Legal advice

We have a team of advisors, who provide legal advice on all aspects of employment and labour law. The team consists of legal advisors and lawyers with extensive experience in this field.

We provide legal advice covering all levels of company personnel - directors, managers, salaried employees and workers paid by the hour.

Our lawyers will represent you, our member companies, if a dispute goes to court or arbitration.

Legal subjects

We provide legal advice on:

• Collective agreements
• Collective dismissals
• Determination of salary
• Employment and employment contracts
• Equal treatment and discrimination issues
• Expatriation and foreign labour in Denmark
• Holidays and days off
• Maternity/paternity leave
• Non-competition and non-solicitation clauses
• Severance agreements
• Sickness
• Termination of employment
• Terms of employment
• Transfer of business undertakings
• Warnings and summary dismissals
• Working hours

The Danish labour market is mainly regulated by collective agreements.

DI negotiates and concludes collective agreements and offers legal advice on all aspects of the rules determined in the collective agreements.

Collective agreements regulate working conditions and stipulate rules and procedures for deciding working conditions at company level.

200 collective agreements

DI has concluded approximately 200 collective agreements.

The two main agreements are the Industrial Agreement, which covers workers such as craftsmen paid by the hour working in industrial companies, and the Collective Agreement for Salaried Employees in Industry.

When a company is covered by a collective agreement, union claims regarding establishment of another collective agreement cannot be brought against the company. In addition, companies are protected against industrial action.

Employees may, therefore, not go on strike and may be brought before the Labour Court if they do so. The Labour Court can issue penalties in case of non-compliance.

See all documents for employment matters

Services regarding collective agreements

• We provide legal advice in relation to interpretation of agreements, conclusion of local agreements, co-operation with shop stewards, and other issues regarding collective labour law
• We provide services to assist you in settling disputes in relation to breaches or interpretations of DI's collective agreements. We participate in conciliation meetings and organisational meetings and assist you in legal disputes brought before the Arbitration Tribunal and the Arbitral Tribunal on Dismissals. 

Understand The Danish Labour Market Model

We provide legal advice on all laws regulating the Danish labour market.

In most countries the labour market is regulated by laws stipulated by the country's own legal system. The Danish labour market is unique in the way that the rules regulating the conditions between employers and employees are settled through collective agreements. Labour unions and employers' organisations negotiate these collective agreements without governmental interference. This is the so-called Danish Model.

No general law covers all areas of the Danish labour market. Nevertheless, a few laws regulate specific areas. Most of these laws originate from EU legislation.

Danish Acts

Here are some of the Danish acts, which regulate the conditions between employers and employees:

Act on the Use of Health Data etc. on the Labour Market (PDF)

Act on Employees’ Entitlement to Absence from Work for Special Family Reasons (PDF)

Circular on Labour Clauses in Public Contracts (PDF)

Consolidation Act on an Employer's Obligation (PDF)

Act on the Board of Equal Treatment (PDF)

Consolidation Act on Entitlement to Leave and Benefits in the Event of Childbirth (PDF)

Consolidation Act concerning the Posting of Workers etc. (PDF)

Consolidation Act on Prohibition against Discrimination on the Labour Market (PDF)

Consolidation Act on Conciliation in Industrial Disputes (PDF)

Act on the Legal Rights of Temporary Agency Workers (PDF)

Act on Maternity Equalisation in the Private Labour Market (PDF)

Act on the Labour Market Fund for Posted Workers (PDF)

Executive Order on the Danish Labour Market Fund for Posted Workers (PDF)

Act on Restrictive Employment Clauses (PDF)

Consolidation Act on the Prohibition of Differences of Treatment in the Labour Market etc. (PDF)

Consolidation Act on the Board of Equal Treatment (PDF)

The Danish Holiday Act

The Working Environment Act

Executive orders supplementing The Working Environment Act

Do you need templates? We offer a wide range of templates for employment matters. The templates ensure that your contracts live up to legal requirements, collective agreements and special needs in your company.

You can find templates for terminations, warnings, severance agreement, employment contracts for directors, leaders, and other employees ect. Or you can download a template for your new company policy on GDPR or sexual harassment. Fx:

Template for employment contract for salaried employees

Template for termination of employment

See all documents for employment matters

Working hours

Normal working hours are 37 hours per week in Denmark. Annual working hours, however, vary from year to year. In addition to this, the collective agreements allow flexible working hours.

Annual working hours may vary from year to year due to the conditions of employment and shifts in calendar days. Certain days are public or general holidays.

Normal weekly working hours are 37 hours. The annual working time may, however, vary from employee to employee.

The rules concerning working hours for employees - covered by collective agreements - are determined in the specific agreements. The rules determined in the collective agreements allow for variation in the weekly working hours as well as local flexibility.

Flexible working hours

If a company is covered by a collective agreement it can implement flexible working hours.

When planning the working time, it is important to be aware of the possibilities in the collective agreement. Most of DI's collective agreements lay down rules concerning:

• normal working hours
• variable weekly working hours
• shift work.

The working time should be planned in accordance with the operating hours of the enterprise.

We can help you:

• prepare local negotiations of variable weekly working hours
• design shift work schemes
• develop an overview of the possibilities for flexible working hours

Holidays

According to the Danish Holiday Act, all Danish employees are entitled to five weeks of paid holiday.

The collective agreements entitle employees to five additional days off for holiday purposes.

Public holidays

• January 1
• Maundy Thursday
• Good Friday
• Easter Monday
• Ascension Day
• Great Prayer Day (falling on the fourth Friday after Easter)
• Whit Monday
• December 25
• December 26

General holidays

• May 1
• Constitution Day (June 5)
• December 24

Do you have international employees? We provide legal advice on rules pertaining to foreign workers employed in Denmark or workers in foreign countries. The rules vary according to the employee’s country of origin and the country in which they are stationed.

We provide legal advice on residence and permission to work in Denmark.

Advice regarding employment contracts

We offer free legal reviews of employment contracts for expatriated employees and mobility frameworks including:

• Choice of law and jurisdiction
• Social security
• Rules on holiday
• Conditions on accommodation, entry/arrival, departure, car, etc.
• Stationing abroad/expatriation vs. local employment
• Choice of work force when choosing between expatriating existing employees, recruiting new employees, or using agents
• Return to the home country.

• We provide legal advice concerning all employee-related aspects of collective dismissals and business undertakings, including outsourcing, contracting out and mergers.
  
  It requires a substantial amount of preparation to complete a successful transfer of business undertakings.
  
  
• We provide services to assist your company in understanding both legal aspects and human implications.
  
  
• We provide legal advice on collective dismissals.

Do you need assistance regarding aspects of the Danish educational system concerning vocational training and apprentices? We can guide you to relevant information or provide a wide range of consulting resources in many fields.

DI is involved in the development of the public supply of education and training. We lobby to have an educational system that provides a highly qualified supply of labour, which is in balance with the companies' demand for labour.

We have more than 700 representatives appointed at various levels of the educational system to ensure compliance between the educational system and companies' demand for skills.

Education for adults

We can assist you if you need information regarding vocational training and education for adults.

Apprentices

We offer advice and provide consulting resources on issues such as employment and education of apprentices.

If you need information about wages, salaries, employment statistics, pay systems etc., you are welcome to contact us. 

We can assist you in preparing statistics on employment, wages and salaries.

We also offer advice on pay structures and pay systems, and we can help you choose the best type of stock-based incentives.

DI can help you see both benefits and downsides in rules and regulations regarding total reward.

Moreover, we know the most commonly used benefits in Denmark and various ways to implement such benefits.

Do you need assistance and services in the field of OSH consultancy?

We can assist you with:

• Advice on current OSH regulations
• Ensure compliance with existing and upcoming OSH regulations
• Employer and employee rights and responsibilities
• Employer standards and requirements for specific operations
• Authority reactions
• Filling appeals in Appealing OSH cases

We provide information on how you can handle specific OSH risks as well as how and where to seek financial support from external funds.

Get network relations

Over the years, we have established many influential networks among our members. In the field of OSH, we organise a specific network for OSH managers. The network represents more than 300 companies. This is an ideal space for DI members to share their experiences in health and safety issues.

DI active in councils

We are active in many OSH branch councils nationwide. The OSH branch councils comprise employers' and employee organisations in close coordination with relevant companies. Their main function is to provide guidelines with respect to OSH issues in each individual branch.

Join our courses

We offer a wide range of educational courses in occupational health and safety aimed at both employers and employees.