Terms of employment

Researchers

The employment contract
The employment contract describes employee’s and employers’ rights and duties.

Central regulations in the employment contract
The terms of employment for academic staff at Norwegian Universities are regulated by laws and collective agreements:

• The State Personnel Handbook (in Norwegian)
• The Basic Collective Agreement for the Civil Service 2006-2008   The latest: Hovedtariffavtalen i Staten 2012-2014 (in Norwegian)
• The Working Environment Act
• The Act relating to Gender Equality
• The Anti-Discrimination Act
• The Holidays Act
• Act relating to universities and university colleges

The teaching language
The teaching language will normally be Norwegian. The employees must normally be able to teach in Norwegian or one of the other Scandinavian languages within two years of his/her appointment. The newly hired employees and their spouses/cohabitants are entitled to attend Norwegian language courses arranged by UiB.

For further details on Norwegian language training see our information on Norwegian as a Second Language.

Teaching experience
Teaching experience is a requirement. The newly hired employee will be offered appropriate training if this requirement has not been met before the appointment.

Gender Equality
UiB is determined to be a front-runner in the area of gender equality and we are working to achieve significant results. In our action plan for gender equality we have set the goal of achieving a proportion of 50 per sent women in all new academic positions during the next three years. Read more about goals and measures in our Action Plan for Gender Equality (pdf-file).

Working hours
Standard working hours at the university are 40 hours per week including 1/2 hour meal break per day. Working hours are from 08.00 - 16.00.

For office and administrative personnel working hours are 37.5 hours per week including a 20 minute meal break with obligation not to leave the work place.

Flexible working hours have been introduced for some of the Faculties, and all the Faculty Secretariats, Central Administration and the University Library.

Holidays
Employees under 60 years of age, who work a 5 day working week, have the right to 25 working days holidays, while employees over 60 years have the right to an additional 5 days holiday. Read more about holidays at Vacations.  

Leave of absence
The general leave of absence arrangements in the State also apply to employees at the University of Bergen. Read more about leave of absence and sick leave.

Sabatticals
For employees in scientific positions, Guidelines Sabatticals apply in particular.

Probationary period -
(Tjenestemannslovens § 8)
The probationary period is six (6) months and shall be made known to the employee in writing.

The probationary period should be actively used to evaluate how the employee adapts himself/herself to his/her tasks, the employee's professional competence and reliability, and the employer's follow-up activities. The employer shall during the probationary period, provide the necessary guidance and evaluation of the employee's work.

Read more about this here.

Term of notice
A public servant always has the right to terminate his/her employment. During the trial period the period of notice (the first six months) is three weeks. If the term of service is one year or less the period of notice is one month. If the term of service exceeds one year the period of notice is three months.

Wages and Salaries -terms and conditions
Wages and salaries are fixed in accordance with the State Regulative as stipulated in the main tariff agreement. The positions are either placed in a wage frame or directly allocated to a stipulated wage level.

Payday is the 12th of each calendar month.

Wage increments
Higher wages can be attained through either service seniority adjustments or wage negotiations. A pre-condition for service seniority adjustments is that your position is classified in a wage framework. Wages that are stipulated directly cannot be adjusted through such increments.

General increments or increments that apply to the whole group of positions are a result of central negotiations under the main tariff settlement with the state.

Personal increments are negotiated at the University of Bergen. In order to be considered in the local negotiations, you should notify your labour union of your claim, and the union will negotiate on your behalf with the employer.

Worker unions at UiB
List of worker unions (in Norwegian).