Employee Handbook

What an employee handbook is

An employee handbook (دليل الموظف), also called a staff handbook, is a document that gathers what an employee needs to know about working in an establishment: its policies and procedures, what it expects of the employee and what the employee is entitled to, in a single reference the employee can return to.

How an employee handbook differs from the work regulation

The work regulation (لائحة تنظيم العمل) is a statutory document with requirements and an approval route laid down in the Labor Law and its Implementing Regulation, and among its contents are the provisions on violations and penalties. An employee handbook is an internal document that the establishment writes for itself. It may explain what the work regulation contains and add internal arrangements to it. One rule keeps the two apart: an employee handbook does not amend the work regulation and does not replace it. For that reason the handbook itself carries an express reference to the approved work regulation and to the Labor Law as the reference point wherever the handbook differs from them.

The requirements of the work regulation come from the Saudi Labor Law (نظام العمل). Article 12 of the Labor Law has the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development issue one or more unified models for the work regulation, covering the rules of work organisation and the provisions connected with them, including the provisions on benefits and on violations and disciplinary penalties. Article 12 of the Labor Law also has the Ministry set the controls and mechanisms for approving work regulations.

Article 13 of the Labor Law obliges every employer to prepare a work regulation for its establishment in accordance with the model prepared by the Ministry, and allows the Minister to grant an exemption from that obligation. Article 13 of the Labor Law then allows the employer to include further terms and provisions in the regulation, provided they do not conflict with the Labor Law, its Implementing Regulation or the decisions issued under it. Finally, Article 13 of the Labor Law requires the employer to announce the work regulation, and any amendment made to it, in a visible place in the establishment or by any other means that ensures those subject to it know its provisions.

The approval route itself is set out in the Implementing Regulation (اللائحة التنفيذية), issued by Ministerial Decision No. 115921 and in force since 19 February 2025. Article 4 of the Implementing Regulation separates two routes:

• A regulation prepared by the establishment. It must be reviewed and certified by one of the law firms approved on the Ministry’s website and then submitted to the competent department of the Ministry, under the procedures that department sets.
• The model work regulation. An establishment with fewer than 50 workers may adopt it electronically, without any amendment or addition, and an electronic certificate is issued for it.

The figure of 50 workers in Article 4 of the Implementing Regulation separates the two routes. It does not release any establishment from the obligation in Article 13 of the Labor Law.

An employee handbook passes through none of these steps, so a clause written in it leaves the approved work regulation as it was. A change to the work regulation is made in the work regulation, and Article 13 of the Labor Law requires that amendment to be announced. The handbook cannot stand in for the work regulation, because the obligation in Article 13 of the Labor Law is to prepare the work regulation, subject to the Minister’s power of exemption.

The same holds for violations and penalties, the part of the work regulation named above. Article 67 of the Labor Law bars the employer from imposing any penalty that is not provided for in the Labor Law or in the work regulation. An employee handbook is neither of the two, so a penalty written only in the handbook has no basis under Article 67 of the Labor Law. A handbook may explain the penalties set out in the approved work regulation, but it cannot be the source of a further one.

Royal Decree M/44 of 1446H did not amend Articles 12, 13 or 67 of the Labor Law. Articles 12 and 13 of the Labor Law were last amended by Royal Decree M/46 of 1436H. The statutory side of the work regulation, including the other places where the Labor Law refers to it, is covered in our guide to the work organisation regulation.

What an employee handbook contains

An employee handbook can cover the following subjects:

• An introduction to the establishment, its values and its general structure.
• Working hours, attendance and leave, with the procedures for requesting leave.
• Wages and the dates on which they are paid, together with the allowances and benefits the establishment has set.
• Conduct policies, including the code of conduct (مدونة السلوك الوظيفي) or a reference to it.
• The procedures for raising a grievance (التظلم) and for internal reporting.
• Policies on the use of the establishment’s devices and its data.
• The procedures for ending the employment relationship and for handing back the company assets held in custody.

Several of these subjects also have a place in the model work regulation annexed to the Implementing Regulation, whose chapters include wages, benefits and allowances, working days and hours, leave, the duties of workers, the end of the employment contract, violations and penalties, and grievance. On these subjects, a handbook may explain what the approved work regulation provides. The model work regulation also leaves the establishment two blanks that touch the list above: the date on which wages are paid, in Article 15 of the model work regulation, and the number of working days and the weekly rest day, in Article 26 of the model work regulation. Where a handbook states either, the approved work regulation remains the reference.

What keeps an employee handbook in use rather than archived

An employee handbook stays in use, rather than sitting in an archive, when it has these features:

• The language of an answer, not the language of a regulation. It is written to answer a question that occurs to the employee, not to cover every possibility.
• A named point of contact. Each policy names the person or department to ask when an exception arises.
• An issue date and a version number. No one can tell which version is in force when the handbook carries neither.
• An acknowledgement of receipt. It is kept in the employee file.

The risk of neglecting an employee handbook

An employee handbook that has not been updated after a policy changes becomes a source of a mistaken expectation for the employee, and of a potential dispute when the policy is applied. For that reason its review is tied to any amendment of the work regulation or of a core policy, not to an annual date alone.

An amendment to the work regulation is already an event the establishment has to act on, since Article 13 of the Labor Law requires any amendment to be announced in a visible place in the establishment or by any other means that ensures those subject to the regulation know its provisions. Tying the handbook’s review to that amendment keeps what the handbook explains in step with the text that has been announced.

This is an explanation of the concept and of the statutory provisions cited, not legal advice.