Indeterminate Workday

in the USSR, a work schedule that is not limited to regular hours, which makes it possible for the appropriate persons to work outside ordinary working time. Such work is not considered overtime work.

The indeterminate workday is established for persons whose labor does not always fit within the framework of normal working time. This would include the heads of enterprises, institutions, shops, and divisions, as well as chief specialists, foremen, engineers, technicians, dispatchers, and all persons for whom a precise record of working time is impossible, such as commodity experts, forwarding agents, and supply workers. The basic rules for normal working time also apply to persons on indeterminate workdays. Work is to be limited to what is generally established as normal working time, and such workers’ customary range of duties is defined accordingly in official directives. All work not included in the customary range of official duties is specially compensated.

Workers on indeterminate workdays may be enlisted for work that extends beyond ordinary working time only in certain cases of extreme necessity, as provided in the decree of the Council of Ministers of the USSR of Aug. 29, 1953. Work beyond ordinary working time is not permitted on a regular basis. Workers on indeterminate workdays do not receive additional monetary payment for work beyond the normal working time, but are instead given supplemental vacation as specified in Paragraph Three of Article 34 of the Basic Principles of Labor Legislation of the USSR and the Union Republics.

Lists of workers authorized for indeterminate workdays are approved by ministries, departments, and councils of ministers of the Union republics in agreement with the appropriate trade union bodies. For every position so authorized, the amount of supplemental vacation to be provided is established by the management of the enterprise or institution in agreement with the factory, plant, or local committee of the trade union. This amount cannot exceed 12 workdays, as stipulated in Article 14g of the Statute on the Rights of Factory, Plant, and Local Committees, as ratified by a decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on Sept. 27, 1971.