To think that most part time jobs are never really part time?

[Onlyonewayout]

I got offered a job at the end of last year. One of those rare term time only jobs that fitted around school pick ups. The hours I’m contracted are 18 hours. Except I’m not doing 18 hours a week, I’m doing 30 hours (I do bill for overtime). The reason I only want to work part time is that I have three kids and two of the children have special needs. The youngest has severe complex special needs and a medical condition. He’s very hard work.

The job is busy. My colleagues are busy. One is on the verge of leaving as she’s stressed and too busy, one who started 2 weeks ago is saying she’s so busy. When I’ve raised it with work, they’ve bought up that maybe they should employee me for more hours or I pass work to my colleagues (I’m not their boss and they’re already busy). One of the kids who has special needs is getting upset as she’s saying I’m always at my computer and I’m grumpy. The work has to be done. Those higher up leaver things until the last minute and it’s incredibly chaotic. They don’t respond to schedules and me and my colleague can’t get them organised.

Do actual part time jobs exist? Or do people end up squeezing a full time job into part time hours?

I think you have to be really careful with part time jobs as some roles don't really work well as part time and you will be called on to make up for this.

Honestly, I'd just stop doing it. If you're an admin assistant how are you managing a large group of people? I'm assuming that's not in your job description?
I'm contracted to 17.5 hours and that's exactly what I do, I don't check work emails or my work phone outside of my contracted hours, if there's a meeting on one of my non working days my boss asks if I'm available, I arrange childcare if possible and I take the time back.

Honestly, I'd just stop doing it. If you're an admin assistant how are you managing a large group of people? I'm assuming that's not in your job description?
I'm contracted to 17.5 hours and that's exactly what I do, I don't check work emails or my work phone outside of my contracted hours, if there's a meeting on one of my non working days my boss asks if I'm available, I arrange childcare if possible and I take the time back.

If you're doing the house and billing them they might not realise how much of an issue it is. Just tell them you can only manage the 18 hours going forward.

No there are very few part time jobs in admin that actually are part time. Most of them are doing a full time job in fewer hours.

Im contracted for 16 hours a week...this week ive worked 33.5 hours....i'm happy though as i need the money.

I work for a training school. So we run courses. Each admin person has a hub they’re allocated to. Mine has 61 people in it this year. Up from 40 last year. They’ve also changed the way they run the courses so there’s more reports and data to collect. Everyone is billing extra hours but the director isn’t bothered as he just wants the work done.

I'm an academic and work 0.6 but usually more. If I have to work a whole day out of my normal days I take a day off (despite my former HoD saying that wasn't in the spirit ). I rarely take extra hours off though.
I don't get overtime as I'm on a salary.

This is why I jobshare. I work long hours (much longer than I’m paid for) on the days I work, as it’s very busy with a lot of pressure with deadlines measured in minutes or hours and changing requests etc. But on the days my jobshare partner is in, I’m completely off work, and don’t worry about it at all.

We operate on a Flexi system and my team water given reduced caseloads to reflect part time hours, however it's not the kind of work where you can say it's 3pm I'm off, if there's q crisis situation etc as it's very much about risk management and public protection, do someone might go to pick up DC then log back on at home. When I came back from mat leave I was told by colleagues at my level don't come back on 4 days a week (as they had) your workload will be the same as full time for less money, half time was different as they are issued job shares. So I consolidated full time to 4 days which works really well, it's not easy to get out at five and I don't mind because I'm meant to work longer hours anyway, it also means I can cover briefings etc for colleagues who do need to leave, and they pick things up for me on my NWD

I have always worked part time and yes it has always been part time. I have always made sure i set the boundaries from my first day - i do not do extra hours unless i get them back as TOIL.

Its simple really - when you are done you are done and you need to prioritize what you do in your hours and let your manager know what you did not manage to get done.

I did ten hours week. Wouldnt do again too bitty. Would rather a few long days. Admin work. I did find he piled more work on if I got through it

Then you are supporting too many people.

You need to talk to whoever is your line manager, keep saying its too many people, they need to hire another person for 2-3 days a week and direct some of the next 21 people to them.

I'm a lecturer. As I work part time (0.5 FTE) I'm allocated half as many modules as my full time colleagues, so it works well. I probably do work slightly more than my contracted hours (unpaid), but only slightly.

The low contract hours is because they then only have to pay you those hours as holiday and redundancy pay.

This is what my husband’s friend who owns a temp agency told him.

My job is 6 hours but I work up to 25.

I’ve interviewed recently for lots of part time jobs advertised as 4, or 12 hours, for example, but at interview all say at least 20 hours.