Legal Break requirements and hours worked - office job

starcloud

My girlfriend has been offered an office admin job in central London on £20k. The hours required are 9am to 6.30pm with half an hour unpaid for lunch but there is an expectation that if it is busy she might have to stay late, sometimes up to 10pm even.

She is not happy about possibly working 50hrs a week which brings the salary closer to minimum wage. Also, 30 mins unpaid lunch seems very tight for such long hours. The journey time is 1 hour each way and about £6.70 a day.

I assume all this is legal? The starting range was up to £22k and she might well push for that as a start. She has a few years experience of related jobs, but the job market is as it is that this offer took 3 hrs of interviews over 2 sessions.

The company is small and expanding working with international students.

It sounds like there is potential but they sound like they want so much for a start in terms of commitment for relatively little money.

Any thoughts?

Thanks

wiogs

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1998/1833/regulation/12/made

If she gets half an hour break then it is ten minutes more than the legal minimum.

What sort of "expectation" do they have that she may work later? Would this extra work be unpaid.

martinsurrey

as long as the hours worked do not take her under NMW, which at £20k a year is an average 61 hours a week (using the 21+ rate from 1 Oct 13), its all above board and legal.

unfortunetly as shes found out, there are many people going for few jobs, so she has little in the way of power.

starcloud

wiogs wrote: »

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1998/1833/regulation/12/made

If she gets half an hour break then it is ten minutes more than the legal minimum.

What sort of "expectation" do they have that she may work later? Would this extra work be unpaid.

The salary is pro rata and there was no mention of paid overtime.

The expectation of extra work is probably up to 10 hours a week more at the most.

scheming_gypsy

starcloud wrote: »

but there is an expectation that if it is busy she might have to stay late, sometimes up to 10pm even.

She is not happy about possibly working 50hrs a week which brings the salary closer to minimum wage. Also, 30 mins unpaid lunch seems very tight for such long hours. The journey time is 1 hour each way and about £6.70 a day.

to be honest I think she's just getting stressed over the worst possible case scenario that will probably never happen.
"IF busy she MIGHT have to stay late, SOMETIMES up to 10pm". The most likely scenario is that she might end up working till 10pm at some point occasionally, but may have to work till 7 / 8 pm every so often to catch up on the work load.
They've probably mentioned it because it's happened sometimes in the past and they want new staff to be aware that it's a possibility.

anamenottaken

starcloud wrote: »

The salary is pro rata and there was no mention of paid overtime.

The expectation of extra work is probably up to 10 hours a week more at the most.

What do you mean by "the salary is pro rata"?
What is it pro rated to?

AP007

starcloud wrote: »

The salary is pro rata and there was no mention of paid overtime.

The expectation of extra work is probably up to 10 hours a week more at the most.

Pro rata is only used for part time work

ie 5 days a week £20k, or 3 days a week £20k pro rata

Meaning 3/5th of the £20k etc