Nightshift & Maternity

mazza111

First port of call would be asking manager for a risk assessment.

Nothing gets done.

Call HR and ask for a risk assessment.

I was on a relatively light part of the store, health and beauty, until I fell pregnant at the same time they decided to give my section to twilight staff. Which meant I was on grocery the same as everyone else. Yes it is heavy work. Take care of yourself and your baby.

tori.k

Congrats on your news wildflower ....have you ask to be moved to a lighter isle like crips or H&B im surprised they haven't moved you already TBH as that's seems to be the standard pratice, the last maid in our place moved over to twilight shift would that be an option for you? if you would rather not do days, there are loads of lighter work that can be found like toilet rolls and tea&coffee, cereal and cages and pallets should be brought out to you to the shop floor, your manager is young could be that he is waiting for you to say what you can&can't do,

macalacka

I do wish employees would take responsibility for themselves when it comes to risk assessments. This is not a rant at you CornishWildFlower but I read it so much on here.

Just go ask for your risk assessment, simple.

In terms of your hours etc you just need to talk to your line manager about what else you can do. You must realise though that they may not be able to accomodate the hours you want so you may need to compromise. Is the supermarket 24 hours? Can you do the checkouts or admin? I used to work for ASDA before my HR days and we had a lot of roles that did not require as much heavy lifting. Can you do home shopping picking? what department do you work on now?

supermaiden

I fully understand how you feel with needing other colleagues to do things. Luckily I worked with quite a few women who wouldnt hear of me doing anything that would be a risk to myself or baby. The guys werent so understanding but did the heavy lifting anyway and never said anything to me, I could just tell lol but what can you do. I never did a lot of lifting but what I did lift was heavy and I tried to make up for it in other ways by helping out with shutting down and cleaning things up.

Defnitely chase, and if the manager is a young lad who doesnt know much he needs to be told as he may not even think of the dangers of you doing these things. Like I said before you have to care for yourself and baby. I would simply ask for either different tasks which dont include lifting and bending or ask to be put on checkouts until you leave. I know a girl who had that happen as she was struggling and went to checkouts.

Its really important you stand up for yourself and your baby. I cannot stress that enough. I would hate for something to happen when all it would take would be them doing what is necessary.
I am wondering if we work at the same company but different stores, it sounds similar

acl2009

Hi CWF

First off congratulations on your pregnancy. I'm currently 31 weeks and I work shifts in the emergency services. I am incredibly fortunate that my direct boss is a a woman with 2 children and has been nothing but fantastic. My shifts involve 2 9 hour days followed by 2 15 hour nights. I have used some of my annual leave entitlement to only do 1 night shift in each block, though my boss did say I could get a note from my doc instead of using my leave but I didn't feel comfortable doing that as I don't like to take the pi$$, as I've had a very easy pregnancy and there was no medical need for me to its just more of a convinience and to stop tiredness thing!

I have a colleague who is at a similar stage in her pregnancy to you and she was actually signed off night shifts by her doctor. Can your doctor/midwife provide a document to your employer stating that your are to do limited night shifts? At the end of the day yours and your baby's safety is the main priority and any employer - especially if it's a national well known supermarket - would be far too scared to risk being held responsible that god forbid anything should happen. They should also allow you to take an extra break even if for half an hour as pregnany is bloomin tiring especially if you are doing any manual work.

Get the risk assessment done ASAP and remember they can not discriminate against you for being pregnant.

good luck with your boss