“Stay an extra hour tonight, we’re slammed.” It sounds harmless, but in a work-study contract every hour worked beyond 35 hours creates specific entitlements: a premium calculated on your own pay, time off, and sometimes a tax advantage.
In short: a work-study trainee (apprentice or professionalisation contract) is a full-fledged employee, subject to the statutory working week of 35 hours (article L. 3121-27 of the French Labour Code). Hours worked beyond that at the employer’s request are overtime: +25% from the 36th to the 43rd hour, +50% from the 44th, unless a collective agreement sets another rate, which can never be below 10%. The premium applies to your actual hourly rate — a percentage of the SMIC (French minimum wage), which is €12.31 gross per hour since 1 June 2026. CFA hours count as working time (article L. 6222-24). An adult trainee may not exceed 10 hours per day, 48 hours in a single week and 44 hours on average over 12 weeks. Overtime is exempt from income tax up to €7,500 net per year. Under 18, the rules are much stricter (8 hours per day, 35 hours per week, overtime only exceptionally): they are covered in our guide on apprentices under 18.
Can a work-study trainee work overtime?
Yes. Apprenticeship and professionalisation contracts are employment contracts: the trainee follows the company’s collective schedule, usually 35 hours a week, sometimes 37 or 39 hours with extra days off (RTT). Any hour worked at the employer’s request (or with their agreement) beyond 35 hours is an overtime hour, with the compensation that goes with it.
Where many trainees go wrong is the scope of working time. Article L. 6222-24 is explicit: “the time spent by the apprentice on training provided in apprentice training centres is included in working hours”, except for optional extra modules freely chosen by the apprentice. Three practical consequences:
- A 35-hour week at the CFA is already “full”: an extra day at the company on Saturday becomes overtime.
- You are paid as normal during your weeks of classes.
- Homework and revision done at home are not working time: the rule covers training hours organised by the CFA.
Under a professionalisation contract, article L. 6325-10 sets a similar rule: working time, including time spent in training, may not exceed the weekly hours practised in the company or the maximum daily limit of 10 hours.
Key point: your work-study week is not “a school week plus a work week”. It is one single working week, split between two places.
What if you are under 18?
Being a minor takes precedence over being a trainee: 8 hours per day and 35 hours per week at most, overtime only exceptionally (5 hours per week, with the labour inspector’s approval and the binding opinion of the occupational physician), a waiver up to 10 hours / 40 hours reserved for building, public-works and landscaping sites, no night work and 12 hours of daily rest. Everything is explained in our dedicated article: apprentices under 18: working hours, overtime and night work. The rest of this guide concerns adult trainees.
What are the maximum working hours for an adult work-study trainee?
Overtime can never be used to break the ceilings set by the Labour Code, which apply to trainees just as they do to other employees.
| Rule | Legal limit | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| Maximum daily hours | 10 h (up to 12 h under a collective agreement for increased activity or organisational reasons) | L. 3121-18 and L. 3121-19 |
| Maximum in a single week | 48 h (up to 60 h exceptionally, with administrative authorisation) | L. 3121-20 and L. 3121-21 |
| Average over 12 consecutive weeks | 44 h (46 h under a collective agreement) | L. 3121-22 and L. 3121-23 |
| Break | 20 min once 6 h have been worked | L. 3121-16 |
| Daily rest | 11 consecutive hours | L. 3131-1 |
| Weekly rest | 35 consecutive hours (24 h + 11 h), on Sunday in principle | L. 3132-2 and L. 3132-3 |
| Annual overtime quota | 220 h per employee, in the absence of a collective agreement | D. 3121-24 |
An adult trainee may also work at night, on Sundays or on public holidays under the same conditions as the company’s other employees (exemptions from Sunday rest, night-worker status, etc.). These hours are not overtime in themselves: only hours beyond 35 in the week count. Any night or Sunday premiums depend on the collective agreement or the applicable exemption scheme.
How is a work-study trainee’s overtime paid?
What are the premium rates?
In the absence of a collective agreement (article L. 3121-36):
- +25% for hours from the 36th to the 43rd inclusive;
- +50% from the 44th hour.
A company or industry agreement may set other rates, provided they are never below 10% (article L. 3121-33). Depending on the industry, the result may be more or less favourable than the statutory rate: check the collective agreement named in your contract.
What base is the premium calculated on?
The premium applies to your actual hourly rate (gross monthly salary ÷ 151.67 hours for a 35-hour full-time job), not the full SMIC. For an apprentice paid the legal minimum, this rate is a percentage of the hourly SMIC, €12.31 gross since 1 June 2026 (€12.02 from January to May 2026).
| Situation (statutory minimum pay) | Gross hourly rate | Hour at +25% | Hour at +50% |
|---|---|---|---|
| Apprentice aged 18-20, year 1 (43% of the SMIC) | €5.29 | €6.62 | €7.94 |
| Apprentice aged 18-20, year 2 (51%) | €6.28 | €7.85 | €9.42 |
| Apprentice aged 18-20, year 3 (67%) | €8.25 | €10.31 | €12.37 |
| Apprentice aged 21-25, year 1 (53%) | €6.52 | €8.16 | €9.79 |
| Apprentice aged 21-25, year 3 (78%) | €9.60 | €12.00 | €14.40 |
| Apprentice aged 26 or over, or trainee paid the SMIC (100%) | €12.31 | €15.39 | €18.47 |
Example: a 19-year-old apprentice in year 2 works 39 hours one week. Her 4 overtime hours earn her 4 × €7.85 ≈ €31.39 gross on top of her salary. From age 21, the percentage applies to the minimum wage set by the collective agreement if it is higher than the SMIC; if your contract provides for a salary above the minimum, that salary is the base. To find your exact rate, use the pay simulator and read our article on the SMIC from 1 June 2026.
Can time off replace payment?
Yes, in some cases. A collective agreement (or, in companies without a union representative, the employer if the CSE — the staff council — does not object) can replace all or part of the payment with equivalent compensatory time off: one hour with a 25% premium gives 1 h 15 of rest. This time off must actually be taken.
Beyond the annual quota (220 hours in the absence of an agreement), each overtime hour also gives the right to mandatory compensatory rest: 50% of the time worked in companies with 20 employees or fewer, 100% above 20 employees.
Do not confuse this with make-up hours: if the company closes for a long weekend and asks you to make up the lost hours, those hours are not overtime and carry no premium (article L. 3121-50).
What is left net: tax and contributions?
- Income tax: overtime is exempt up to €7,500 net per year (2025 and 2026 income). For an apprentice, the salary is in any case exempt up to the annual amount of the SMIC (€21,622 for 2025 income): the overtime-specific exemption therefore mainly benefits employees on professionalisation contracts, whose salary is taxed normally.
- Contributions: overtime pay benefits from a reduction in the employee’s old-age insurance contributions, capped at 11.31% and at the contributions actually due.
- Apprentices: for a contract signed since 1 March 2025, the salary is exempt from employee contributions only up to 50% of the SMIC (€933.51 gross per month since 1 June 2026). Overtime can push pay above this threshold: the portion above it is subject to contributions and CSG-CRDS. Details in our article on apprentice net pay.
Can you refuse overtime?
In principle, no: overtime falls under the employer’s management authority, and an unjustified refusal can be sanctioned, including for a trainee. But you can legitimately say no in three situations:
- Maximum hours exceeded. No employer can make you work more than 10 hours in a day (without an agreement) or more than 48 hours in a week. Here, refusing is a right.
- Conflict with training. Your CFA hours are working time: an employer cannot ask you to miss a class to cover a peak in activity, because they have committed to letting you follow the training.
- Abusive request. A refusal may be justified when the request is made unfairly (late and repeated notice with no real emergency, excessive intrusion into personal life); judges assess this case by case.
Practical tip: never discuss overtime only verbally. A short email afterwards (“To confirm, I’m staying until 7 p.m. this Thursday”) creates a dated record.
How can you prove your hours in a dispute?
Since a ruling of the Cour de cassation (France’s highest court) of 18 March 2020 (No. 18-10.919), the employee must present sufficiently precise evidence of the hours they claim to have worked; the employer must then respond with its own evidence. The employer also has an obligation to record working time when employees do not all follow the same collective schedule (article D. 3171-8).
Useful evidence includes:
- a diary or daily logbook where you note your arrival time, departure time and break every day;
- badge or time-clock records, of which you can request a copy;
- emails and messages sent outside working hours, which date your presence;
- CFA schedules proving your weeks of classes;
- statements from colleagues, admissible before the employment tribunal.
What should you do if overtime is neither paid nor compensated?
In this order:
- Talk to your apprenticeship supervisor or tutor, figures in hand. It is often a payroll oversight or a misunderstanding of the rules.
- Contact your CFA, which supports apprentices facing difficulties, and, for an apprenticeship contract, the apprenticeship mediator appointed by the chambers (CCI, CMA, chamber of agriculture), free of charge (article L. 6222-39).
- Alert the labour inspectorate (DREETS / DDETS services in your département), especially if maximum hours are exceeded.
- Contact a trade union, which can help you draft a formal notice for free.
- As a last resort, go to the employment tribunal (conseil de prud’hommes), with no lawyer required: back-pay claims are time-barred after 3 years (article L. 3245-1).
An annotated Labour Code or a practical employment-law guide helps prepare the discussion: quoting the exact article defuses many misunderstandings.
How do you keep up the pace without burning out?
The law sets ceilings, but 35 hours at work plus revision and commuting add up to a heavy real workload. A few habits:
- Protect one real day off per week, with no revision.
- Plan for exams: an apprentice is entitled to 5 working days of paid leave to prepare directly for their exams, to be taken in the month before them (article L. 6222-35).
- Look after your gear: comfortable safety shoes if you spend the day on your feet.
- Watch for warning signs (sleep problems, recurring pain): you can ask to see the occupational physician at any time, not only during the apprentice medical check-up.
To organise classes, work and personal life, our guide on balancing work, studies and personal life offers practical methods.
What should you check when signing the contract?
- The reference weekly hours: 35, 37 or 39? At 39 hours without RTT days, 4 overtime hours are built into every week and must appear with their premium on the payslip.
- The applicable collective agreement: it sets premium rates, the annual quota and sometimes bonuses that trainees also receive.
- How working time is recorded: time clock, timesheet, self-declaration.
Then reread your payslip every month: overtime appears on a separate line, with the number of hours and the rate applied. If the line is missing although you worked more than 35 hours, ask straight away. To go further, see our pages on financial aid and work-study job offers.
Sources: French Labour Code (articles L. 3121-16 to L. 3121-50, D. 3121-24, L. 3131-1, L. 3132-2, L. 3162-1, L. 3245-1, L. 6222-24, L. 6222-35, L. 6222-39, L. 6325-10, D. 3171-8) on legifrance.gouv.fr; service-public.gouv.fr (fact sheets “Heures supplémentaires d’un salarié du secteur privé”, “Les heures supplémentaires sont-elles imposées ?”, “Contrat d’apprentissage”, “Smic”); Cour de cassation, social chamber, 18 March 2020, No. 18-10.919.