Discounts for public service employees

[Doonewanker]

Had a fb message earlier today saying that my kid's swimming teacher would be giving discounted prices for his swimming lessons for kids of police officers.

(Don't know what level of discount.)

He said that he hoped that in time he'd be able to extend this discount to NHS workers too.

I'm neither.

I understand police/BHS workers' job are fucking tough and that the annual pay increase is abominable. Along with questionable pensions, benefits compared to the past etc.

Is this a new thing? Do we now normally discount for public sector employees?

Not goady - not particularly bothered either way but genuinally want views.

He's on a public fb page. Noticed he's had at least 20 messages today from non clients saying they'd like to take up his offer. Great business advertising if nothing else!

What you think? Sorry if done before.

If anyone feels ‘jealous’ come along, for some reason there’s PLENTY of jobs in psychiatric nursing. No need to feel jealous- you could have the place of one of the 2000 nurses leaving each month

@summerholiday79 I have had a brief look and things like access to English heritage one sign up gives the registered person plus 1 adult and 6 children free access so I would assume you only need one card?

Lots of private companies offer a perks scheme which give you discounts all over the place so I don't see the blue light scheme as any different

So you’re griping because someone is prepared to give back to those that put themselves through horrendous stuff to help us????

Totally unreasonable.

Karigan, come on, not everyone in the public sector or nhs puts themselves through “horrendous stuff”.

😂 it’s not jealousy to think something’s a bit odd. My friend is a salaried GP earning well over 60k - why on earth do they need a discount?!

DH pays a subscription for his discount card and many other benefits so HE pays for it in a way, he isn't automatically offered the discount in most places. And his pension contributions pay for current retired officers pensions. It's self supporting as a system. It isn't reliant on employer contributions.

I'm all for police officers, firemen, drs, nurses or actual medical staff getting discounts but why should an office worker who already gets a nice pension from the government get discount?

DH pays a subscription for his discount card and many other benefits so HE pays for it in a way, he isn't automatically offered the discount in most places.

So why not make it open to anyone who is willing to pay to sign up?

Also, at Costco you need to have a certain profession to join. Why?! It’s such an antiquated system. Matalan used to be the same and have opened it up now.

CheekyRedhead - I used to be an NHS medical secretary dealing with distressed cancer patients in a very busy department earning around 19k a year. I’ve also been a civil servant “just” doing a relatively important desk job which helped to keep people safe.

There is a strange attitude that people who work in offices do nothing all day and their work has zero importance. Public sector office workers have had no pay rises and these jobs pay relatively little anyway. The NHS around here pays admin staff on band 3 a starting salary of just over £17k. Medical secretaries have been downgraded and do a lot more work with far fewer staff where posts have been slashed.

There are many office workers at HMRC, DWP etc - again, those roles have been slashed and staff have to work to targets doing essential work.

Thousands of office workers at the MoD, Security Service, GCHQ and Secret Intelligence Service. All working to keep us safe and not earning mega bucks. A decade ago. Mi5 were advertising admin roles paying under 15k - in central London!

And the average NHS pension is £5000 a year - let’s not forget that the workers contribute too, I used to pay 6% into mine.

At the risk of further infuriating people, DP had the choice of not paying anything into his military pension but he chooses to top it up.

But polar, that’s no different to anyone else. I don’t think any job is more valuable than another - public, private or third sector. Private sector cuts be meant plenty of people haven’t had a pay rise either but they can’t strike over it because there’s no collective voice like with public sector.

Im a Firefighter and have a blue light card. It gives some good discounts that I do use. Im working all weekend on 14 and 16 hour shifts so won't get much use of it this week unfortunately. We also have a staff website with local businesses and discounts.

I have a small business and have been contacted by the companies who organise the discount cards for NHS and Polic staff etc to ask if I'd like to be a part of the scheme to offer discounts. It works both ways - there's a benefit for the card users as they get discounts and a benefit for the business as we get promoted to a large organisation with a lot of staff so the discount pays for itself. I think it's a business transaction with a massive organisation and not preference for certain types of jobs/employees. I remember Boots used to do a Christmas shopping night for NHS staff before Christmas with a big discount and it was always packed.

Does anyone know of any schemes that teachers can sign up to? I know NUT give a countdown card but it's mostly things that you have to buy vouchers in advance.

I think most of it is just a marketing ploy rather than the companies being altruistic. I'm a civil servant and don't think the discounts are anything special. Like most discounts, you only get it on high margin products.

25% off at Pizza Express or whatever is nothing special, anyone can get that. Its just a way of charging people who are not sensitive to price more while being able to keep customers who shop around and look for deals.

The military seems to be an exception to that. I have seen some genuinely good deals available to them.

I didn’t know about most of this stuff and have worked in the nhs for 15 years! Know about Nando’s but never bothered using it.

If people are envious of the so called benefits of the public sector they can join and union and try to improve their conditions. There are also unions for people in the private sector such as USDAW for retail workers and when I worked for an airline I joined BASSA. The rail workers can join RMT.

I was treated far better and paid a lot more working in banking and for an airline compared to my experiences in the NHS/Civil Service/local government.

John Lewis employees get between 12% and 25% discounts. 40% off cinema tickets, money off monthly phone contract, discount on breakdown cover with the AA, discounts with a few restaurants.

And I wouldn’t call the David Lloyd discount amazing, it’s £5 a month cheaper for me.

It’s pretty hard for unions to change things in the private sector because there’s no collective voice. Little point in striking etc.

I’m not envious of the public sector, I just don’t yhink they have it worse than anyone else.

Most gyms will give you their corporate rate (usually no joining fee and £10 or so off the monthly fee) if you show your NHS badge.

I work in Canada currently and the same applies here (cheaper phone deals, we get the corporate rate along with employees of erm, Scotiabank, CIBC etc) so while it’s a perk I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it. They get to attract a big pool of employees with their discounted rate, we get cheaper phone bills. Win-win.

My DF is still in the police and my DM was a nurse consultant so they both have/had discount cards. Years and years ago when they both were new into their jobs the discounts were much better. When they went somewhere in their uniforms in tiny villages in NI they used to get everything on the house! Less so when they moved to England, and especially less so now. At the time when they were newly qualified all that stuff helped massively, so I can see why these kind of discounts still exist for people in those jobs.

I think it's good but sad that this has to he a substitute for paying a proper wage.

Prison staff do. They have a tough job and it's nice to get some perks. It's always been a thing.

I get a big Vodafone discount as an NHS worker.