Night work and night work rules

Night work constitutes any work performed between the hours of 11.00 pm and 6.00 am. Employers can only require their employees to regularly work nights in the circumstances listed in section 8 of the Working Hours Act. 

However, collective agreements can contain provisions concerning the distribution of working hours that either limit or expand the list of circumstances in which night work can be performed.

Employees’ consent to night work does not need to be sought except in specific circumstances, such as to enable urgent sowing or harvesting, to attend to parturient or sick farm animals and, to a certain extent, in bakeries.

Ad-hoc night work

No night work permit is needed for ad-hoc night work. Ad-hoc night work can refer to, for example, holding a video conference at night due to the other party being in a different time zone. 

Exemptions from night work rules

Occupational safety and health authorities can permit an employer to set up a regular night work schedule subject to certain conditions if the work can, due to its nature, only be performed at night or if performing the work in the daytime is otherwise impractical. 

Requesting exemptions

Exemptions from the rules on night work can be sought by sending a written application to the Division of Occupational Safety and Health of the Regional State Administrative Agency for Southwestern Finland. See here for contact information.

If you return the application via e-mail, it is recommended that you use the secure connection of the regional state administrative agency. Use the encrypted e-mail connection at least when sending data which contains confidential or otherwise sensitive information. The form itself is in Finnish. Secure e-mail

Form (pdf, in Finnish): Night work permit application

A decision on a night work permit application can only be taken once the shop steward or an elected representative of the affected employees has been heard. If there is no such representative at the workplace, the occupational safety and health representative must be allowed to comment on the application. In the absence of any kind of personnel representative, each of the affected employees must be reserved an opportunity to express their view.

Extensions to derogation permit

Unless there has been a significant change in the employees’ working conditions since a permit was granted, either the employer or the shop steward or another representative of the employees within the meaning of section 36 of the Working Hours Act can decide on extensions to the derogation permit granted for a limited period. However, the parties cannot agree to extend a temporary derogation permit granted before 1 January 2020. In this case, a new request for permit must be made in order to extend regular night work.

In situations where it is possible to extend the permit by agreement, but no contract arises, the employer may submit a new request for permit to the occupational safety and health authorities. 

Night work notifications to occupational safety and health authorities

Occupational safety and health authorities can ask employers to provide them with information about any regular night work schedules.