Both major civil servant unions push back against new overtime verification system

Both major civil servant unions have pushed back against the government's plan to scrap the daily cap on recognized overtime hours while requiring workers to log their presence in an electronic system at set intervals. The unions argue that forcing civil servants to repeatedly prove they are working — including at disaster sites, public service counters and on field assignments — treats the entire civil service as potential fraudsters.

The Federation of Korean Trade Unions' civil servant affiliate held a press conference Tuesday in front of Cheong Wa Dae in Seoul, calling on the government to suspend the hourly overtime verification system and conduct a full review through labor-management consultations. On Monday, the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions' National Federation of Government Employees' Unions held a press conference to the same effect in front of the Ministry of Personnel Management in Sejong.

The government plans to overhaul the civil servant overtime system starting Oct. 1. The centerpiece of the reform is the abolition of the existing four-hour daily cap on recognized overtime, so that workers are paid for all hours actually worked. The monthly 100-hour exception ceiling applied during emergency situations will also be removed, and a new supplementary allowance will be introduced for non-designated Grade 4 national civil servants covering overtime beyond 25 hours a month.

In exchange, oversight of overtime will be tightened. Civil servants working overtime will be required to log their actual work status at set intervals in the government's electronic personnel management systems, known as "e-Saram" and "Insarang," with department heads responsible for confirming the entries. Disciplinary proceedings will be required after even a single instance of fraudulent claims of 500,000 won ($361) or more.

The unions say the hourly check-in requirement fails to account for the realities of public-sector work. They argue that logging into an electronic system at fixed intervals is simply not feasible during disaster response — whether fighting wildfires, managing flood damage or containing livestock epidemics — or while handling public inquiries, welfare consultations or off-site assignments.

The unions also flagged the burden placed on individual workers who miss a check-in. If a manager is left to decide whether after-the-fact documentation is acceptable, civil servants could be denied pay even for hours they genuinely worked, they said.

Shin Dong-geun, chairman of the Federation of Korean Trade Unions' civil servant affiliate, said penalties for fraudulent overtime claims had already been significantly toughened and managerial accountability clearly defined. "Requiring all civil servants to repeatedly prove they are working is excessive control," he said.

The National Federation of Government Employees' Unions said the system "treats all civil servants as potential fraudsters while ignoring the fundamental principle of fair compensation for overtime work," and called for the hourly verification system to be scrapped and replaced with a reasonable framework for compensating actual working hours.

Confusion over the scope of the system is also growing. According to the Federation of Korean Trade Unions' civil servant affiliate, the government told the sixth session of the civil servant labor-management council on Sept. 14 that even after the system goes live on Oct. 1, individual agencies would be free to decide whether to use it.

The unions, however, said the overtime record-keeping guidelines distributed through the standard local personnel information system contain no such opt-out provision, and that the system was designed on the assumption it would be applied uniformly across all local governments.

Materials the government released in July stated that the electronic personnel management system would be improved, piloted and then rolled out to all civil servants. The check-in interval was not specified as one hour but described as "set time units." Local governments were given discretion over how to manage total overtime volume for local civil servants, taking into account the nature of their work and operating environment.

The government maintains that expanding recognized overtime to cover all hours actually worked makes verification procedures necessary to prevent pro forma overtime claims and fraudulent allowance payments. Ministry of Personnel Management Minister Choe Dong-seok said the government would "ensure that time actually worked is properly compensated while strictly managing unnecessary overtime."