A company in China attempted to mandate its staff’s toilet use with specific time slots, claiming the policy aligned with an ancient Chinese text, but it was shut down after the order was opposed.
A manufacturing company in Guangdong province introduced the “Toilet Usage Management Rule”, as quoted, last Tuesday (Feb 11), intending to maintain a sense of order, improve workers’ efficiency, and instil discipline.
Citing a local news report, the South China Morning Post stated that the company referred to the ancient Chinese text of the Yellow Emperor’s Inner Canon, also known as Huang Di Nei Jing, which aimed to improve employees’ health.
Employees would be made to pay a fine of 100 yuan if they violated the rule. The company added that its management would monitor the workers’ movements through surveillance cameras.
The over 2,000-year-old text was recognised as the earliest and most significant work in Chinese traditional medicine, typically dubbed as China’s “origin of medicine”, as quoted.
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The time slots imposed for the restrictive toilet usage were before 8am, from 10.30am to 10.40am, between 12pm and 1.30pm, from 3.30pm to 3.40pm, and from 5.30pm to 6pm.
Meanwhile, employees working overtime were granted access to the toilets after 9pm.
Should an employee urgently need to urinate outside the specified time slots, they are allowed to do so but must keep their time to two minutes only.
However, workers with “special physical conditions” who need bathroom access outside these time slots were asked to apply to the company’s human resources department for approval, but their pay would be cut according to the time spent in the toilet.
The company intended to schedule a pilot run of the new policy until the end of February, with implementation set for March 1.
Last Thursday (Feb 13), the company abandoned its plans to implement the change and revoked the rule following widespread objections from its staff.
