Source: Sánchez Devanny Eseverri SC
On December 19, 2024, a reform to the Federal Labor Law (“FLL”) was published in the Official Gazette of the Federation (“DOF”) that aims to force employers to provide chairs with a backrest to workers and agree on mandatory rest periods during the workday.
Various provisions of the FLL were modified to establish the obligation for employers to provide a sufficient number of seats or chairs with a backrest available to all workers in the service, commerce and similar work centers sectors, for the execution of their functions or for periodic rest during the workday. Likewise, in the case of periodic rest, the employer must provide seats or chairs with a backrest, and they must be located in specific areas designated for this purpose in the same facilities of the workplace. These provisions must be applied in industrial establishments when the nature of the work allows it.
Another purpose of the reform is to prohibit employers and their representatives from forcing their workers to remain standing for the entire workday.
Additionally, provisions related to the use of seats or chairs with backrests must be included in the Internal Work Regulations (“IWR”), as instruments that regulate relations within the workplace. According to the FLL, employers are required to deposit and register the IWR with the Federal Center for Conciliation and Labor Registration once it has been modified.
The transitional articles of the reform establish that the provisions will enter into force 180 calendar days after the day of their publication in the DOF, that is, June 18, 2025.
On the other hand, it is established that the Ministry of Labor must issue the corresponding regulations on work risk factors within a period of no more than 30 calendar days after the entry into force of the reform, that is, no later than January 19, 2025.
Likewise, it is established that employers will have a period of 180 days from the entry into force of the reform to adapt their internal regulations to comply with the provisions of the FLL.
According to the new provisions, the employer is obliged to provide a sufficient number of seats or chairs with backrests in the service, commerce and similar work centers sectors. It is therefore recommended that employers in Mexico conduct a cost and feasibility analysis to provide seats or chairs with backrests in their workplaces for which they are responsible.
In addition, industrial workplaces are not expressly exempt from the application of the reform, but only when the nature of their activities requires it, which will require a case-by-case analysis to determine those in which the obligations described above must be met. Of course, in industrial workplaces, the impact that this reform could have on existing collective labor relations must be analyzed.
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