SA Wages Pro

Overtime: The 1.5x Rate and the 3-Hour Limit

4 min read — Updated September 2026

What Counts as Overtime

Overtime is time worked beyond the employee's ordinary working day. If someone's ordinary day is 9 hours and they work 11, that is 9 ordinary hours and 2 hours of overtime.

You no longer type overtime hours in by hand. SA Wages Pro works it out from the timesheet: record the hours actually worked each day, and anything above the ordinary day becomes overtime automatically when you run the payslip.

Set the employee's hours per day correctly on their profile. That single number decides where the ordinary day ends and overtime begins.

The Rate Is a Flat 1.5x

Under section 10 of the BCEA, overtime is paid at one and a half times the normal hourly rate. That is the rate for every overtime hour - the first one and the tenth one alike.

There is no second, higher band. Overtime does not step up to double after a certain number of hours.

The most common misunderstanding is that the "3 hours" in the Act is the point where the rate changes to 2x. It is not. Three hours is the daily LIMIT on how much overtime may be worked. The rate stays at 1.5x throughout.

The Limits: 3 a Day, 10 a Week

The BCEA caps overtime at 3 hours in a day and 10 hours in a week. Overtime must also be agreed to - an employee cannot simply be ordered to work it.

  • Maximum 3 overtime hours in any single day
  • Maximum 10 overtime hours in any week
  • Overtime must be by agreement, not by instruction
  • Going beyond these limits is only lawful under a collective agreement

SA Wages Pro flags a warning when a day goes past 3 overtime hours, or when the pay period averages more than 10 overtime hours a week. The payslip still calculates - the warning is there so you can check the timesheet before you finalise it.

A Worked Example

A worker earns R30.23 an hour and has a 9-hour ordinary day. On Tuesday they work 11 hours.

Ordinary hours: 9 x R30.23 = R272.07. Overtime: 2 hours x R30.23 x 1.5 = R90.69. The Tuesday total is R362.76.

If they had worked 13 hours instead, all 4 extra hours would still be paid at 1.5x - but you would get a warning, because 4 hours of overtime in one day is over the legal limit.

Sundays and Public Holidays Are Kept Separate

Hours recorded as Sunday or public holiday hours are never also counted as overtime. Those days carry their own premium under sections 16 and 18, and adding the overtime rate on top would be double counting.

On the timesheet, mark the day type correctly and SA Wages Pro puts the hours in the right bucket.

Was this article helpful?