Plans to improve work conditions through controversial labour legislation may end up costing at least HK$700 million each year for the managers of the city's commercial and residential buildings.
According to official and industry estimates, there are about 100,000 workers employed in building management and security. About one-fifth of them are outsourced by the government and so work eight hours a day. The rest work the maximum 12-hour shift with one day off a week. On average, the monthly salary is about HK$6,600 for the eight-hour-shift workers, and over HK$7,000 for the 12-hour-shift ones. On an hourly basis, the wage rate works out to be HK$31.70 for eight-hour shifts and between HK$24 and HK$25 for 12-hour shifts, according to Hong Kong Building Management and Security Workers General Union calculations.
A one-hour lunch break is not included in the wage calculations.
Based on these assumptions, if Hong Kong introduces a 10-hour-a-day work schedule, roughly 80,000 workers who now work 12 hours a day will have to be paid two hours of overtime a day. Assuming workers already enjoy a minimum wage of HK$28 an hour and are paid 1.5 times this rate for overtime, the additional financial burden would amount to HK$698.88 million a year, much of which would likely be shouldered by tenants through higher management fees.
If the maximum number of work hours is capped at 44 per week, as called for by the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions, the extra cost rises to over HK$1.63 billion a year.
A study conducted about a decade ago by Dr Andy Chan Wing-chiu, a Polytechnic University associate professor of management and marketing who specialises in labour management, found a reluctance by most major building-management firms to increase the number of shifts from two to three, mainly because of the cost of hiring more staff. 'It may be that different industries need different standard working hours. But if the law applies to everyone, some employers may increase hiring to avoid paying overtime,' Chan said.
Part of the reason why discussions on legislating maximum working hours in Hong Kong have been extremely slow - despite two attempts in the past 10 years - is that many questions remain about the concept of standard working hours. A government insider said the issue was simply too complex.
'How do you define a work hour? When a tour guide is woken up in the middle of the night in Tokyo to help one of his charges who has run out of toilet paper, does that count as a work hour? What about a doctor on call for 24 hours? Or the real estate agent who waits two hours in front of a client's home for a cheque?' a senior executive with a major utility firm said.
'How is overtime pay calculated? If it is too high, might some employers choose to hire more staff instead? This could lead to more people working part-time or multiple jobs.'
Many countries enjoy standard 40-hour work weeks, including the US, Canada, Portugal, Poland, Estonia, Japan, Thailand, Pakistan and Lebanon. The mainland also has a 40-hour work week, and it limits the amount of overtime to 36 hours a month. Elsewhere, working hours vary, but not by much. For example, the French working week is 35 hours; in Australia, it is between 35 and 40 hours; and it is about 50 hours in India. Workers in the EU and Britain cannot be forced to work more than 48 hours each week.
But there are often exemptions. For example, while Singaporeans do not have to work more than 44 hours a week, work hours can be unlimited and can extend to rest days if there is an accident, if the work is vital to the community, or if urgent work is required on machinery or plant.
Counting the cost
Hong Kong may introduce a 10-hour workday
If this happens, extra overtime would cost building managers, in HK dollars per year, $700m