Promotion, pay rises and grade points: please tell me your tales

[DalmatianJane]

Really hoping someone here has been in a similar situation and can offer some advice.

I’m going up for promotion this year (Russell Group) from L to SL, and it’s not clear what salary point I will be on if the SL application is successful. I'm at the top of the normal grade point range for L (though haven't made it into the 'contribution points' range, whatever that is) and am wondering whether I will just go directly to the bottom of the SL grade point to slowly work my way up, or whether there's any mechanism for asking to start a few rungs up.

Has anyone made this jump - either L to SL, or SL to Reader or Reader to Prof - who can shed any light on which spine point you went up to in the new grade? And has anyone managed to convince their institution to let them start at something other than the bottom of the new grade point?

I'm somewhat reticent to ask my HoD or departmental colleagues as I don't want to look grasping and avaricious (people in my discipline tend to make a big show of not being in it for the money - funnily enough it's mostly well paid senior professors who are the loudest in this respect). But, as luck would have it, we are applying for a mortgage, right at the point my payslips will show a lower salary than usual due to the strike, and it's looking pretty tight. So even a little bit of extra salary might make the difference between getting the mortgage - and the house - and not.

(I know this will be highly institution-specific but would still love to hear from others who have been through similar things, as the HR webpage at my institution is less than transparent about the processes . I will ring HR about it, but would love to go into that conversation armed with knowledge about how it works at other places.)

Try your HR website. This example from Cambridge is bottom of the scale or 2 points, whichever is greater www.hr.admin.cam.ac.uk/pay-benefits/promotion

In all institutions I have been in, you go to a specific point on the new scale, usually the bottom. There is no room for negotiation unless you have an external offer, i.e. it is a retention issue.

And to add: I do think that institutions are a little silly not to consider this case by case, and give bigger pay awards where the person clearly deserves it.

As soon as an academic starts trying to get external offers, the genie is out of the bottle: they mentally withdraw from the institution and may focus on their own careers, turning away from tasks that help the institution but not themselves. A rather cheap token of appreciation, giving a few points on the pay scale, could prevent this genie escaping from the bottle.

This whole issue is one reason for the gender pay gap in academia - men are much more likely to look for external offers and push up their pay that way.

As pp said - bottom of the new scale by default when you stay in your current institution.

It would take something really exceptional - like a simultaneous external offer, winning a Nobel prize, etc. - to start an internal promotion on a higher point.

Thanks for the replies. No Nobel Prize or external offers coming my way (I have tried, but it's one of those fields where there are literally hundreds of applicants per position) so looks like it's the bottom of the scale for me.

I’d expect bottom of next scale too, but look at discretionary spone point raises too. I had one last year, because I knew I wouldn’t be promoted, but I’d done a ton of work on something that I wanted recognition for. You won’t get that the same year as a promotion, but worth considering for the future.

It's usually just the equivalent of one or two points 'up'. Essentially, in most cases, it's an extension of the payscale rather than a big rise. The exception would be for big admin roles - there tends to be 'danger money' associated with HoD and above.

The exception would be for big admin roles - there tends to be 'danger money' associated with HoD and above.

HoD supplements are worth very little money, given the amount of work involved. Much more lucrative to take on advisory roles for research councils outside the UK, or serve on review/appointments panels.....