Time flexibility and Change the Disadvantage of Employment Rules
Authors:   Wonkwang University Legal Research Institute has, Kim Dae Hyun 
Published: July 2022

Companies should change their working hours according to social trends or operating conditions. In the case of the introduction of the flexible work system in relation to the change of employment rules, it can be seen that the convenience of workers is centered on the purpose, so the introduction or change of the shift system is considered a disadvantage. Even if looking at the provisions of Article 93 Subparagraph 1 of the Labor Standards Act, the working hours shall be specified in the employment rules, and if changed, the procedures for changing the employment rules shall be followed. Here, the question is whether the change in working hours will correspond to a change in disadvantages in employment rules. When determining whether a change in employment rules is disadvantageous to workers, the decision should be made by examining the existing interests. If the change can be objectively revealed and evaluated quantitatively, it will be easy to judge whether it is disadvantageous, but it is difficult to judge if the objective factors are not well revealed on the surface and conflict with the subjective interests of workers. It can be seen that the latter is the case of a change in working hours and a collision of daily disadvantages. In the latter case, it is inevitable to examine the impact of workers due to changes in employment rules, and the social experience of COVID-19 infection showed that they should have a new perspective on changes in employment rules such as changes in working hours.
At this point, there was a Supreme Court ruling on the change of working hours. On February 13, 2017, the Korea Broadcasting Corporation reorganized its work style for nine regional general offices and nine regional countries nationwide. The main point is to change the group 3 shift, which was the existing central form of work, to a mixture of parallax work, shift work and ordinary work. The workers argued that the reorganization constitutes a disadvantage change in employment rules, and that it is ineffective because it is unilaterally implemented by the Defendant without any agreement with the trade union under a collective agreement signed in 2012. The corporation argued that the reorganization of the work type is only a simple work order and does not constitute an employment rule, so there is no need to agree with the labor union, and even in the employment rule, it is not a disadvantage change or a reasonable level.
The target judgment showed consistent judgment on the same criteria as the previous judgment method in that it was comprehensively judged by comparing various factors of changed working conditions. However, it seems that the situation in which the workplace is scattered locally across the country and the situation in charge of different tasks were not judged in detail. According to previous laws, changes in employment rules have been judged by treating them as disadvantageous changes between workers, but in the case, it was not a disadvantageous change by synthesizing the reduction of overnight work, increase or decrease of actual working hours, and frequency of vacation use. However, these factors alone cannot cover both the region and the working environment according to the work content. In addition, the circumstances that led to the lawsuit must be due to the difference in the level of perception of the construction and the worker's perception of the change in work type, which seems to require a separate in-depth review.