Brazil night shift premium and fictional hour
The urban night shift premium does not just add a percentage on top of the hourly rate: it also shrinks the hour itself, so working 7 clock hours at night can be paid as if it were 8 hours, a detail that changes the final total more than the premium percentage on its own.
The urban legal night interval only runs until 5 AM; the hour between 5 AM and 6 AM is already an extension, handled separately from the fictional hour.
The premium does not apply to 7 clock hours, but to the 8 hours already converted by the fictional hour; using clock hours at this step would underestimate the amount owed.
This hour pays the same 20% premium (TST Precedent 60, II), but without the 52-minute-30-second reduction: it counts as one full clock hour, not a fictional hour.
20% for urban work (CLT art. 73) and 25% for rural work (Law 5.889/1973 and Decree 73.626/1974), with different periods for crop farming and livestock.
It is the fictional hour set out in CLT art. 73, §1: instead of paying per clock hour, the law shrinks the time unit for the night period, so fewer minutes of work already fill one "hour" for payment purposes, which in practice increases the number of paid hours per clock hour actually worked.
No; Law 5,889/1973, which governs rural work, sets out no reduced hour, so a rural night clock hour equals exactly one paid hour, with the 25% premium applied without any time conversion factor.
Yes, when it is habitual: the same reflex pattern of 1/12 for 13th salary, 1/12 times 4/3 for vacation plus a third and 8% FGTS on those reflexes (roughly 21% of the total) applies to a regularly paid night premium, the same mechanism used to calculate overtime reflexes.
No; Law 5,889/1973 sets 9 PM to 5 AM for crop work and 8 PM to 4 AM for livestock work, so the specific rural activity determines the window, unlike the single urban regime of 10 PM to 5 AM that applies to any activity.
⚠️ Educational estimate. Confirm with qualified professional.
CLT art. 73 (20% sobre valor-hora, hora ficta = 52'30"); Súm. 60, I, TST