TAIWAN Law and Practice Contributed by: Chengkai Wang, Yachi Huang, Herman Lin and Tzutien Huang, Dentons Taiwan (Dacheng Taiwan)
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1. Employment Terms 1.1 Employee Status
tices as per Article 65 of the Labor Standards Act. Despite this, it is advisable to formalise all employ - ment agreements in writing to ensure clarity and legal compliance. Article 7 of the Enforcement Rules of the Labor Standards Act recommends that employment contracts include key elements such as: • job description and workplace; • working hours, breaks and rotational shifts; • salary details, including payment methods and timing; • contract terms, termination conditions and retire - ment policies; • benefits including severance, pension and bonus - es; • worker responsibilities for expenses; • safety, health and welfare policies; • labour training; • disciplinary and reward systems; and • other relevant rights and obligations of employees and employers. 1.3 Working Hours Under the Labor Standards Act, the maximum allow - able working hours are 8 hours per day and 40 hours per week (Article 30). Overtime is permitted but can - not exceed 12 hours in a single day or 46 hours per month (Article 32). For every four consecutive hours worked, employees are entitled to a minimum break of 30 minutes (Article 35). Additionally, employees should receive one regular day off and one rest day off every seven days (Article 36), and they are entitled to annual paid leave (Article 38).
The Taiwan Labor Standards Act does not specifically distinguish between blue- and white-collar workers with respect to domestic employees. Instead, this dis - tinction mainly applies to foreign workers under the Employment Service Act, which categorises them into two groups: specialised or technical workers (white- collar) and those primarily engaged in manual labour (blue-collar). For domestic workers, distinctions under the Labor Standards Act are based on the nature of the employ - ment contracts, distinguishing between definite- and indefinite-term contracts. Additionally, Taiwan recog - nises apprenticeships, which are regulated separately. 1.2 Employment Contracts Taiwan’s labour law recognises two main types of employment contracts: indefinite and definite. Def - inite-term contracts are restricted to specific cir - cumstances, such as temporary, short-term and seasonal contracts, as well as to particular project engagements as stipulated by Article 9 of the Labor Standards Act. The maximum durations for these con - tracts are as follows: up to six months for temporary or short-term, nine months for seasonal and over one year for project-specific contracts; the latter requires prior notification to the appropriate authority. Although a written employment contract is not uni - versally mandated in Taiwan, it is required for appren -
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