To finish work on time

[tellow]

I'm a lunchtime supervisor. I'm contracted to work 11.30-1.30. I always blow the whistle to signal that it's time to come in at 1.25 its often 5-10min after that that I actually leave the building. Everyone does the same and never complains. Last week I blew the whistle at 1.20 to allow extra time that was needed to round up the reception class, obviously they aren't used to the routine or us and they keep running off etc. I get an email today complaining that the whistle is being blown to early. Obviously by blowing early the rest of the school re-enters school 5 min earlier than normal. I will mention it tomorrow but I feel this should of been obvious. Am I expected to stay even longer after my time has finished which we already do? How are we expected to blow the whistle at 1.30, line the children up and walk them in and finish at 1.30? AIBU?

First out the door... probably with a significant amount of. Compensation for unfair dismissal.

Anyone can report a company for not paying minimum wage.. you don't even have to work there.

A goos example is sports direct... who only employ on zero hours contracts. So super easy to stop giving hours to anyone with no consequences. They were still fined and forced to adjust their policies.

Just because you didn't feel empowered to use our countries laws to protect your rights. Doesn't mean others shouldn't.

Minimum wage is there for a reason.

6 mins a day is 30 minutes a week thats an extra hour every 2 weeks. For someone being paid 1 hour a day that means they aren't being paid for a significant amount of their time.

Well, calleach, your employer was breaking the law

Totally reasonable for OP to want paying for her time. 5 minutes makes a great deal of difference when you add it up over a year. That's half an hour a week, 39 weeks a year, comes out to an extra 2.5 days work per annum her employer have decided they're entitled to unpaid. That's not to say they won't be dicks about it if it's brought up especially if they're an academy but the principle of the thing is correct. Actually I wish more people took OPs approach and did something about it.

Cailleach666

Your employer could easily be taken to court. I would be first out the door anyway without them throwing me out if I worked there.
My shift finishes at 5.30 and I'm packed up and in my car by 5.35. Our nursery closes at 6pm so would never stay any later unless sorted before and paid.
You and your OH must be missing out on a lot of overtime pay!

OP speak to the HT. I think blowing the whistle at 1.25 is reasonable and anyone expecting you to stay later than 1.30 are unreasonable

Oh actually 5 x 5 minutes is actually 25 minutes but OP sometimes works an extra 10 minutes. So probably still about 2.5 days a year average but not in the way I initially wrote it out!

I doubt very much that the OP is out by 1.30 still

YANBU

However you should have checked this with the head first, i am assuming you didnt because you dont mention this

What about blowing a different whistle at 1:20 for Reception? Who's responsible for rounding them up? You could have a double whistle at 1:20 for Reception and a single whistle at 1:25 for the rest of the school. Just for a few weeks while Reception settle in.

I'd definitely ask to be paid for the time you actually work but they probably won't. I work in care and we never get paid for extra time such as handover which we have to be there 15 mins early for. Loads of staff have stopped coming in early. If a resident needs us we obviously end up staying late and we don't get paid.
We've all begged for fair pay over and over again. Unfortunately they know we need our jobs so they rely on this. And they rely on us staying with the residents because we actually care about them unlike the big bosses who don't even know they're fucking names.

Wow I think I would be terrified if added up the amount of hours I work and don't get paid.

I work in retail management and there just aren't enough hours in the day to cover everything I'm supposed to do. It's annoying but I love my job and I always make sure my team get paid their overtime if they stay behind with me.

Having said that Op YANBU many people only want to work their exact contracted hours and from what you said you are being flexible for them anyway.

I would ask for a meeting and explain your concerns you never know if they are reasonable they may end up paying your for the extra time. I suppose the only risk you are taking is putting their backs up legally they cannot fire you for that but they could make life very hard.

Do your colleagues feel the same? Could you gather together and challenge things? Are you a member of a union?

Only solution is for the whistle to blow at 1 30 and teachers collect from playground.

Also Op do you mind me asking when you took the job did they say you would be expected to stay behind until all they children are rounded up/job was finished? Sorry I'm just trying to anticipate what they may say to you if you approach it with them.

I know my team are expected to be in 15 minutes before shifts start! This is they can go through the morning/afternoon/evening brief just as I am if a shift is being passed over to me from a colleague now this is unpaid but it's in our contracts and everyone who is hired is made aware of this before hand in the interview and again when they sign their contracts.

Meh, I couldn't get worked up about five minutes.

Also, it's "should have", not "should of". You should know this if you work with pupils.

While I think that if you are contracted to be looking after DC until 13.30, then in an ideal world you should be paid until 13.45 to allow for handover, contingency time etc, I don't think I'd be too stressed about 5-10 minutes a day.

It's a sad fact that nowadays the main thing that stops schools and hospitals from collapsing entirely is the goodwill of the staff there to paper over the cracks like this.

Totally agree with you Tellow . Unfortunately schools rely on good will to run smoothly , this is slowly changing as people are realising that they are being taken advantage of

dolcezza99 rude and nasty

If you are paid minimum wage then it's illegal for you to work more for free. If you're paid more , it's not - they are just relying on your goodwill. As a proportion of your pay or hours an extra 5/10 mins a day DOES make a difference. It's vastly different from jobs paid substantially more where some overtime is reasonably to be . expected. I don't think you're being unreasonable .... apart form using 'of' rather than 'have' ..... grrr

dolcezza99 rude and nasty

Agree with annette

Not nasty at all. It's information that would be helpful to the OP, lest she ends up using "should of" and embarrassing herself in an educational setting. People who work at a school should know this, surely.

When I was a nurse often you would be expected to stay if some thing happened which was all well and good when I was single with no kids but when you have responsibilities such as children you can't just stay an extra half an hour or whatever

I think people who correct posters spelling, grammar and punctuation are rude and nasty

dolcezza99 Had tellow had been asking for advice about grammar it may have been helpful .
tellow was asking for advice about his/her hours of work

You were rude

surrey on the other hand was obviously making a half joking comment

Not as rude

In my opinion obviously

Go and speak to your head teacher/line manager about your working hours by all means, but you absolutely CANNOT take a unilateral decision to blow the whistle 10 minutes before the end of lunch. I'm not surprised there were complaints.

I think it's entirely reasonable to leave work on time op. If you have a one-off situation and have to perform some emergency first aid or there's a fire at school then he's things can't be helped but to be expected to do an extra 5-10 minutes each day is simply down to poor timetabling of staff. This needs to be changed and I'd certainly have a polite word with my line manager (probably the aht for you I'd guess) then move on to the ht if it continues.

I think you'll be heard as a good mms is hard to find , many won't do your job as the hours you work are right in the middle of a day which pretty much makes the rest of it impossible to use!

Good luck op , I hope you get it sorted.

Also to those of you that think she should suck it up - if you work extra hours without pay then fine , but it doesn't mean the op should.

Just turn up 2 minutes late each day. That will add up over the week to and and half your unpaid overtime. Or don't sweat the small stuff

I'm a teacher, off sick at the moment, and we blow the whistle and get the children off the playground. Whoever is on break duty does the lunch whistle too. As soon as we appear at 1.00 the LSAs leave.