Working Hours / Lunch Break Query

Comms69

onemanwenttomow wrote: »

Argh OMG trust me I do understand - I have worked there for 10 years and they have changed the system. It didn't affect my pay. I wouldn't be complaining if I benefited from it would I. Doesn't matter if it affected your pay or not.

I am not contracted to do 40 hours work. - your contract says 40 hours. If you want to do 35 hours, they can lower your pay. How does that sound? I'm contracted to work 35 hours and take an hour lunch break every day of an hour. I have to work overtime to take my lunch break off. - exactly, because it's considered work...

"Standing around waiting" is part of the job. So that is effectively irrelevant to what you are saying.

EXACTLY! and taking your lunch IS PART OF YOUR WORK!


It doesn't matter how long you've worked there (well except to say you have some protection from dismissal).


Of course you can continue to argue the point, doesn't change that literally everyone has disagreed with you. Don't take that personally, it's because most people here understand employment law to one level or another. You came here asking for advice because you presumably don't.


If youw ant people to simply agree with you, that's fine. Put that in the opening post, everyone will say "You're right". What then? You go to your boss and say "12 strangers online said I'm right and you're wrong"; the response is likely to be a P45.


People post here to help. Helping doesn't mean agreeing with exactly what people want to hear.


You can have nice agreeable advice; or you can have accurate, disagreeable advice. -Cant have both.

onemanwenttomow

I think I'm coming across worse than how it appears in my head, so I'll start by apologizing and thanking everyone for their advice.

Okay - i get your point that taking lunch is considered as work - but that never seemed to be the case before. I never used to have to work the extra hour in order to take the lunch break off which is why I am annoyed by it. I could work 7 hours overtime and that'd be enough to take a day off.

If that truly is the case, then I should be able to book off 3.5 hours in the morning, come in for my one hour work (lunch) and then take 3.5 hours in the afternoon... isn't that strange?

TELLIT01

It all hinges on whether you are contracted for 40 hours with paid lunch break, or 35 hours with unpaid lunch break. If 40 hours then they are technically correct in wanting you to build up 8 hours o/t before getting a day off, although I also understand your logic in stating you only WORK 7 hours.
Unfortunately, it's their game, their ball and their rules, no matter how idiotic their stance may seem.

nicechap

onemanwenttomow wrote: »

I think I'm coming across worse than how it appears in my head, so I'll start by apologizing and thanking everyone for their advice.

Okay - i get your point that taking lunch is considered as work - but that never seemed to be the case before. I never used to have to work the extra hour in order to take the lunch break off which is why I am annoyed by it. I could work 7 hours overtime and that'd be enough to take a day off.

If that truly is the case, then I should be able to book off 3.5 hours in the morning, come in for my one hour work (lunch) and then take 3.5 hours in the afternoon... isn't that strange?

Exactly my point (see previous post).

So, your complaint is not about the lunch break being paid or not paid but in a CHANGE to the way management have applied the rules.

If you were a member of the union, presumably there would have been some consultation or official notice that this new way of working is the correct way.

You are left with either accepting the situation, being angry and abiding by the new rules, or looking for something else that in overall terms is more acceptable to you.

You've had the benefit of the incorrect approach for a while, as far as I can tell from your posts they are not trying to claw back those hours, so you're still up in overall terms.

Entirely up to you how you react.

jobbingmusician

Here's an alternative approach (I do understand the basis for your dissatisfaction. I don't actually think you are being treated unfairly, though).

You have to work 8 hours overtime in order to accrue a day's leave, right? So this 8 hours should be on exactly the same basis as your ordinary day - an hour of it should be a lunch break. This works out just fine if the 8 hours is (for example) a Saturday's work, but rather less fine for your employer if you are accruing it as 'working late' in hour or two blocks at the end of the paid working day. An eighth of your overtime should be 'lunch break' time! This might be a better argument to put to the employer for changing their current calculations.

And actually, now I've put it in writing this way, I DO think you're being treated unfairly

There's anther reason for disliking this way of managing things - it makes your hourly rate lower, if you ever need to use this for comparison purposes when applying for another job.