 Fujitsu subsidiary employee goes to court over 130 hours per month unpaid overtime A 25-year-old male employee at a subsidiary of major electronics maker Fujitsu Ltd. recently visited the Akahata Kansai Regional Bureau in Osaka and showed his work records, including 130 hours overtime in a month, requesting that this harsh situation be reported in Akahata. The employee, Nakahara Shota, said he had announced the case to the Labor Standards Inspection Office and also filed a lawsuit against the company calling for compensation. While Nakahara was working at the company's Osaka office, he suffered from depression in April 2003, and has been on leave since last October. Nakahara showed the Akahata reporter his work records which he had submitted to the LSI Office. It shows that he arrived at the office at 8:40 a.m. and worked till 11 p.m. or even till 2:00 a.m. next day. He used to work 15 hours a day and used to work even on Saturdays or Sundays. His job was the development of computer software for pharmaceutical data processing. About 20-30 workers work in the office, but there are only a few full-time employees, most being temporary workers. Nakahara was in charge of overseeing several teams, and he was also a troubleshooter for technical problems. He worked 130 hours overtime a month. But the hours he could punch on the time recorder was 20 hours, the upper limit the company set for overtime. He said, "With others also working overtime, the atmosphere is that you can't be the only one to punch the time recorder." In October 2003, Nakahara was ordered to develop another software in addition to the ones on hand. Many from his team quit one after another because of the excessive workload. The company did not fill the vacancies, and the untrained Nakahara was left alone with the hard work. Nakahara's depression did not improve even after five months after he took leave. Last June he appealed to the LSI Office and in October he filed a lawsuit for compensation. Nakahara said that he visited the Akahata office because his parents subscribed to the paper and he was convinced that his case would be heard. He said, "I've lost my health because of the long hours of work. I don't want new employees to undergo similar hardships." (end) |