Phone ringing during lunch break!

mountainofdebt

What's a lunch break ?

to be honest it would be nice not to work through my (unpaid) lunch break let alone only have the phones to worry about

Fire_Fox

Abbafan1972 wrote: »

Read my original post re the car. And no, no-one forces me to sit in the office, but my point is there's nowhere else!

Go for a walk, you don't have to actually go anywhere, just get out in the fresh air and sunlight (even in winter and on cloudy days it is beneficial), work on the recommended 10,000 steps a day and your intake of vitamin D. People are expecting you to answer the telephone because you are choosing to sit at your desk, that suggests you are either antisocial or committed to making a good impression in your shiny new job, ie. answering the telephone even tho on a break.

Daedalus

I would probably answer, its a direct line so will always be about my clients and phone normally means urgent. There is no pressure to answer, if no one answers there phone it is forwarded to out departments mini contact centre who will take a message.

Only rock the boat if your boss is open to new ideas

duckandcover

Seems odd that they would want the entire office on lunch at the same time.

Does that mean then that there are other people also sitting at their desks having lunch at the same time, and if so do they answer the phone as well? I.e. do you share the responsibility during that half-hour?

I usually have lunch at my desk and would normally only answer the phone if for some reason no one else is available, although often towards the end of the lunch hour I'd just answer it automatically out of habit!

Edit: does your phone have a 'do not disturb' option? I don't use mine but the options there, which means the phone doesn't ring for external calls, and for internal calls the other caller will see that you're unavailable.

persa

AP007 wrote: »

Depending on what you do the call could take 2 or 20 mins or longer. Then what?

In my old job if I picked up the phone I would then be talking to a supplier who would be asking something then Id have to investigate and then the call goes on and on.

If it's quiet enough to warrant it, I'll finish up 20 minutes earlier, or take a 20 minute break later. If it's busy season, I'll be grateful if only 20 minutes of overtime are required in one day...

If I don't want to be disturbed at lunch, I go out. As far as I'm concerned, if I'm at my desk, I'm contactable. It's a pain picking up voicemails and playing phone tag, I'd rather just answer the first call if possible.

daisy0210

I had the same problem in my old job. If the phone rang at lunch time we still had to answer it.Maybe you should talk to the person in charge , keep a record of how often you answer the phone at luchtime and come to some arrangement .

Achtung_Baby

Unless you know the call is going to take up the majority of your break, it's always worth answering really. You never know when it might be an important caller. Plus, if it's important, they'll probably continue to ring anyway.

ditzyat50

It takes a very strong willed person not to answer a ringing phone. I personally would end up answering it and then be really annoyed with myself for not taking my entitled lunch break. Is it possible you could just take if off the hook?

AP007

persa wrote: »

If it's quiet enough to warrant it, I'll finish up 20 minutes earlier, or take a 20 minute break later. If it's busy season, I'll be grateful if only 20 minutes of overtime are required in one day...

If I don't want to be disturbed at lunch, I go out. As far as I'm concerned, if I'm at my desk, I'm contactable. It's a pain picking up voicemails and playing phone tag, I'd rather just answer the first call if possible.

No company I have ever worked for has paid over time or ever allowed TOIL of anything.

If you work your lunch break due to no cover some companies do not care.

skintandscared_2

A work phone should NEVER go unanswered. During normal working hours, how many of you are at the same level and responsible for answering the phones? I would set up a rota of all those people, so everyone has one day where they are the one who answers the phone during the designated lunch half-hour, and they take THEIR half-hour break either before or after everyone else, thus getting their own quiet half-hour. We get an unpaid hour for lunch and that is what our larger departments do.

I, personally, very rarely go out for lunch and eat mine at my desk as we are a very small department and I'm often there on my own. I would never not answer the phone.