By Kim Hyo-jin



Rep. Lee Yong-ho of the minor opposition People's Party has proposed a bill to ban companies from giving work-related orders via social media after work.



According to Lee's office, Monday, the bill is to limit employers or management from giving work orders both directly and indirectly after work via phone calls, emails, mobile messaging or other forms of social networking services, and defines it as a violation of the freedom of an employee to have a private life.



Such an act is only allowed when there is an appropriate reason. But still, companies should pay over half of the normal salary by counting it as overtime work, according to the bill.



Lee, the People's Party chief policymaker, said he devised the bill mindful of growing complaints among workers about companies contacting them casually via Kakao Talk and other mobile messaging services to give them more work.



"Many workers complain of stressful working conditions, saying it's like they are on call 24 hours a day due to the boss' messages sent anytime, anywhere via social networking services," he said. "Fixing the practices of using social networking service should be the first step to improve the quality of workers' lives."



According to a Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry survey conducted on about 500 companies and 1,000 employees in November last year, 74 percent of office workers said they had received work orders from their bosses after working hours.



Only 42.2 percent of managers who gave after-hour orders said it was because of urgent matters, while 30.3 percent answered it was only because the work to be done came to mind at that moment and they wanted to feel safe by assigning it to an employee to do right away.



The proposed bill is in parallel with a government move. The labor ministry said last week that it would seek to draw up measures to guarantee employees' right to rest.



The ministry plans to collect opinions from management and labor on how to address the issue by the end of the year and to commission research to look into how widespread the practice is in the business sector, a senior ministry official said.



The limitation of after-hour work orders through social networking service was one of President's Moon Jae-in's campaign pledges. The ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) is expected to support the passage of the bill, Lee's aide said. Sixteen People's Party and DPK lawmakers signed the bill.



Some, however, made critical views of the bill, saying lawmakers should include more detailed regulations otherwise the move would only end up as a fruitless attempt to fix the problem.



"I doubt such a practice can be properly monitored," Park Ji-sun, a 33-year-old office worker, said. "Companies would resort to other means such as ordering more work right before the end of the working day or not reporting their after-hours work orders to the authorities."



