What's a working day in an office job?

[Concestor]

This has come up in a work situation where someone gets paid a day rate and logs their hours and I'm curious.

I think a working day in an office job is 7.5 hours, based on the 9-5.30 with a lunch hour. Obviously I know lots of people work different patterns to this these days.

Do you think a working day in an office job is 7.5 hours? Or something else? What hours would you expect from a contractor on a day rate where the hours per day hadn't been clarified/agreed?

7 hours 9 - 5 with hour lunch unpaid

I do 8-4 with an hour unpaid lunch, so 7 hours per day.

I agree that a 7.5 hour office day feels fairly standard. But if hours of the day rate have not been agreed upon formally, ie with a contract, then I'm not sure it matters.

What is the standard working week at the place?
If 40hrs I'd expect 8hrs a day, if 35 then 7hrs.
Certainly any less than 7hrs I'd think you were being shortchanged.

mine is 35 hr week 9-5 with 1 hour each day for lunch unpaid

Depends. I hire contractors at up to £1k per day, and I expect a good days work out of them. Very few people in my industry (office based) only work 7-8 hour days. Most are at their desk by 8am, leaving sometime between 6-9pm depending on workload at the time.

I think about 7 to 8 hours. I work freelance and charge a day rate. Honestly I'd be a bit put out if somone was asking me to prove my hours or similar. I often work in a flexible way responding to things they come in. So I'm doing extra bits too. There's definitely trust needed, but I feel at the level a contractor is working at quibbling over 30 mins isn't the vibe.

My contract is 7.5 hours. My previous employer was 7 hours. Plus an hour lunch break so standard working hours are 9.-5.30 now.

9-5 with half an hour for lunch.

It’s 7.5 hours in our office. Flexible start
/ finish times and lunch breaks so there’s folk in any time from 7:30am to 6pm. Personally, I tend to work my hours according to what needs doing. This week is a very quiet work week as I’m between projects but last week I worked 3 x 9 hours days plus travel. IME
contractors tend to work longer hours than employees.

What's a "office job"? Data entry is an office job...CEO is an office job.

I’m a contractor and a day is 7.5 hours so I just work it out based on number of hours/ 7.5 x day rate as I usually work some of every day.

I do 7.5 hours with 30 mins lunch. We can choose anytime between 8 and 6. I choose to do 8 til 4. Some others do 9.30 5.30

Some of my contracts say 8hrs = 1 day but usually they’re offering a higher day rate than I usually charge.
Normally I call a day between 7 and 8 hours - I charge for whole days mostly so if I’ve done 7hrs total that’ll be a day charge but equally sometimes I call 15-16hrs two days.

All the contractors that work for me usually put in 7.5 hours a day in their timesheets/invoices.

Depends on the industry, mine is easily 9 sometimes 10 hour days in the office. Contractors are generally 9-9.5 hours per day (half hour unpaid lunch break). Same in every place I've worked where I've done the same job.

My oh used to be a contractor his contract said "professional hours" it was invariably 8am to 6pm with odd days off for religious reasons such as Friday off instead of Sunday depending where in the world he was supporting.

Ours is 7.3 hours which is a pain but then most people work 8.11 hours on a 9 day fortnight.

I work a few different jobs.

My employed job has a working day as 7.5hrs and we have a 30 mins unpaid lunch break.

My sessional work where I'm paid a day rate is for an 8hr working day, not inclusive of any unpaid breaks.

Surely if they are a contractor they need to clarify how many hours of work they class as a "day"?

Full time in many jobs is 37.5 hours (contracted, I know many people work more) so yes 7.5 hours. I've only ever had one contract that was 40 hours. Occasionally you hear of people on 35 at full time.

This is how I feel. I have recently just been asked to
Prove my hours

7.5h in my job
8h at work with unpaid 30m lunch.
We work flexi so start and finish core hours are 8-10am and 4-6pm and you can take lunch anytime between 12 and 2pm.
Must clock in and out 4 times a day (NHS clinical staff but not nurse/doctor)

It's complicated, contractor is the closest I could get without being totally outing, sorry. They are self employed but don't get to set the rate or hours so this conversation has arisen.
I'm in a similar role in another team and I consider 7.5 to be a day, but there's no clarity anywhere.

My day rate contract usually states either 7 or 7.5 hours (it varies between jobs).
In reality, you are being paid a lot of money to get the job done, so you just work as needed; sometimes it will be 7 hours, but sometimes it will be twice that.