Can your employer legally forbid you from having a second job?

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rockorocko
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Can your employer legally forbid you from having a second job?

Post by rockorocko » Fri Jul 19, 2019 11:33 am

My contract states the following:

"The Employee is not allowed to have any other paid or unpaid occupations or tasks which are significantly time-consuming during the term of this contract without a specific written consent".

Is it legal in Finland for employers to forbid employees from having entrepreneurship or other secondary jobs by having them in the job contract? Also what if it's not significantly time-consuming? How is this defined?

Also, In the contract penalty section, nothing is stated about the secondary job.



Can your employer legally forbid you from having a second job?

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betelgeuse
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Re: Can your employer legally forbid you from having a second job?

Post by betelgeuse » Fri Jul 19, 2019 3:19 pm

rockorocko wrote:
Fri Jul 19, 2019 11:33 am
My contract states the following:

"The Employee is not allowed to have any other paid or unpaid occupations or tasks which are significantly time-consuming during the term of this contract without a specific written consent".

Is it legal in Finland for employers to forbid employees from having entrepreneurship or other secondary jobs by having them in the job contract? Also what if it's not significantly time-consuming? How is this defined?

Also, In the contract penalty section, nothing is stated about the secondary job.
It's unlikely to be binding. You are not allowed to compete with your employer though.
Section 3 Competing activity

Employees shall not do work for another party or engage in such activity that would, taking the nature of the work and the individual employee's position into account, cause manifest harm to their employer as a competing activity contrary to fair employment practices.

During the term of employment, employees shall not embark on any action to prepare for competing activities as cannot be deemed acceptable, taking into account what is stipulated in subsection 1.

An employer which recruits a person whom it knows to be impeded from work on the basis of subsection 1 is liable for any loss caused to the previous employer jointly with the employee.
https://www.finlex.fi/fi/laki/kaannokse ... 010055.pdf

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rinso
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Re: Can your employer legally forbid you from having a second job?

Post by rinso » Fri Jul 19, 2019 5:09 pm

"The Employee is not allowed to have any other paid or unpaid occupations or tasks which are significantly time-consuming during the term of this contract without a specific written consent".
I think your employer wants to prevent you from taking day and night shifts resulting in a tired not very attentive worker. But that could be covered by negative performance reports.

SecretCode
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Re: Can your employer legally forbid you from having a second job?

Post by SecretCode » Fri Jul 19, 2019 5:58 pm

I don't supposed Finnish law is very different from UK or other countries I know ...

ie that the reasonable intention is to stop you being too tired to do your work for this company. Another probably unstated intention is to stop you working in the evenings for a competitor, but if they were serious about that they would have a non-compete clause.

And that it's very likely not enforceable at all.
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rinso
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Re: Can your employer legally forbid you from having a second job?

Post by rinso » Fri Jul 19, 2019 9:14 pm

And that it's very likely not enforceable at all.
Indeed not in a legal proceeding. But if the boss thinks your performance is hampered by your second job, there will be consequences. (like no promotion, negative performance reports, .....) Trying to outsmart your employer is never a good idea.

Upphew
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Re: Can your employer legally forbid you from having a second job?

Post by Upphew » Tue Jul 23, 2019 10:21 am

SecretCode wrote:
Fri Jul 19, 2019 5:58 pm
I don't supposed Finnish law is very different from UK or other countries I know ...
Common law vs. civil law. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_n ... al_systems
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necadam
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Re: Can your employer legally forbid you from having a second job?

Post by necadam » Fri Aug 09, 2019 2:20 pm

rockorocko wrote:
Fri Jul 19, 2019 11:33 am
Is it legal in Finland for employers to forbid employees from having entrepreneurship or other secondary jobs by having them in the job contract?
No.
(Except for the cases of direct competition.)


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