On call (zero-hour) contractual arrangements: a new form of employment. Elements of compared law

• Author: Mihaela-Emilia Marica
• Pages: 70-78

On call (zero-hour) contractual arrangements: a new form

of employment. Elements of compared law

PhD student Mihaela-Emilia MARICA1

Abstract

Considering the evolution of atypical employment forms and their diversity, the

elements of novelty brought about by atypical employment forms lie not only in their

proliferation at an extremely fast pace, in most EU member states, but also in the fact that

the non-standard employment forms known so far have been joined by very many new

versions and subcategories, which allows a sub-categorization of these forms as atypical and

very atypical. Currently, these new types of employment are no longer marginally used o n

the European labor markets, as their number has increased very strongly, the trend becoming

a true phenomenon. As an exhaustive presentation of these works arrangements is beyond

the scope of the present paper, we sha ll hereby address ma inly the on call employment

contract, in order to highlight its benefits for the labor market, as well as the major negative

implications of implementing it. This is a relevant pursuit, since the Romanian labor

legislation has not yet issued any stipulations to regulate this new type of work arrangement.

Keywords: on call contract; atypical work; new forms of work; flexible work.

JEL Classification: K31

1. General considerations

Considering the evolution of atypical employment forms and their diversity,

the elements of novelty brought about by atypical employment forms lie not only in

their proliferation at an extremely f ast pace, in most EU member states, but also in

the fact that the non-standard employment forms known so far have been joined by

very many new versions and subcategories, which allows a sub-categorization of

these forms as atypical and very atypical2. Currently, these new types of employment

are no longer marginally used on the European labor markets, as their number has

increased very strongly, the trend becoming a true phenomenon3.

1 Mihaela-Emilia Marica – Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Romania,

avocatmihaelamarica@yahoo.com.

2 The term first appeared in the vocabulary of Eurofound in 2010 (The European Foundation for the

Improvement of Living and Working Conditions), Eurofound Report, Very atypical forms of work,

http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/publications/htmlfiles/ef1 0091.htm, accessed 12 January 2016.

3 Extensive research conducted by the European Observatory of Working Life into Flexible forms of

work; very atypical contractual arrangements, has revealed that the occurrence of these highly

atypical contractual arrangements across labor markets, differs among EU member states. In this

respect, there are three categories of states: 1) States where these new forms of employment are

already widespread, and also ackn owledged by the legislation. This category includes, for instance,