Leaving NHS bank role

sapphireeye

I'm looking for some advice, ideally from someone who's worked on the NHS staff bank or for NHS professionals! I'm working as an administrative worker on the NHS bank at a local hospital, I'm a student and have previous NHS experience so just wanted temporary work to be able to fill my holidays. I was offered a position which I started a few weeks ago, the manager was a bit wishy washy about explaining the job over the phone and wasn't really sure how long they'd need me. I told them I was available until the end of September apart from one week where I'm on holiday, and she said that they had a new permanent member of staff starting so just needed someone to fill the role until then but she wasn't sure when the new employee would be starting, it could be any time.

On starting the role it turned out it was nothing like I expected, despite having worked in the same job band in the past. There's so much work that I'm really struggling to cope with it on my own, a massive backlog from where they haven't had anyone in the role and I'm using a load of systems that I have no previous experience of and working in a department that I knew nothing about. I've managed to pick everything up but I still feel completely overloaded, I ended up in the toilets crying on a few occasions (I know that's pathetic!!) because I had the manager shouting at me as I hadn't done tasks that I didn't know I was meant to be doing (no-one told me) and I dread going in every day.

I've now been offered some temporary work elsewhere which I know I'll enjoy a lot more (I worked at the same place last summer, the role is only for a few weeks in September) and I'd really like to take it but I'm not sure what the rules are regarding leaving bank work and I can't find anything in any of my paperwork or online. I know that I don't have to accept work and they don't have to offer it but I'm not sure what happens once you've started a position. I can't find anything about notice periods or anything that mentions leaving and I'm not sure whether because I said I can work until the end of September I'm now tied into that. I know when I've worked in the NHS in the past I've seen bank workers dropped at a moment's notice but I don't know if it works the other way round. I emailed HR to explain how much I'm struggling with the role (I don't have time to ring them during my working hours) and to ask if there was anyone else that could take over but they haven't got back to me. My line manager in the department has just gone on annual leave.

Does anyone know what the requirements are in this situation?

LittleVoice

South Gloucestershire PCT has the following in its Bank Staff policy and I see no reason why an acute trust would be different.

Whilst periods of notice do not form part of the bank contract, bank staff
should notify the PCT if they no longer intend to work for the Bank.

I would give notice of your intention to leave to whoever is replacing the manager on leave, with a copy to the Bank administrators (HR contact?).

jackyann

I have done a lot of NHS bank work, and in my contract there was no mention of notice at all, on either side.
Normally, as a courtesy, you let people know if you aren't coming in, but there was no legal need to do so.
The only thing I would consider is that as a lot of bank work is "word of mouth", are you likely to work there again? If so, you may like to write down your reasons for stopping the job and give some courtesy notice.
If you really want to, then you should write down all of this, tell your manager that you are contacting HR (you don't have to tell him/her why) and aks them to help you discuss this problem with the manager (who sounds dreadful)
However, i can see that you would rather cut & run!

sapphireeye

Thanks both for your replies, they were very helpful. My contact in HR has emailed me back saying she'll speak to her manager about it. I'm at university training for a profession where I'll rely on the NHS for a career so I really don't want to mess them around hence why I'm trying to go about this the best way. I also don't want to let the department down! I'm due to go on holiday at the end of next week (which I think my manager might have forgotten) so they will probably need to find someone to cover me anyway.