To say " leave my zero hours contract alone! "

[Seventy6]

Just heard on the news of proposals to make employers fix the hours of employees after 6 months if there is a 0 hours contract.

My 0 hours job is perfect for both parties at the moment, I work on projects and can work if I want and if needed for that piece of work. If I can't, that's ok, they can use someone else. Some weeks I work loads , in the holidays much less. If I have to fix my hours the flexibility which makes the arrangement will be lost. I will no longer have a job.

My student sister has a similar situation in the restaurant where she works, she also enjoys the flexibility, whilst the restaurant can afford to operate in a seasonal weather based business.

I know these contracts don't work for everyone, but it is wiring to take the flexibility away for all.

I don't think anybody is going to abolish zero hours contracts altogether.

YANBU. These contracts do work very well for many people.

I think something should be done to make sure employees aren't exploited, but I don't think it would be right to force employers to offer contracts that don't work well for their business.

I really can see the majority of unscrupulous businesses making life impossible for their employees around the 10/11 month mark so that they leave. Thus wriggling out of ever having to provide decent contracts.

And who, typically on this kind of wage, is going to have the time/money/know-how to challenge this kind of behavior through employment law? Very few :(

LowClouds - that's not quite true - if you're making your own hours, working from your own premises etc. then you can be self employed, multiple employers are not necessary.

1000s of IT contractors work this way, for one customer at a time.

I don't think the proposals are going to take a zero-hours contract away from you if you want to keep it OP. I'm sure there will be plenty of latitude to get around it.

Labour's plans to tighten up on the way people on zero hours are exploited in my opinion don't go far enough. The reality is not going to be "fixed hours" which is unworkable in areas like home care but "guaranteed hours". This means the employer has to provide or pay 18 hours for example, but you need to guarantee availability for 26 hours.

The devil, as always, is in the detail.

I on a one motnh contract, i hate it and i dread having to sign back on should they wish to get rid of me which they seem to have done to people in the past

oops, sorry for typos, im on a one month contract

I think forcing people to become self employed when they don't want to be would be no better than zero hours contracts.

My DH is technically self employed, despite working for the same company for the last five years. As a result he gets no security as he could be let go with a weeks notice, no holiday pay, no sickness benefits, no pension. The very slight increase in his hourly wage for this type of contract doesn't outweigh the benefits he would have if he was staff, so I really don't see how forcing people into self employment will give workers a better deal.

Then why OP don't they treat you as a consultant on a call off contract instead?

Zero hours contracts are dreadful for many people when in reality they aren't doing what you are doing.

I would prefer that we had better employee representatives who can protect workers instead of the government having to wade in and use a sledge hammer. This representatives would be called unions but for some reason people think it is a bad thing for workers' rights to be championed. Business = profit = king. But only for a select few.

Hotcrosshunny

I think they can't treat me as a consultant because I do not meet the definition of a self employed worker.

Op, you're lucky that the flexibility works both ways with your employer.

In dh's work, the staff on zero hours get told when to come in and if they can't then those are likely to be the last hours they'll be offered. The flexibility is all on the employer's side and staff are expected to be available to work whether they get hours or not.

Can you imagine trying to arrange paid for child care around that? (clue: on the wages paid you can't)

Could it be replaced with 1 hour contract.

I have a casual zero hours contract with an employer (as well as a fixed part time job). I don't think that they would have an issue with offering fixed work after six months as I doubt that anyone would take it. I'm not sure how much they would be expected to offer as I only do a few hours here or there.

The main problem with zero hours contracts seems to be that some employers seem to feel that while they should not be obliged to offer work employees have to take anything they do offer. Some of these employers also put something in the contract to stop employees taking work elsewhere which is outrageous! This should be stopped.

I thought it wouldn't fit your situation because you don't do the same hours each week. The idea is that if people are actually working a regular work pattern then they should have the security of the contract to go with it.

For you - you don't do a regular work pattern so you stay as you are - which suits you.

If zero hour contracts are left only as an option then I imagine some businesses will pressure employees to accept them.

A zero hour contract with two way flexibility would suit me as I'm self employed and therefore work is unpredictable. But they are inherently problematic and I think better for the majority, were they to be scrapped.

I don't like the idea that you are sanctioned if you don't want to apply for it and tbh i wouldn't either. DP is on zero hours and it's ok at the moment it's a steady stream of work but I always worry it will just stop suddenly. He is a good worker and been there for over 4 months. I wish they would make it after 6 months they HAVE to offer a job if the employee wishes to take it.

I very reluctantly agreed a zero hours contract with our part-timer, as I don't approve of them in principle. However, she wanted the security of being employed with the flexibility of choosing her own hours to a large extent; we wanted the flexibility of not being tied to a fixed number of hours per week/month, so for us all, a zero hours contract is working well.

It does help that we've known her a long time, and each side knows the other won't take the piss. Wish that was the same for all employer/employee relationships .

ChunkyPickle - happy to be wrong. This was some time ago, but it was what I was told by a previous tax inspector who was running the course. I am sure clients can be sequential. The point being made was really that companies shouldn't make staff redundant, then rehire them as contractors, with no guaranteed hours for the worker but all the financial liability.

I worked for a company for a few weeks on a zero hour contract. They told me they would be able to give me 22 hours a week at least, no doubt about it, that way I could work out my wages and claim WTC. Stupidly, I believed them.

After a week they dropped my hours down to 6 a week so that job had to go, which was a good thing as I hated it anyway.

I think zero hour contracts are disgusting and only suit a very few.

Lets face it, whatever the law says there are always going to be some employers that find a way to get around it and therefore still exploit people. It pisses me right off.

Years ago I got offered a job in an estate agency, but a condition of them offering me the job was that I had to opt out of the working hours regulations and sign the waiver!

I'd imagine many companies will pull those kind of stunts.

Self employed people charge a much higher rate than employed people to make up for the lack of security, NI and tax, holiday/pension, and usually skills. If an employer has people on a 0 hours contract to save money, they're not going to pay an enhanced rate, so the person offering to go self employed will end up earning very little once they've taken out all the other bits and pieces which have to come out of the rate.

I don't think that's a good solution for most people on 0 hours.

I loved my 0 hours contract for 2 years, until another company took over and I was literally given 1 hour of work a week (I had been doing 30-40 hours previously)

YANBU to not want it gone completely, it can really work for some, however there seems to be a lot more people being screwed over by it unfortunately.

It's only a labour party proposal. Even if they win the election next year, there's no guarantee whatsoever that it'll ever come into reality. I wouldn't worry too much about it yet - remember all the things we were promised before the last election that still haven't materialised?!

I would imagine there will be an opt-out clause?

Zero hours contracts have been incredibly damaging for some and do not provide stability or a good home/life balance in most cases.

Actually, it wouldn't affect you after 6 months anyway - that's the earliest you'd be able to request it, if you wanted it. And it'd only happen automatically if you'd been working the same hours for 12 months, so if you didn't want it, it wouldn't happen, because it's unlikely you'd have been doing the exact same hours for 12 months in the OPs situation.