Family friendly working - it's ok as long as you're not the service user

[gramercy]

You hear such a lot about family friendly/women friendly working. All very good in theory.

But my dentist has left and been replaced with one who works Monday to Thursday 9.30 till 3pm. No school holidays. Now, that's marvellous for her, I'm sure. But I don't want to take my dcs out of school to go for a check-up. I want to go after school or when they're on holiday.

What if all shops only opened between 9 and 3.30? Or doctor's surgeries? Or the cinema? Or restaurants? Only pensioners could access any services!

I don't know if I'm being unreasonable or not, but frankly I'm a bit cheesed off with the surgery for foisting this person on old patients. I would take my business elsewhere but since it's a (rare) National Health dentist I'm stuffed.

Blimey, I wonder if we share the same dentist

Mind you, she's been there for years but has just returned.

Yes, it's bloody annoying but a decent surgery would make sure there was another Dentist available to cover the hours she doesn't work.

Isn't there another dentist at the surgery who works different hours?

i guess if you are a highly skilled professional you can decide for yourself when you want to work

My dentist, fwiw a young dude a few years into his career, only does nhs work on a wednesday. unless i fancy paying through the nose (teeth?) then wednesday it is

inconvenient, but he gets to set those terms, and if i don't like it i can go elsewhere as can you

You could contact PALS, they are there to deal with this sort of thing. YANBU there should be an in between, maybe 1 day she works late or 1 day a week in the holidays.

I don't think the issue is with this dentists working hours. The problem is with the Surgery not having another dentist working the rest of the hours In the working day.

I agree with Scacalogos - it's about the surgery not providing a service over longer hours / school holiday, not about this dentist's Ts&Cs.
Pretty annoying for you in this case, but possibly means they are retaining a highly regarded colleague who might choose not to work as the other option. I would have though that would mean she can still see a lot of patients, leaving a partner a lot less to do than if she didn't work at all.
Equally, not all jobs are quite so 'customer facing' as this, and there are quite a lot of people who are happy to do jobs starting at 3pm or whatever, to fit around their commitments, be that a college course or their own childcare.
So, YABU to lump all family friendly working hours as bad, becasue of one poor experience.

I agree,for example, a lot of gps do work part time hours that suit them, which is fine as long as their are other gps at the surgery who work alternate hours/days.

I get that you're making the point about 'women friendly' working because your dentist happens to be a woman. But TBH, it sounds a bit as if you're passing the buck to her when the blame is with the practice. They'd presumably have been just as disorganized if they'd employed a bloke who requested to work those hours. This issue isn't the individual who's working - it's the fact the practice needs to cover enough hours and sufficiently sensible hours, to provide the service.

I think your point really only holds for a (NHS) dentist or a (NHS) doctor, though. Restaurants can and do open whenever they choose ... why not? So can cinemas.

They may lose custom, but it's a bit silly to assume you're best placed to know whether or not they are losing custom. There was a coffee shop I used to love that opened from 12 noon until 2am. People occasionally wondered why the heck they chose those hours, but they were clearly getting the money in!

Have you actually been told you have to see this dentist and you can't transfer to another in the surgery?

Have you actually called round a few other NHS practices in the area? I ask as it was nigh on impossible to get an NHS dentist here a few years back, now it's easy as sugar free pie, my parents, DH, DB and I all changed practices last year and it only took a phone call.