I have another flexible work story, hot off the press. I work for the NHS and am trying to gain some superspecialised experience. Have been offered job asked my employer and have been told....

yes in your own time

I want to cry!

My dh was turned down. Told it was for business reasons. Pointed out his female boss worked flexible hours. Was then told he should have negotiated this at the beginning of his contract (before he had children). Just got bored and gave it up...

I have flexible work hours. However, job description not changed, just hours (and therefore pay) reduced.

I asked to work from home 2 days a week, and to change my hours to be 8-4:30 instead of 9-5:30. This worked out really well - to the extent of me now working mainly from home all the time!

However, the reality of doing what I asked for really isn't as simple as I had hoped for. In actual fact I often need to be in customer meetings, and there's only so many of them that can be done via conference calls, so I sometimes have to be somewhere quite far from home for a very long day.

Swings and roundabouts I suppose - at least my company went out of their way to try to accommodate me!

I have had all my flexible working requests granted. I work at an ancient university. They are fabulous . I've done 4 full days, 3 full days and now do 60% FTE as 0915 - 1500h four days a week so I can do the school run.

Dh has never asked and doesn't want flexible working but I do know that friends who work within the NHS have had dreadful times being allowed to train flexibly.

MI I need you on my speech thread

My partner asked to work from 7.45 to 4pm three days a week, and his employer was fine about it. He did it for 14 months.

oh and he was made to do 6 months probation to ensure his hours didn't suffer (lawyer)

He gets the odd dig about it at work but he thinks fuckem

DH and I both did

I wanted to go down to 4 days a week. I was refused but then got poached by another company and part of my agreement to jump ship included 4 days a week. Now I am self employed and I work 3 or 4 days a week, one from home

DH asked and was allowed to work from home one day a week. It works v well - he starts and finishes early so he can collect dd from school

I requested and got flexible working.

My husband requested and got refused, his boss relented eventually but it has ruined their working relationship and he will probably end up not taking it up.

I requested very slight changes to my working day, and was successful. I start and finish early, and work 1/2 hour less than everyone else every day. I took a pay cut to do this.

The company relocated to a different part of London a few months after I returned from maternity leave, so I needed to leave 15 minutes earlier to catch my train. They were fine about cutting my lunch break to three-quarters of an hour so I could do this.

I'm lucky in that I do enjoy my job, but I do sometimes feel a bit stuck here - I'm not confident that I'd be able to do the same hours in a new job. So I'm not looking for one!