Changhua County will pay out overtime compensation owed to firefighters for many years — good news for front-line fire personnel.

• The county government has reviewed the accumulated uncompensated overtime hours from January 2023 to July 2024, and will pay them out in a single disbursement before November this year.
• Firefighters have long worked long hours on urgent duty, and many overtime hours could not be scheduled as compensatory leave, leaving them to accumulate.
• Under the law, overtime must be met with either payment or compensatory leave; the county government budgets a cap of NT$19,000 per person per month for overtime pay.
• Since July of the year before last, field units have been required to properly schedule rest and compensatory leave, and monthly overtime hours claimed have now fallen to single digits.

Outlook: The county government says it will continue to review staffing allocation and duty regulations, but once the money is paid out, the fundamental problem of insufficient personnel remains.