HCR Collective Agreement: Working Hours, Pay and Staff Meals

The HCR collective agreement: the text, IDCC 1979 and what it governs

The national collective agreement for hotels, cafés and restaurants was signed on 30 April 1997 and extended by ministerial order on 3 December 1997. It carries the number IDCC 1979 and Journal officiel booklet 3292. That reference is what your accountant, your payroll software and the labour inspectorate will ask for.

A collective agreement is a deal struck between employers' organisations and employee unions within an industry. It builds on the Labour Code and, on many points, sets terms that are more favourable to staff. The IDCC is simply the administrative identifier given to each collective agreement; for hotels, cafés and restaurants, that number is 1979.

In practice, a chef is covered by three layers of law: the Labour Code, the HCR agreement and their own employment contract. Where these conflict, whichever provision is most favourable to the employee applies.

What the HCR agreement actually does day to day

It pins down the points where the Labour Code stays too general for a restaurant. In particular, it covers:

• weekly working hours and the premium rates paid on overtime;
• paid leave, rest days and guaranteed public holidays;
• the job classification grid and the minimum pay for each level and step;
• staff meals and the meal benefit in kind;
• notice periods, probation periods and retirement severance pay.

In short, it governs most of what costs a venue money and time.

Who is covered: the scope of the HCR agreement

Scope is defined by the business's main activity, not by its shop sign. It applies to hotel businesses and commercial food service, as well as licensed premises.

• hotels with or without a restaurant, seasonal hotel-restaurants;
• traditional restaurants, bistros, brasseries, pizzerias;
• cafés, bars, nightclubs and other licensed premises;
• event caterers, in certain cases.

Left out are contract catering, fast food (which falls under a separate agreement) and staff canteens. If you're unsure where you stand, start with your APE code but settle it on the reality of the activity you actually carry out: the APE code is an indication, not proof. Every employee's payslip must state which agreement applies, and the text has to stay available for consultation on the premises.

Working hours in hospitality: the 39-hour week and overtime

The statutory working week is still 35 hours. But the industry agreement allows a contractual week of 39 hours, which is the norm in kitchens and dining rooms alike. Hours 36 to 39 are therefore overtime, and must be paid as such.

How to calculate overtime under the HCR agreement

Premium rates rise in bands. They apply band by band across the calendar week, not as a single blanket rate.

On a 39-hour week, an employee accrues roughly 17.33 overtime hours a month at the 10% rate. Those hours must appear as a separate line on the payslip. Past the annual quotas, compensatory rest either replaces or comes on top of payment.

Rest days, split shifts and daily spread

The agreement provides for two weekly rest days, consecutive or not depending on the size of the business and the season. Daily rest is at least 11 hours, reduced to 10 for certain live-in staff. The daily spread of hours and the number of split shifts are capped too.

On the ground, the typical employment tribunal case isn't a misread pay scale: it's a rota scrawled on a whiteboard, never archived, impossible to produce six months later.

A written record kept for at least a year beats any verbal arrangement. It's also what protects you in an inspection.

Paid leave, public holidays and 1 May

The baseline comes from the Labour Code: 2.5 working days per month of actual work, or 30 working days for a full year. The agreement adds days based on length of service.

• 1 extra working day after 10 years' service with the business;
• 2 days after 15 years;
• 3 days after 20 years.

On public holidays, the industry went considerably further than the law. Since the 2007 amendment, employees are entitled to 10 guaranteed public holidays a year on top of 1 May, provided they meet the one-year service condition. Those days are either taken off and paid, offset with a rest day, or paid as compensation.

1 May: a case of its own

1 May is the only public holiday on which the law requires closure. A restaurant can still open, since the nature of the work allows it. When it does, the employee receives, on top of their normal pay, an allowance equal to a full day's wage: pay is doubled. This rule is not negotiable and cannot be swapped for a day off.

The HCR pay scale and the staff meal benefit in kind

The agreement's grid sorts jobs into 5 levels and 3 steps, from commis to autonomous manager. Each position carries a minimum hourly rate. A pay amendment is negotiated almost every year: before applying a grid billed as "2025" or "2026", check its signature date and its extension order.

Two habits are enough to keep payroll safe. First, compare the actual hourly rate against the minimum for the level, never against the SMIC alone. Second, check whether SMIC increases have overtaken the bottom steps: where they have, the SMIC wins.

How benefits in kind work in hospitality

Food provided to staff is a benefit in kind subject to social contributions. It is valued in guaranteed minimum units (MG): one MG per meal, two MG for a day with two meals. The MG stood at €4.22 on 1 January 2025, so roughly €8.44 a day and around €180 a month for a full-time employee.

Where the employer doesn't feed staff, an allowance of the same value is paid instead. This is a line not to forget: skip it for two years and it comes back with penalties. The social security rules here are specific to the industry, and URSSAF checks them regularly. On the same theme of formal compliance, displaying allergens and other mandatory information in the dining room falls under the display requirements that apply to restaurants.

Employment contracts, notice periods and retirement

Employment contracts in hospitality

A written employment contract is the norm, including for casual shift staff. The probation period varies by category: one month for a regular employee, two for a supervisor, three for a manager, renewable once. The contract must state the applicable collective agreement, the job, the level, the step and the agreed working hours.

Notice periods for dismissal and resignation

The agreement's provisions set clear durations, gross misconduct aside:

• under 6 months' service: 8 days for a regular employee;
• 6 months to 2 years: 1 month;
• over 2 years: 2 months;
• managers: 3 months regardless of service once probation has ended.

During the notice period, the employee keeps paid hours to look for work. For resignations, the durations are generally shorter.

Retirement

Voluntary retirement entitles the employee to a payment from 10 years' service onwards, calculated in months of salary and rising with seniority. Compulsory retirement decided by the employer requires the employee to have reached the legal age that permits such a decision, and triggers a payment at least equal to statutory redundancy pay. The notice period is the same as for dismissal.

Where to find the HCR agreement in PDF, and how to keep it current

The official text is free. Three reliable sources, in this order:

• Legifrance, searching for "IDCC 1979": consolidated, up-to-date version, downloadable as a PDF;
• the Journal officiel, booklet 3292, for the printed version;
• the industry's trade bodies, which publish annotated summaries.

Be wary of "HCR collective agreement 2024" or "2026" PDFs circulating on third-party sites: they often leave out the latest pay amendments. A text eighteen months out of date is enough to trigger a back-pay claim.

Then there's the day-to-day. Complying on working hours comes down to rotas that are kept, an archived record of hours worked and payslips people can read. The rest of your admin load can be trimmed elsewhere: updating prices and allergens takes a few minutes with a QR code menu, and menu management tools spare you a reprint every time something changes. Time saved in the dining room is time handed back to payroll and rotas.