Working hours in shops

[Fishpie]

Hi can anyone give some advice, I have a friend who works in a retails shop and has contracted hours, yet is constantly expected to stay after the finish time (this applies to everyone working there) do the staff have a right to leave the store once there official time of finish ends? there is no extra pay or time given in lieu for any extra time worked - mainly cashing up duties which are expected once the shop closes which is when the staff are paid to thanks

[lbruk]

If they are not being paid, then there is no need for them to stay. A lot of work is done under "voluntary overtime" and it should be paid, but very often isn't.

 

I guess it gets to point where does it become unacceptable anymore, is 15 minutes acceptable? 30 mins? It's all a matter of perspective and what is "normal" for that working environment.

[Fishpie]

thanks will pass that on, I think employers are taking even more advantage at the moment where there are more people looking for job then actually have a job all comes down to fear of losing the one they have

[lbruk]

i agree, employers are out to get everything they can out of employees without paying for it! Especially in Retail, but retail has always been that way in one way shape or form.

[becky2585]

Up to 30 minutes each day is considered reasonable for unpaid overtime. I would think, if your friend checks their contract, it will stipulate as such. It's very common.

[Sidewinder]

Completely agree. It is all a question of what is 'reasonable' in the circumstances - the type of employment, what the time is used for, and what can be expected 'in the interests of the business'.

[Fishpie]

thanks for the replies but the contract just states contracted hours, the company used to pay an extra few minutes for cashing up but that has been taken away, if you ask in other retailers you find most staff get paid up to an extra 15 minutes for such duties

[millitant]

i am now going to put my tin hat on for this one

 

why is it acceptable for staff to do "reasonable" unpaid overtime

you work as to your contract of employment and any extra by agreement is then done at over time rate

 

please tell me where in the employment rights act that the practice of compulsory overtime is acceptable.

 

a one off occurrence for the good of the company is permissable but not every day

 

According to the TUC Labour Force Survey Summer Quarter 2011, 5.3 million UK staff worked an average of 7.2 hours of unpaid overtime each week in 2011. This totals almost two billion hours of unpaid overtime for the year, worth around £29.2 billion.

 

how many extra jobs does that equate to?

and by doing this , stopping extra staff being employed

 

so i will ask the question again

 

where does it state in the employment rights act compulsory unpaid overtime is acceptable beyond contracted hours

[lbruk]

All employment law mentions the word reasonable, so to say that it might be reasonable to work above and beyond your contracted hours is reasonable, because you have fallen behind, or is it unreasonable because you are making up for other people?

 

I believe the reason for the overtime is as relevant as the actual working it.

[bonnygirl]

I totally agree, employees may have caring commitments and needs to leave their work on time, therefore if he or she is obliged to stay behind due to not enough staff being available or a member of staff has fallen behind due to maybe being disabled, or maybe too much work been given to staff which would make other staff that stayed behind doing unpaid overtime. If the employees that was made stayed behind had to pick up children from a nursery or childminder they would have to pay extra being late in picking them up. Employers do not even give staff time off to attend hospital appointments and if an employee should be 5 minutes late and that happens a few times they can be sacked for it.

I feel when staff are asked to work extra time without pay then that is stealing from them.

[Hacked_Off]

My advise would be to get out I retail. I've worked in several shops at different levels and they are all the same. They do not care about staff and will do anything to shaft you if it means them saving a few pennies!!

[bonnygirl]

It is mainly the multinationals that are the ones that wants employer to work without pay, I expect it is because they are so large that they think that they are above the employment law. also they government have been giving some of them free workforce on the taxpayer. :|

[becky2585]

Militant, the Employment Rights Act isnt the only source of law.

 

I would suggest applying common sense in this situation. If I was on the phone at 16:55, I wouldn't cut a client off at 17:00 because that happens to be the end of my working day. That's just daft.

 

However, there are legal arguments if you complete an extra full hour of overtime that you should be paid NMW for that additional hour.

[bonnygirl]

Militant, the Employment Rights Act isnt the only source of law.

 

I would suggest applying common sense in this situation. If I was on the phone at 16:55, I wouldn't cut a client off at 17:00 because that happens to be the end of my working day. That's just daft.However, there are legal arguments if you complete an extra full hour of overtime that you should be paid NMW for that additional hour.

 

No course not that would be rude, however, if you were serving a customer with a large amount of purchases and you need to collect you child from a nursery and by completing the purchases for the customer resulting eating up half an hour of your time which make you an hour late in collecting you child from the nursery and paying an hours extra to the nursery for being late, I would not be too happy about, if it happen a couple of times a week. This would add up to a lot of you or mine time and the employer with a lot of free labour that could well afford to spend money on employing more staff. I would make exception for small business but not multinational ones.

 

Also, would you be happy looking after your colleagues cases if they had to leave on time due to commitments, most employees would not mind finishing a phone call, but if it was a complicated phone call and involved a lot of work looking at your colleague case notes and leaving notes in the file, which would take up to 50 minutes to complete would you be happy if that kept happening 3 or 4 times a week.

.

[becky2585]

No course not that would be rude, however, if you were serving a customer with a large amount of purchases and you need to collect you child from a nursery and by completing the purchases for the customer resulting eating up half an hour of your time which make you an hour late in collecting you child from the nursery and paying an hours extra to the nursery for being late. If that was to happen a couple of times a week it would add up to a lot of time free labour for employer that could well afford to spend money on employing more staff. I would make exception for small business but not multinational ones.

 

Also, would you be happy looking after your colleagues cases if they had to leave on time due to commitments, most employees would not mind finishing a phone call, but if it was a complicated phone call and involved a lot of work looking at your colleague case notes and leaving notes in the file, which would take up to 50 minutes to complete would you be happy if that kept happening 3 or 4 times a week.

.

 

Well that does happen to me frequently, so you're probably asking the wrong person

[assisted blonde]

Common sense, if you are dealing with a customer and its the end of the day, if you dont deal with them properly ( however long it takes) you have one less customer, lot less customers mean less work = business closing or cutting back = no job.

Cashing up after the business has closed has always been part of retail work, if it takes 5 mins good, if the till dosnt balance and it takes 50mins so be it, it dosnt happen every day that it takes that long,and you dont get last minute customers every day.

[millitant]

i will accept up to a maximum 15 minutes staying above your contracted hours in situations that you state

 

talking to a customer on the phone for an example.

these are one off issues

 

if it happens everyday it is a serious no,no

 

management need to evaluate their current staffing level and not "flex up" exsisting staff

 

if people do not object then custom and practice comes into play and management would accept it as the norm

 

that is putting money into company profits and not your pocket, and please do not get me going on family friendly policies etc and how that would effect this so called compulsory unofficial overtime

Edited May 26, 2012 by millitant

[lbruk]

Unfortunately Militant, the store management probably do not have the luxury of "flexing up" due to the constraints of the employee budgets handed down from Head office or like. As an ex store manager of a multinational retailer i can categorically say that it is almost relied upon that employees will work for free! Now I never regarded this as acceptable and still do not, but i also lived in the real world and if an employee had not cleared up after themselves or there was a queue at the till, it would be "expected" that they stay to sort it out.

 

I have a tribunal pending for my employment in retail, and i hope to try to make it easier for the people still employed there, i doubt my chances of helping them though!

 

Its a grey area, I would say again to the managers that went from working 45 hours a week to 60 hours a week at Xmas? is that compulsory overtime or voluntary overtime? the contract says meeting the needs of the business, but the hours increase is so different, is that acceptable or unacceptable? Its all a matter of perception and expectations.

 

I dont believe a one-size-fits-all approach is correct here.

[millitant]

what i would like to know is how the retail sector has allowed this to happen

 

you mention xmas and extra hours

if the manager does not want to do those so called extra hours or unpaid overtime he should not have to. xmas is a busy period i grant you so what is stopping a retailer going to an agency and hire extra staff

royal mail use students for an example

 

its not like you cant plan or forcast for busy periods such as xmas or bank holidays

 

the real problem is with staff worried about their job if they complain as the contract of employment is all but worthless now.

 

the meeting of business needs is just an implied term in any contract of employment and that term as i have allready stated is just for a one off event for the good of the company, not the norm

 

i am talking of things like the zero hour contracts and part time positions also that is also the norm now in the retail industry

 

try getting a loan or mortage on a zero hour contract

 

have you thought all those extra minutes of working for free may be stopping you or a collegue from getting a full contract of employment

Edited May 26, 2012 by millitant

[dreadpiratesteve]

It's been like this for years, since I worked in retail at least! The main problem stems from the companies running to budgets, setting the wages for the store manager to adhere to and these budgets are set to the bare minimum required, with bank holidays and seasonal activity is taken into account. The store manager simply can't just order in agency staff and they often cost more than regular staff! If there is any flex in wages then it is often ridiculous! As a bar manager I was told that I could have £50 in extra wages for every £1000 taken! Back then, I was looking at an extra 8 hours for staff to sell roughly 400 pints of lager on top of what my staff are usually selling!

 

Another issue is that shop unions, if any aren't standing up for this behaviour from the companies, not to mention that many retail staff are not part of any union for various reasons and even if they were, if there was a strike action on this, shop workers can ill afford to take an unpaid day off!

[Sidewinder]

Any big multinational relies on flexibility now more than ever. I have to echo the views above - Store Managers in even the biggest retailers in the country simply cannot spend money on wages. They must plead for every penny - even if this means that stock in the warehouse cannot be put out on display. Margins, figures and market share have to come above customer satisfaction - to declare a profit warning or poor figures is disastrous for market confidence and future investment.

 

So. Whilst it is the simplest thing in the world to say that a particular company is making £Millions, so get Temps or Students in for busy periods, that simply won't happen in the current climate. I see at first hand every day how staff aren't replaced when they leave, managers have to cover Sundays as they don't have to be paid, overtime is banned, staff have to be available to more than one department.

 

I absolutely agree that it isn't right, but stopping the practice is not easy. Grievances and working to rule are fine in theory, but will quickly mark you out as a troublemaker, and with 1001 people after every job going, very few are willing to risk it. For each person who doesn't want to work over their time, there are many who will, so it perpetuates.

 

Unions? They sign away more than they ever get in return!