What’s the deal with flexi time?

I work in a large building with checks on entry, where if we all arrived at 9am it would be carnage. Flexi time allows for a staggered entry and exit and also allows me to not have to use annual leave or work time for appointments, I just work around them. Downsides have been that often I work through my lunch, or 1 or 2 hours over my daily hours, due to workload (public sector) and there is an expectation of this in my specific role, with little time to take it back. However there are people in other departments who do take the piss (claim half an hour dinner but take an hour and half, leave at lunchtime every friday with no hours built up to do so etc) and make it difficult to meet business need; this requires strong management which doesn't always happen. I think if used appropriately and still able to respond to business need, there should be no issue

We had flexi time but also core hours to cover the phone lines for the public. Most people now actually prefer to email as that can be sent at any time. In my office it fortunately fell that certain people came in early, others came in after doing a school run. That meant everyone staggered lunch and some left when core hours were finished, ie me at 4pm to collect my child from nursery, those that came in later worked later. It worked for our department, I built flexi to cover bank holidays as I was part time.

The ability to build flex and take a day off was brilliant but due to having a small department it was harder than you think. In a previous job a group of 5 of us would leave early due to flex, go to a spa for a few hours, then out to dinner. Really helped with mental health and this was 25 years ago.

Jealousy I guess, the same as all those people who bitch about wfh.
DH has flexitime, it sounds good on paper , but in practice it's just an excuse to avoid paying for overtime. He never gets to take all the flexitime he accrues because his dept is always so short staffed and underfunded.

Flexi time is great. I don’t take the piss tbh, I usually build up an extra two days a year of leave just by coming in a few minutes early every day. Suits me 🤷‍♀️

If it affects the service received by the public then it’s unreasonable.

Depends what you mean by flexitime tbf.