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Has anyone gone from 5 to 4 days? What's the process?

4 replies

mobilemay · 20/02/2024 07:53

I'm FT but considering dropping a day from 5 to 4. It's to do with having reached 60 and apparently if I don't take my FS pension, it'll be subject to a reduction.

Has anyone reduced their days? What is the actual process? Questions I've got are:

  1. Do I start by contacting HR to give me a figure on how much monthly salary I will get on 4 days?
  1. Will they inform my Head of School without my consent?
  1. Are they obliged to consider my request? What if my HoS doesn't agree to the reduction? Is that it?
  1. Will I end up just cramming 5 days of work into 4?
  1. Is a Friday or Monday as a non-work day the better option?
  1. I get around 49 (incl BHs) annual leave at the moment. What would I get for 4 days of work? If I take a Monday as non work day do I lose BH Mondays when they happen?
  1. I know I will lose out on my career average pension as I won't be paying in as much. If I pay in more, does my employer contributions parallel this?
  1. Has anyone done this and regretted it?

My head's spinning at the moment and I can't see the wood for the trees.

OP posts:
Whyisthemoonmadeofgreencheese · 20/02/2024 17:21

Yes, and definitely not regretted it. The demands of UK academia today are such that I do not envy anyone continuing to work full-time into their 60s.

Some of the answers depend on your employer's specific procedures. Pension? Don't know whether you are in USS or TPS - in either case the best way to find out pension implications is to phone their helpline. But I would be wary of approaching HR just to find what your salary would be (probably unnecessary anyway for that information, as this sounds like a straightforward 20% salary reduction; you can calculate your new take home pay using MoneySavingExpert's Income Tax Calculator; and may be pleasantly surprised, as for tax reasons the take home pay reduction will be less than 20%, and you can also subtract from the reduction what you'll save on commuting costs). Better to speak to a trusted part-time colleague or union rep.

Your employer is obliged to consider your request, but not to accept it - however in the current perilous financial climate for universities is likely to welcome saving 20% on your salary and employer's pension contributions. When you make your request to your line manager, present an itemised list of demands so as to get clear agreement on which specific 20% of your job roles you will no longer do. You are in a good position to negotiate, as from your employer's point of view you are offering to make 20% of yourself redundant - what's not to like! But especially if the details are likely to be tricky, seek advice from a trusted third party and exercise your right (if you have one) for you to have a supporter attend the meeting as an observer.

Once you've gone down to 4 days, be firm about it - this is not as hard as it sounds, as being part-time is a near-unanswerable way to say no to requests to take on additional unpaid tasks ('Sorry I can't do that because I am officially contracted to do 20% less' trumps 'Sorry I can't do that because I've got too much on at the moment'). Yes there will probably still be occasions (e.g. marking season) when in practice you won't be able to keep to the hours you are paid for, but it is better for your wellbeing to be paid 4 days for sometimes working 5 than be paid 5 days for often working 6.

Mondays vs Fridays? Depends on your circumstances: both have their appeal. On balance Mondays gives more of a psychological boost given that many people dread Mondays, especially if you are in a workplace where many fulltime colleagues disappear on Fridays anyway, so you could feel cheated if that is your only official weekday off. But Wednesdays, if that's when meetings happen, could be best so you can get out of meetings and have a well-earned breather midweek. Annual leave? Complicated as for part time workers it's normally calculated in hours rather than days, so best to ask a colleague at your university who is already part time. But above all enjoy that whole extra day off every single week! Hope that helps - best of luck.

mobilemay · 20/02/2024 19:20

Whyisthemoonmadeofgreencheese · 20/02/2024 17:21

Yes, and definitely not regretted it. The demands of UK academia today are such that I do not envy anyone continuing to work full-time into their 60s.

Some of the answers depend on your employer's specific procedures. Pension? Don't know whether you are in USS or TPS - in either case the best way to find out pension implications is to phone their helpline. But I would be wary of approaching HR just to find what your salary would be (probably unnecessary anyway for that information, as this sounds like a straightforward 20% salary reduction; you can calculate your new take home pay using MoneySavingExpert's Income Tax Calculator; and may be pleasantly surprised, as for tax reasons the take home pay reduction will be less than 20%, and you can also subtract from the reduction what you'll save on commuting costs). Better to speak to a trusted part-time colleague or union rep.

Your employer is obliged to consider your request, but not to accept it - however in the current perilous financial climate for universities is likely to welcome saving 20% on your salary and employer's pension contributions. When you make your request to your line manager, present an itemised list of demands so as to get clear agreement on which specific 20% of your job roles you will no longer do. You are in a good position to negotiate, as from your employer's point of view you are offering to make 20% of yourself redundant - what's not to like! But especially if the details are likely to be tricky, seek advice from a trusted third party and exercise your right (if you have one) for you to have a supporter attend the meeting as an observer.

Once you've gone down to 4 days, be firm about it - this is not as hard as it sounds, as being part-time is a near-unanswerable way to say no to requests to take on additional unpaid tasks ('Sorry I can't do that because I am officially contracted to do 20% less' trumps 'Sorry I can't do that because I've got too much on at the moment'). Yes there will probably still be occasions (e.g. marking season) when in practice you won't be able to keep to the hours you are paid for, but it is better for your wellbeing to be paid 4 days for sometimes working 5 than be paid 5 days for often working 6.

Mondays vs Fridays? Depends on your circumstances: both have their appeal. On balance Mondays gives more of a psychological boost given that many people dread Mondays, especially if you are in a workplace where many fulltime colleagues disappear on Fridays anyway, so you could feel cheated if that is your only official weekday off. But Wednesdays, if that's when meetings happen, could be best so you can get out of meetings and have a well-earned breather midweek. Annual leave? Complicated as for part time workers it's normally calculated in hours rather than days, so best to ask a colleague at your university who is already part time. But above all enjoy that whole extra day off every single week! Hope that helps - best of luck.

This is really helpful. Thanks. I can see the point about Fridays but I don't want to surrender my BHs and think I might be doing that if I take Mondays ...?

Am in TPS - both Final Salary and Career Average. Atm, I'm losing money from my FS pension due to abatement (reduction) so it makes no sense to keep working 5 days and get less money. Something to do with having a FS pension whilst still contributing to a career average TPS one and not being allowed to earn more than what their salary if reference states I can.

Contacting the TPS is a nightmare. It seems the only way is to message them through their website.

OP posts:
Whyisthemoonmadeofgreencheese · 20/02/2024 20:53

Hopefully others more legally knowledgeable than me can answer your question about Bank Holiday Mondays, but I think you wouldn't lose out as this is covered by legislation on not treating part-time workers less favourably than full-time ones, as the TUC point out:
https://www.tuc.org.uk/guidance/i-dont-work-mondays-will-i-miss-out-bank-holidays
Further info from Citizens Advice:
https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/work/holidays-and-holiday-pay/working-on-bank-holidays/#:~:text=If%20you%20work%20part%2Dtime,if%20you%20were%20full%2Dtime.
If I have understood the position correctly, you would still get the same amount of time off in total regardless of whether your day off is Monday or Friday. The only difference is that if your day off is Friday, you would be effectively forced to use up 4 Mondays out of your leave rather than 1 Friday, so giving you a bit less flexibility about when you use the rest of your leave. So that makes, if anything, having Mondays off a better deal than Fridays. But: most universities include all the Bank Holidays in leave entitlement anyway, regardless of whether you are full time, or which days you normally work part-time. (The only universities I've heard of teaching on Bank Holidays are Oxford and Cambridge.) So I can't see how you would lose out, unless you actively want to work on Bank Holidays so as to take more leave at other times, and your employer allows Bank Holiday working, but it doesn't sound from your question like that is the case?

Soccermumamir · 23/02/2024 17:59

Ĥi,
I dropped from 5 to 4 days this year. I work in FE, and literally every man and his dog had to agree to it. Was a long wait, but I got what I needed.

Due to go back to 5 days in September, but we shall see.

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