The Statutory Minimum Wage (SMW) rate has been raised from $37.5 per hour to $40 per hour with effect from today.
 
Employees are protected by the SMW whether they are monthly-rated, daily-rated, hourly-rated, piece-rated, permanent, casual, full-time or part-time, etc, regardless of whether or not they are employed under a continuous contract as defined in the Employment Ordinance (EO).
 
The SMW is not applicable to live-in domestic workers, irrespective of their sex, race and nationality, student interns and work experience students as specified in the Minimum Wage Ordinance (MWO), and people to whom the EO does not apply.
 
The SMW also protects disabled employees. The MWO provided a special arrangement for employees with disabilities to opt for a productivity assessment to determine whether they should be remunerated at no less than the SMW or at a rate commensurate with their productivity.
 
For the disabled employees who have chosen this special arrangement, their employers have to pay wages of not less than the amount to be calculated according to the new SMW rate and the degree of productivity assessed.
 
Additionally, the monthly monetary cap on the requirement of employers recording the total number of hours worked by employees under the EO is raised from $15,300 to $16,300 with effect from today.
 
When wages payable in respect of a wage period are less than $16,300 per month, the employer is required to keep a record of the total number of hours worked by the employee in that wage period.
 
For enquiries, call the 24-hour hotline 2717 1771 or drop by the Labour Department’s Labour Relations Division branch offices.