Brussels Reopens an Infringement Case, Telling Portugal to Fix Gaps in Its Rules on Predictable Working Conditions
The European Commission says Portugal has not fully transposed the EU directive on transparent and predictable working conditions, flagging gaps in the Labour Code on trial periods, on-call notice and hiring information.
Brussels has put Portugal back in its sights over workers' rights, reopening an infringement procedure that says the country has still not fully written a key European labour directive into national law. The European Commission argues that Portugal's Labour Code (Código do Trabalho) leaves gaps in the rules on transparent and predictable working conditions — the standards that govern what a new hire must be told, how trial periods work, and how on-call staff are treated.
The directive behind it
At issue is Directive (EU) 2019/1152 on transparent and predictable working conditions, whose deadline for transposition across the bloc was 1 August 2022. The Commission has notified Portugal, together with the Czech Republic, Estonia, Ireland, Greece, Hungary, the Netherlands and Finland, that their transposition remains incomplete. The eight member states have two months to respond; if Brussels is not satisfied, the case can be escalated and, ultimately, referred to the Court of Justice of the European Union with the threat of financial penalties.
Where Portugal's law may fall short
Lawyers who follow the file point to several soft spots. The directive expands what an employer must tell a worker on hiring and shortens the deadlines for doing so, which may require changes to Article 106 of the Labour Code, according to employment specialist Pedro da Quitéria Faria. Trial periods are another flashpoint: Portuguese law links their length to the type of contract, but, as lawyer Pedro Antunes notes, it does not adjust them to the complexity of the job, as the directive's proportionality requirement demands.
The gaps go further. For workers with unpredictable schedules, the directive obliges employers to give reasonable notice and to pay compensation when already-scheduled work is cancelled at short notice — a mechanism Antunes says the Labour Code currently lacks. The rules also protect the right to hold a second job outside working hours, let employees with at least six months' service request a more predictable form of employment and receive a written answer, and require that legally mandated training be free and count as working time.
What this means for you
- New employees: If the law is tightened, you can expect clearer, faster written information about pay, hours and conditions when you start a job — useful for anyone navigating a contract in a second language.
- Shift and on-call workers: The directive is designed to curb last-minute schedule changes and to compensate you when shifts are pulled, a common grievance in hospitality and delivery work.
- Second jobs and side work: Blanket bans on taking additional employment outside your hours would be harder for employers to enforce.
- Timeline: Nothing changes overnight. The Ministério do Trabalho (Ministry of Labour) maintains the directive was already adequately transposed and disputes the Commission's reading, so any amendment to the Labour Code could take months of negotiation.
For Portugal's large and growing population of foreign workers, the dispute is worth watching: it is precisely the newest, least-established employees — those on trial periods, variable hours and unfamiliar contracts — whom the directive is meant to shield, and whom a fuller transposition would most directly protect.
