Workplace Childcare

What workplace childcare is

Workplace childcare, also called a workplace nursery (حضانة أطفال العاملات), is the place an establishment prepares to look after the children of the female workers it employs. In Saudi Arabia it is governed by Article 159 of the Saudi Labor Law (نظام العمل), an article of two paragraphs that differ in nature: the first is a duty that applies by force of the text, and the second is a discretionary power given to the Minister.

Workplace childcare under Article 159(1) of the Labor Law: one duty, two conditions

Article 159(1) of the Labor Law requires every employer that employs fifty or more female workers to prepare a suitable place with a sufficient number of nannies (مربيات) to care for the children of those female workers who are under six years of age, where the number of those children reaches ten or more.

The two conditions apply together, and neither is enough on its own: 50 or more female workers, and 10 or more children under six. Stating the fifty and dropping the ten extends the duty to establishments the text does not cover. Counting the children of all employees, rather than the children of the female workers, misreads the same condition from the other side.

Workplace childcare under Article 159(2) of the Labor Law: a power of the Minister, not a duty

Article 159(2) of the Labor Law provides that the Minister may require an employer that employs one hundred or more female workers in a single city to establish a nursery itself, or jointly with other employers in the same city, or to contract with an existing nursery, to care for the female workers’ children under six during working hours. In that case the Minister sets the conditions and arrangements governing the nursery, and also determines the share of the costs borne by the female workers who use the service.

This paragraph creates no obligation until the Minister exercises the power. In the sources we reviewed, we found no ministerial decision doing so. So it would be wrong to write that an establishment employing one hundred female workers must set up a nursery. The difference between “the Minister may” and “the employer must” is the difference between a power and a duty.

The fine for not providing workplace childcare

The Schedule of Violations and Penalties (جدول المخالفات والعقوبات), issued by Ministerial Decision No. 112377 dated 21/8/1447H (9 February 2026), carries a row for this violation specifically: not preparing a childcare place or nursery at an establishment employing 50 or more female workers where the number of their children under six reaches 10 or more. The Schedule sets its fines in three columns according to the size of the establishment:

The words “not applicable” in this row are neither a zero nor an exemption. They follow from the structure of the duty: an establishment that employs fifty or more female workers is necessarily one with fifty or more workers in total, so the two smaller columns have nothing to apply to.

How workplace childcare changes the nursing hour

The provisions name one practical effect of having a nursery on site, and it concerns the nursing hour. Article 154 of the Labor Law gives a female worker, on returning from maternity leave, a period or periods of rest for the purpose of nursing her infant, not exceeding one hour in total per day. The hour is in addition to the rest periods granted to all workers, it counts as actual working hours, and it entails no reduction in wage.

Article 31 of the Implementing Regulation (اللائحة التنفيذية) adds how the hour is taken, and that detail depends on whether a nursery exists inside the establishment:

• Where there is no nursery inside the establishment, she may choose to take the nursing hour at the start or the end of the working day, as suits the interest of the work.
• Where there is a nursery inside the establishment, she may choose a period or periods totalling one hour, as suits the interest of the work.

The Implementing Regulation also provides, in the same Article 31, that the hour is paid and counts as actual working hours, that it runs for twenty four months from the date of the birth, whether the nursing is natural or otherwise, and that on returning from maternity leave the female worker must notify the employer in writing of the time she sets for the period or periods, and of any later change to it. The twenty four months and the written notice are in the Implementing Regulation, not in the Labor Law, and attributing them to the text of the Labor Law cites the wrong instrument. The Implementing Regulation sets an end to the hour and attaches no further rule to that end, and we draw no consequence it does not state. Both instruments are set out in our guide to the nursing hour and medical care for the working woman.

The hour is set per day in Article 154 of the Labor Law, and where there is a nursery inside the establishment Article 31 of the Implementing Regulation leaves the choice to a period or periods totalling one hour, as suits the interest of the work. In the sources we reviewed, we found nothing permitting the hour to be carried over from one day to another or combined across days, and we build no arrangement of that kind on it.

The workplace childcare thresholds in three worked cases

The two conditions in Article 159(1) of the Labor Law work together, and meeting the larger figure does not make up for missing the smaller one, nor the reverse:

• An establishment with 120 employees, of whom 46 are women, whose female workers have 22 children under six. The second condition is met and the first is not, so the article does not apply. The size of the total workforce makes no difference, because the text counts female workers, not employees.
• An establishment with 64 female workers whose children under six number 8. The first condition is met and the second is not, so the article does not apply either.
• An establishment with 50 female workers whose children under six number 10. Both conditions sit exactly at their minimum, so the article applies, because the text says “or more” for both figures.

Both numbers move as the workforce changes and as children reach six, so an establishment can come within the article and fall outside it again in the same year. In the third case, once one child turns six that child leaves the count, the number drops to nine and the second condition is no longer met. The same movement works in the other direction.

Workplace childcare, the nursing hour and the rest break in figures

The nursing hour in Article 154 of the Labor Law and the ordinary rest break differ not in name but in where each sits in relation to working hours:

• The period for rest, prayer and meals. Under Article 102 of the Labor Law it does not count as actual working hours; the worker is not under the employer’s authority during it, and the employer may not require the worker to stay at the workplace during it. Article 101 of the Labor Law provides that a worker may not work more than five consecutive hours without a break of at least half an hour each time.
• The nursing hour. It counts as actual working hours and entails no reduction in wage, and it is in addition to the rest periods granted to all workers, so it is neither taken out of them nor substituted for them.

The effect shows in a working day built on the daily standard in Article 98 of the Labor Law, eight actual hours a day, with an assumed single break of half an hour:

• A worker with no nursing hour does eight hours of actual work with half an hour of rest outside them, so the time spent at the workplace is 8.5 hours, and the wage is for eight hours.
• A female worker using the nursing hour has the hour counted within the eight, so she does seven hours of actual work, and the half hour of rest stays outside the count. Her time at the workplace is 7.5 hours, and her wage is for the full eight hours.

The difference between the two cases is a full hour of time at the workplace, and no difference in the wage. Deducting the hour from the wage, or treating it as a replacement for the half hour of rest, breaks two rules in Article 154 of the Labor Law: that the hour counts as actual working hours, and that it is in addition to the rest periods.

The figures move with the ceiling. Article 98 of the Labor Law lowers the ceiling for Muslim workers during Ramadan to six hours a day or thirty six hours a week. On the same daily standard, a Muslim female worker using the nursing hour then does five hours of actual work, and her wage is for six. The hour is taken from the ceiling in force on that day, not from a fixed figure for the whole year. Hours, breaks and the Ramadan ceiling are covered in our guide to working hours and the weekly rest.

What Article 159 of the Labor Law specifies for workplace childcare

For the place, Article 159(1) of the Labor Law requires only that it be suitable, and for the nannies only that there be a sufficient number of them. The text sets no specification for the premises and no ratio of nannies to children, and states no qualifications for the nannies. So any specification beyond those two words does not come from the article.

The female workers’ share of the cost is mentioned in the article only in paragraph 2, where it is tied to the Minister exercising the power in that paragraph. It is not carried back into the duty in paragraph 1. Article 159 of the Labor Law is also discussed in our guide to dismissal protection and iddah leave, alongside the neighbouring provisions on employing women.

Both paragraphs speak of the children of female workers, and the count on which the second condition rests is a count of their children. That describes what the text says; it is not a ruling on what an establishment may choose to offer beyond it. An establishment that extends its childcare to the children of male employees by its own choice offers a more favourable arrangement, and that extension does not take on the provisions or the thresholds of Article 159 of the Labor Law.

The nursing hour begins when the female worker returns from maternity leave. The length of that leave, and the rules on dividing and extending it, are set by Article 151 of the Labor Law, and they are not derived from the provisions on childcare. Next to Article 159 sits Article 158 of the Labor Law, which requires the employer to provide seats for women in all places where they work and in all professions, with no headcount threshold.

The provisions relied on are those of the Saudi Labor Law as published by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development: Article 98 (the daily ceiling and the Ramadan ceiling), Article 101 (the five hour limit and the half hour break), Article 102 (breaks outside actual working hours), Article 151 (maternity leave, cited only as the point from which the nursing hour runs), Article 154 (the nursing hour), Article 158 (seats) and Article 159 (workplace childcare), together with Article 31 of the Implementing Regulation (how the nursing hour is taken) and the Schedule of Violations and Penalties (the fine). Royal Decree M/44 of 1446H, in force since 19 February 2025, amended Article 151 of the Labor Law. That decree did not amend Articles 98, 101, 102, 154, 158 or 159 of the Labor Law.

Before an operational decision on workplace childcare is taken

An establishment that wants to know where it stands starts from two numbers, not one: how many female workers it employs, and how many children under six they have. The two together decide whether the duty applies, and they are checked again whenever the workforce changes, not once.

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