every employer.
It's about something much simpler:
sign what you understand.
First check who is actually employing you
The logo on the jacket does not always match the name on the contract.
You may work every day:
on the construction site of a large company,
in the warehouse of a well-known chain,
in a hotel,
in a shipyard,
but the formal employer may be an employment agency.
So check the first fields:
employer's name,
organization number,
your details,
place of work.
If you are employed by a bemanningsforetak and you are leased out to another company, the contract should include the name of the company to which you are leased when it is known. The information must also be updated when the client changes.
This is important, because when you later ask:
“Who is responsible for my pay?”
the answer should already be clear from the contract.
Permanent or temporary? One word makes a big difference
Look for:
fast
or:
midlertidig
The main principle of Norwegian labor law is that an employee should be employed permanently. Permanent employment is open-ended and should provide a real, predictable amount of work.
Temporary employment is possible, but not because the employer simply prefers to have everyone 'on trial'.
It may relate, for example, to:
substitute for an absent employee,
internships,
work that actually has a temporary character, e.g. a clearly limited seasonal increase in demand.
If you sign a temporary contract, it should state:
how long the employment is to last
and
on what basis it is temporary.
Check the current rules:
Arbeidstilsynet — midlertidig ansettelse
“We'll give you a contract for three months for now, then we'll see”
That may be perfectly legitimate.
For example, you are replacing a person for a specific period or the company really has short-term demand.
But it's worth asking:
“What is the basis for my midlertidig ansettelse?”
That's a normal question.
Since 2022, the old general possibility to employ anyone temporarily for a year solely on that basis no longer applies. For ordinary temporary employment there must be an appropriate basis.
If you work in permitted temporary employment for a long period, rights to permanent employment may also arise. For many such cases the current threshold is more than three years of continuous employment, although for some contracts entered into before 2024 transitional rules may still apply.
At the start of a job you do not have to know the whole law.
You only need to know:
why my contract has an end date?
“100%? 80%? Or maybe simply etter behov?”
This is one of the most important parts of the entire contract.
Don't just ask:
what the hourly rate is?
Ask:
how much work I actually get?
An employment contract should specify the workload, for example as a percentage of the position or another actual scope. Norwegian rules for permanent employment require predictability in the form of a real workload.
Example:
100% of the position
is not the same as:
20% + additional shifts
and is something completely different from:
on-call work / extra shift
without a fixed schedule.
Do not assume that:
“There will be a lot of work”
means:
“you are guaranteed a full-time job.”
What does on-call work mean?
In this model, specific working days are not set in advance.
Arbeidstilsynet describes it as a type of framework agreement in which the employer offers individual shifts and the employee can accept or refuse them. The contract should clearly explain how the parties agree on specific working hours.
So:
“call when there is work”
does not provide the same stability as:
“an 80% position”.
This does not automatically mean that such a way of working is bad.
For a student or a person needing extra shifts it can be very convenient.
The problem starts when you think you have received full-time work, but the document says something completely different.
Have you already agreed on a shift? That matters
If, as an on-call substitute, you accepted a specific shift, you have concluded an agreement to perform it.
Arbeidstilsynet points out that, as a rule, the employee has the right to pay for an agreed shift even if the employer later cancels it, although the terms of the contract regarding cancellation may be important.
Therefore keep:
SMS,
work schedule,
message in the app,
confirmation of the shift.
Working hours: “according to the schedule” is not enough
If you work every day:
07:00–15:00,
the matter is simple.
The contract can state this clearly.
If you work:
in the morning,
in the evening,
at night,
on different days,
in a rotation,
the situation is more complicated.
With variable or irregular working hours the contract should include information allowing determination of when you are to work. It may, for example, refer to the work plan or specify an average number of hours over a specific period. From 1 July 2024 the contract should also inform about the rules for changing shifts and about payment for work that exceeds the agreed time or schedule.
Check the rules:
Arbeidstilsynet — work plan, duty roster and rotation
A day-to-day schedule?
If you work according to a work plan, the main rule is that the plan should be ready at least 14 days in advance.
Changes to such a plan should also, in principle, be communicated with at least 14 days' notice.
There are exceptions, e.g. different rules in a collective agreement, emergency events requiring the protection of life or property, or a special, time-limited need for overtime. The employee may also voluntarily agree to a change with a shorter notice period.
This is important if during the conversation you hear:
“We change the schedule practically every day, you must be available all the time.”
Ask before signing how exactly the shift system works.
Salary: find more than one number
In the interview you heard:
270 NOK/h.
In the contract check:
rate,
payment date,
payment method,
allowances,
possible overtime pay,
night allowance or other allowances, if applicable,
other benefits and compensations.
Arbeidstilsynet points out that individual allowances and benefits should be shown separately.
This protects against the situation:
“I thought 270 NOK was the base rate, and the company claims that this amount already includes all allowances.”
If something is to be part of the rate, it is good to know exactly what.
After your first paycheck, return to our guide:
Lønnsslipp in Norway — how to check your pay
Probation: the trial period does not appear "automatically"
The employer says:
“The first six months are, of course, a probationary period.”
Check the contract.
The probationary period must be agreed in writing.
It usually cannot be longer than 6 months. For temporary employment it cannot exceed half of the total employment period.
Example:
a 6-month contract.
The probationary period should not be 6 months.
At most half, that is 3 months.
“During the trial we can dismiss you from one day to the next”
This is not the normal rule.
With a properly agreed probationary period, the standard mutual notice period is 14 days, unless the parties have agreed otherwise in writing or in a collective agreement.
Importantly, during the probationary period this period begins to run from the day the notice is received, and not from the first day of the following month.
The probationary period does not mean:
“the employer can fire you without reason”.
Special rules for dismissal during probation concern, among other things, suitability for the job, professional skills and the employee's reliability.
Check the notice period before you decide to leave
As long as the job is new and everything looks good, the notice period seems unimportant.
Later you get a better offer.
The company wants you from next Monday.
And then you discover:
three months' notice.
The contract should state the notice periods for both the employee and the employer and describe the procedure for ending the employment.
If no other conditions have been properly agreed, the statutory minimum for employment shorter than five years is generally one month. With length of service, and in some cases also the employee's age, the periods may be longer. The ordinary notice period is usually counted from the first day of the month following delivery of the notice.
Check the current notice periods:
Arbeidstilsynet — termination
Vacation and feriepenger should also be in the contract
The contract must contain information regarding:
leave,
feriepenger,
rules for determining the timing of vacation.
Some information may be provided by reference to the relevant regulations or a collective agreement.
You don't have to have a full vacation calendar written out in the contract.
But you should know, which rules apply to you.
Does the company have a collective agreement?
Ask.
Do not assume either:
“every company in Norway has a collective agreement,”
or:
“a collective agreement doesn't apply to me.”
If the company is covered by an appropriate collective agreement, it can affect, among other things:
salary,
allowances,
working hours,
overtime,
vacation,
termination.
The employment contract should include information about any collective agreements that regulate the employment relationship.
“But they told me that in the interview”
And perhaps everyone is completely honest.
But after six months the conversation begins:
You:
“We agreed on a minimum of 35 hours per week.”
Employer:
“No, we said the hours would depend on needs.”
And suddenly you have two versions of the same conversation.
If some condition is important to you:
working hours,
pay rate,
company car,
place of work,
rotational system,
accommodation,
allowance,
ask for it to be included in the contract or the relevant appendix.
Not because you don't trust anyone.
Because a good contract protects both parties against different recollections of the same conversation.
Terms change? The contract should also be updated
Let's assume:
you started at 50%.
After six months you move to 100%.
Or the following change occurs:
position,
scope of duties,
place of work.
With such changes, the information in the employment contract should be updated no later than on the day the change takes effect.
Don't leave the contract for three years as:
“50% warehouse worker”
if you have long been working as:
100% foreman.
Do you have an old contract from before July 2024?
From 1 July 2024, the scope of information that should be included in new employment contracts was expanded.
If your old contract was signed earlier and nothing in the employment changes, the employer does not have to rewrite it on their own for that reason alone.
But if you ask for it to be supplemented in accordance with the new requirements, the employer has two months to do so.
For a person just signing a new contract, however, it is more important:
the new contract should already meet the current requirements.
Don't understand the document? You don't have to pretend
The contract has several pages in Norwegian.
You read the first.
Then the second.
By the third you just start nodding your head.
Don't sign just because it's embarrassing to say:
“I don't understand this clause.”
You have the right to ask for an explanation.
The Working Environment Act also provides that when preparing or changing a contract you may use the assistance of a union representative or another representative.
Arbeidstilsynet also provides its own employment contract template that meets the minimum requirements.
See the official template:
Arbeidstilsynet — templates for employment contracts
You can open it next to the contract you received and compare the most important fields.
Red flags before signing
They do not automatically mean that the employer is cheating you.
But it's worth pausing if you hear:
"We'll make the contract later."
"This is a permanent job, but we won't list any hours."
"The contract is temporary because everyone starts like that with us."
"You have six months probation on a three-month contract."
"The rate covers everything, we don't have to itemize allowances."
"You get the schedule in the evening for the next day."
"There's no point in writing this down, we already agreed."
The best reaction is not:
"This is a scam!"
But:
"I want to understand this before signing. Let's clarify this point."
10 minutes before signing
Go through the contract once more.
1. Who is my employer?
2. Am I permanent or temporary?
3. If temporary — why and until when?
4. How much work is actually guaranteed to me?
5. What do my working hours and schedule look like?
6. What is the base salary and what allowances do I have?
7. Do I have a probation period and how long does it last?
8. What is my notice period?
9. How are holidays and feriepenger handled?
10. Is everything that was important to me during the interview actually included in the documents?
If you answer one of these questions:
"I don't know"
that is not a reason to decline the job.
It's a reason to ask one more question before signing.
Got the contract? Now check your rights in the first days
The contract itself is only the beginning.
When you start working, other things appear:
hours,
breaks,
overtime,
training,
HMS,
wages.
Therefore, after signing, go to:
First day at work in Norway — employee rights
And when the first paycheck arrives:
lønnsslipp in Norway — how to check your pay
This way you won't learn about the Norwegian labor market only when something goes wrong.
OFFICIAL SOURCES
Arbeidstilsynet — employment contract
Current requirements regarding the written contract and its contents.
Arbeidstilsynet — employment contract
Arbeidstilsynet — employment
Permanent employment, full-time positions and the basic rules regarding the employment relationship.
Arbeidstilsynet — temporary employment
Basics and limits of temporary employment.
Arbeidstilsynet — probation and notice of termination
Rules for the probationary period and notice deadlines.
Arbeidstilsynet — work schedule
Schedules, shifts and rules for changing the work schedule.
