California proposes ‘right to disconnect’ after work. How does it work in Portugal?

California has a “right to disconnect” bill on the table. The objective is to help workers remain disconnected from work after working hours.

California hopes to enact a new law that will give employees the “right to disconnect” from their jobs when they are outside working hours. The bill also seeks to ensure that employees are not contacted outside of their working hours, nor are they forced to remain available via email or phone calls.

As reported by CBS News (via Android Authority), bill 2751 was introduced in the California State Legislature and defines, in general terms, the “right to disconnect” of employees.

If the project is approved and becomes law, will eliminate the consequences of not responding to calls from the employer after working hours. Public and private employers will have to create workplace policies that allow employees to ignore them during their free time.

To this end, the working and rest hours must be established in writingand workers will not be required to respond to work-related communications outside of agreed hours.

Violation of the potential law will allow the worker to file a complaint with the California Labor Commissioner and consequently fine the employer.

Although employees can consent to working “out of hours” and always being available, this possibility must be part of the employment contract. On the other hand, employers can create a policy about what an emergency call would be for an employee outside of working hours.

If the project becomes law – a decision that remains to be seen – it will help create sustainable workflows that do not result in frequent burnouts. Furthermore, it will allow workers to find a sustainable balance between professional and private life without feeling pressured to always be present.

How is the “right to disconnect” in Portugal?

In fact, in November 2021, during the reign of teleworking, the Assembly of the Republic approved changes to the Labor Code, now providing, in the case of teleworking, the “right to disconnect”as well as consequences for companies that contacted workers outside working hours.

Simply put, the law, published in the Official Gazette on December 6, 2021, says that, in the case of teleworking, the “employer has the duty to refrain from contacting the worker during the rest period, except in situations of force greater” and that “the violation” of this paragraph constitutes a serious offense.

However, despite the country being in the news because of this step, lawyer Ana Isabel Barona explained to CNN Portugal, in 2022, that the law means that the worker who is teleworking “You have the right to turn off your company computer and cell phone when the workday ends and not turn it on until the next day”.

In the same article, lawyer Rita Garcia Pereira pointed out that the law should be “extended to the in-person work model”, so that “attempts at unpaid additional work” would cease to exist. This is because “in the face-to-face model the law no longer applies“.

Although the update to the Labor Code has changed the teleworking regime, which includes the “Duty to abstain from contact”, several media outlets have stated that the rule applies to most workers and not just those who are in teleworking.

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