Labour expert Aadil Patel told BusinessTech that employers might be under the impression that in instances where their employees are unable to work, that the ‘no work no pay’ principle applies. 

However, when hours are lost as a result of power outages, the fact that employees are unable to work is due to no fault of the employer, nor the employee. Therefore, the no work no pay principle would not apply. 

Unfortunately, this can be financially crippling for a company which is obligated to pay employees while simultaneously is not generating any revenue during those hours of non-activity. 

Patel says since an employment contract is reciprocal by nature, a possible solution to minimise the effects of load-shedding would be to negotiate with the employees or unions an agreement which adjusts the hours of work to avoid facing hours of non-activity. 

He says there are some industries that have already considered the dire effects of load-shedding and entered into agreements on procedures for such situations. 

Load-shedding has a devastating effect on the economy, with some economists stating that the power outages have led to trillions of rands in lost production.

Business Tech