Normal working hours: No obligation to provide non-contractual overtime

Employees whose contractual working hours were 39 hours per week but who, in practice, were required to work six hours' overtime made available to them to the extent of 45 hours per week were not guaranteed that overtime, so holds the EAT in Spence and others v City of Sunderland Council 30.7.99 EAT 1255/98. In this case, the employer had not committed itself to providing overtime by way of a contractual obligation but had deliberately retained flexibility to alter working arrangements in the event of changes in working conditions. The overtime hours worked were not, therefore, part of the employees' statutorily defined "normal working hours".