunde edge-window length (minutes)’ (60) — the edge-hour exception (see below).
The night band itself — ‘Night shift start’ / ‘Night shift end’, default 23:00 – 06:00 — lives with the night premium fields on the policy, not in this block. See Premiums.
When credit accrues#
All of these must hold when a time entry is confirmed:
‘Time compensation active’ is on.
The shift is on or after ‘Ignore shifts before’.
‘Time compensation exemption (Art. 17b Abs. 3)’ is not ticked.
‘Time compensation rate (%)’ is set.
The person qualifies as a regular night worker — either the ‘Foreseeable regular night worker’ checkbox on their person record is ticked, or they have reached the threshold of qualifying nights in the calendar year.
The basis is the night-band hours net of deductible unpaid breaks — breaks that are unpaid, not waived, and where the person may leave the workplace. Casual night workers accrue nothing; when the multiplier is statutory they get the 25% cash premium instead.
Time credit or cash — not both#
On Swiss-seeded policies, ‘Night multiplier is the statutory 25%’ is ticked: for a regular night worker the 10% time credit replaces the night cash premium (the multiplier is forced to 1). The two apply together only when the box is unticked — i.e. when the night multiplier is a contractual bonus on top of the statutory time credit.
The Randstunde exception#
With ‘Randstunde cash supplement (Art. 17b Abs. 2 S.3)’ on, a shift whose night work is one contiguous run no longer than the edge window and touching exactly one boundary of the band (an “edge hour”, e.g. 23:00 – 24:00 at the end of an evening shift) is paid the 10% in cash instead of time. A zero-hours ‘Wage supplement (Randstunde cash)’ audit row is written to the ledger so the payment is traceable.
Worked example#
Band 23:00 – 06:00, rate 10%, threshold 25. Anna works 22:00 – 04:00 with a 30-minute unpaid break at 01:00 that she may leave the workplace for. Her night window is 23:00 → 04:00 = 5.00 h, minus the 0.5 h break = 4.50 h. Credit: 0.45 h.
It posts only if this is at least her 25th qualifying night this year, or she’s flagged as a ‘Foreseeable regular night worker’ — before that she gets the 25% night cash premium instead. If her hours are later corrected, or removed with ‘Undo confirmation’, Shiftavo takes the 0.45 h back with an offsetting ‘Accrual reversal’ row; the original row is never edited.
When accruals reverse#
An accrual reverses automatically when the clock times are corrected, when ‘Undo confirmation’ removes manually entered or schedule-filled hours, and when the shift is deleted or the person is removed from it — the ledger rows survive with their shift link cleared. Unapproving a time entry does not reverse it, and neither does ‘Undo confirmation’ on clocked punches: the punches and their credit stay. See Auto-accrual of night-work credit for the full lifecycle.
How it shows in the app#
The Time compensation ledger lists every accrual row with its source shift.
The Payroll summary carries a ‘Time compensation’ column, separate from the regular, overtime and ‘Night (h)’ columns.
The Time accounts report rolls the same credit up per person under its ‘Night-work credit’ selection.
Verify it worked#
Confirm a night shift for someone who qualifies as a regular night worker, then open Company → Time & leave → Time accounts and filter ‘Kind’ to ‘Night-work credit’. A row appears for that person at 10% of the net night-band hours, with the source shift linked on its detail.