Wibu to ask for more money?

[Lemononachair]

I work in catering and have been furloughed since lockdown was announced. I am desperate to get back to work as I'm so fed up of sitting at home and need to get earning money again.

My workplace was pretty good to furlough me in fairness. I had only been working there 6 weeks when they had to close and had not gotten a contract yet as they told me I would get one when my probation period finished. Probation period was to be 3 months. Because I was furloughed only 6 weeks in I still haven't technically completely my probation. I was told that my furlough would be based on a hours of 36pw even though I actually did 40+. Of course with no contract I couldn't really contest this and I was just happy to be getting any money from them.

Pay rate was supposed to be NMW until probation completed when it would go up to £9ph. At the time MW was (I think) £8.21 but obviously it's now increased to £8.80ish so my proposed 'wage increase' is now virtually none. In addition, the place has had extensive building work done during our closure so is now double the size. We have a completely new menu, a new kitchen team and they have cut staff numbers dramatically so they basically want to change the whole way they operate. They also want us to make everything from scratch and prepare everything ourselves in order to cut costs. This all means of course that my workload is going to increase a huge amount. I've also been asked to 'multitask', as in work in other areas when needed so I'll effectively be doing 2 different jobs. The job description has changed a lot from when I started.

I'm no longer happy to do all this work for minimum wage, even to the end of my probation period as I feel this is a bit of a piss take for a skilled and qualified member of staff to have to do such a huge amount and cover other people's positions too. Wibu to ask for more money now that the job has changed?

If you're a fully qualified professional chef then preparing veg and cooking fresh food should be easy for you. The only thing to question, surely, is them also expecting you to serve customers

Thank you to those of you who get what I mean. It's frustrating to know that most people can happily and easily just dismiss all my hours of literal blood, sweat and tears, the years of study, all the missing out on having a life and working in horrible hot conditions being patronised and screamed at and being burnt and cut on a regular basis as being 'just a cook/waitress'. Working 12hrs straight with no breaks or even a drink for hours on end, not even being able to go to the toilet because you don't have time. Yes it's not life or death but some employers act like it is. These things should not be standard but sadly they are, employment regulations/rules don't seem to exist a lot of the time.

I'm not in a par with a doctor or a lawyer, I know that. I don't expect that kind of salary. I would just like to be able to afford to buy food and heating this winter! I don't think £9.50ph is too much to ask 😂

You can ask but they'll only just get rid of you and find someone willing to do it for the wage on offer

This is largely irrelevant. You are still furloughed, you are six weeks in. You can't ask for a pay rise yet.

As someone who was made redundant due to covid in june and still looking for work its quite tough out there, im still looking and jobs have even been put on hold after o have interviewed for them etc
So if your going to ask then do so carefully , def check nmw has been adjusted but otherwise tread carefully

Sounds like you're being exploited to me. Can't speak from an employee perspective, but as a customer, I would not usually expect the same person to be both cooking and serving my food.

If you need this job then tread carefully. Jobs are thin on the ground right now so they can pretty much pick and choose if they want to replace you.

You’ve only worked there six weeks, you’re still on furlough and haven’t passed a probation. You’re skating on very thin ice.

@VytaminSea surely when I posted the list of duties that would indicate a higher level of knowledge/experience that someone completely unskilled who is only worth paying MW? It wasn't a drip feed, you just assumed I was unskilled 🤷‍♀️

@user1471457751 - yes doing all of those things individually are fine, no problems at all. It's doing ALL of them simultaneously that's an issue. I can't be in 2/3 places at once. I have been a kp, a waitress, a barista and a chef but never all at the same time. I'm only human!

That's the thing though @molifly14, they have struggled. When the head chef left he told me that they had advertised his job at £2 an hour more because they couldn't find anyone to take the job for that little. I appreciate that may not quite be the case for me but you get what I mean.

@Minimumstandard

Sounds like you're being exploited to me. Can't speak from an employee perspective, but as a customer, I would not usually expect the same person to be both cooking and serving my food.

I doubt it’d be a case of “make sandwich, hand out sandwich”, more of a case of “today you’re working in the kitchen”, “tomorrow you’re working as a waitress” etc.

You’re not wrong to want a fair wage for your work

But I think asking for a pay rise at the moment when you’ve been furloughed and not finished probation is foolish. Especially given the current state of the hospitality sector thanks to covid, they will be able to replace you easily

By my understanding you still haven’t completed you probation? And your agreemenr was to be on that pay until probation needed, so you’d be very unwise to rock the boat now. Also, as you said, there is not a lot of similar work going, and other places are making people redundant, so the sad truth is there are likely lots of other similarly qualified people who would jump on the role.

I think a lot of people have had big changes in job requirements due to the pandemic, but companies aren’t brininging more in—they’re bringing in less. Normally kitchen pay/waitress pay includes the expectation that you’ll jump on other bits of work as they come up, or if people aren’t available. You’ll have less customers to deal with, but more tasks—that doesn’t seem hugely unfair?

Yes I am still technically on probation. I don't have a problem being on the reduced rate until I'm finished (well, I do a bit but I'll put up with it for now), it's after that I wanted an increase. Since we have gone from 14 staff to 5 I am now being asked to do the duties of a chef, a kp, a waitress and a barista. The place has doubled in size so we will have the same number of customers if not a little more (not sure what the layout will be yet). So I will be effectively doing a combo of 4 different jobs instead of 1 that I was doing before. I think a slight increase is fair.

Go back and see what it's like. Definitely highlight that the NMW increase wasn't applied as that's illegal and speak to ACAS if it's not rectified.

Possibly the place won't be half as busy when you return so your workload may be very manageable.

As to them having money to expand, they may have applied and received a CBILS loan and used that for the expansion work. Any business who could have successfully applied and didn't is a mug.

Ya. This is not genuine surely. No one would be that selfish and ungrateful right now .come on...

@Lemononachair

Thank you to those of you who get what I mean. It's frustrating to know that most people can happily and easily just dismiss all my hours of literal blood, sweat and tears, the years of study, all the missing out on having a life and working in horrible hot conditions being patronised and screamed at and being burnt and cut on a regular basis as being 'just a cook/waitress'. Working 12hrs straight with no breaks or even a drink for hours on end, not even being able to go to the toilet because you don't have time. Yes it's not life or death but some employers act like it is. These things should not be standard but sadly they are, employment regulations/rules don't seem to exist a lot of the time.

I'm not in a par with a doctor or a lawyer, I know that. I don't expect that kind of salary. I would just like to be able to afford to buy food and heating this winter! I don't think £9.50ph is too much to ask 😂

No one is saying you should, bit of you go into a minimum wage job where you're not expecting to have to cook food from scratch or prep food then of course you aren't being paid to be a qualified chef, you're being paid to be a waitress/cook. You're now saying they've changed the roll so that you're having to actually cook, surely that's a good thing considering your qualifications?

But if they're hiring 5 people and you're all expected to do the same generic jobs, they're not going to pay you all chefs wages. If anything I'd go and speak to them about how it will work if you're all 5 doing this generic bit of everything jobs and see if you're the most qualified if you can be kept in the kitchen.

And pass your probation before demanding a payrise because you applied for a job you're over qualified for

When the head chef left he told me that they had advertised his job at £2 an hour more because they couldn't find anyone to take the job for that little.

Tbh none of it makes sense.
They had 14 staff, all specialised.
During lockdown they managed to double the size of the premises so they could keep roughly the same number of covers and went down to 5 staff. Does this mean they got rid of the head chef?
Now the 5 staff will either am be coming and serving their own meals during their shift, or will be taking it in turns to cook. Presumably not all of these people are fully qualified chefs like the op if they're all on nmw?
So their plan is for the ex barista / ex waiter to be cooking meals from scratch at least some of the time and the chef to be clearing tables some of the time?

If that's actually their plans, I'd look for a new job op. That sounds chaotic. Fine if it's chips in the fryer, burger on the griddle, sandwiches etc but it sounds more proper meals and a decent number of tables?

It sounds to me like they still have a head chef, who will head up the cooking but have lost other kitchen staff, and the waitresses will now be expected to help with food prep too, rather than actually being chefs? And that the others likely wouldn’t have the qualifications you have?

OP it sounds like you’re overqualified for the job you got—did you not consider applying for the head chef role at the time? Or would you not consider applying for a similar more senior position somewhere else?

Being overqualified for your role unfortunately won’t automatically mean you get paid more, you need to make the case for there needing to be a more senior role, and you getting it. It doesn’t sound like they’re necessarily asking you to do anything that requires your specialist skill, and are asking other waitresses to do it too, so unless they’re going to pay them extra it wouldn’t make sense.

However maybe when you go back, if the place is full, you’re finished probation and all is going well with the business, you should tell them you would like a promotion, chef is overworked, you could be a deputy and take over the more complex food work from the others? This would mean taking on extra responsibility too, and if there was business demand (and you had proven yourself to be a great employee) they might be interested?

Yadnbu. I would wait until youve finished probation though. Take your old jobdescription, new job description and have a look around to see what other places are offering for similar roles and experience.

I really really hate the constant race to the bottom on MN as soon as anyone expresses any kind of disatisfaction with their working conditions.

My cousin works in a hotel and they have decimated the number of staff they employ whilst still running at full occupancy and expecting all the extra bits to do with Covid to be covered. It’s a shambles with staff miserable and guests complaining but no changes are planned.
At the moment unless you are lucky it’s a case of suck it up or don’t work unfortunately

@Lemononachair

While I think you should hold hard until you've actually been back at work for a bit, I agree that there's a lot of sneering at the service industry on here: it's always being compared unfavourably with NHS jobs, because everyone involved with the health service is apparently a hero, while waitresses are invariably dossers. I've done loads of different menial jobs for all sorts of pretty compelling reasons, but I've been a lawyer and a waitress, and I know which one has brought me to my knees in terms of graft and stress. And I was good at both.

You’ve got zero legal rights. They’ll just find someone else who is happy to do so. I’m
Actually amazed they bothered to furlough you. I’d be counting my blessings. There is a global recession right now! Do you need the job?

I will definitely wait to bring it up until I'm finished probation, I think that's just sensible considering everything.

To clarify:

The expansion of the restaurant was in progress way before lockdown, it started last year and is only just being completed because of delays. It was always the intention to do this and double the capacity from 60 to 120. Obviously the numbers will be different now.

I was employed as a chef before, I was cooking from scratch but not as much as some items (some cakes, sauces, dressings etc) were bought in ready made. Veg was bought in ready prepped to save time. Also very different menu with much simpler dishes.

Now we are expected to make everything including sauces, dressings, etc from scratch. All the baking is to be done by us. All veg to be prepared by us. Menu is much more complicated and 'restaurant' rather than 'cafe' style. Virtually all the meals are to be cooked to order which makes things much more complicated.

When I say 'us' I mean, the kitchen staff so me, head chef and the extra chef. The FOH staff are not expected to do any kitchen stuff except washing their own dishes - I am the only person who is expected to do both areas as I have barista training and have also worked on FOH in the past.

Before, only the chefs were 'skilled/have qualifications' - this is still the case.

I suspect this would read completely different with input from the employer.

But, as it stands, leave, find a job that you can use your skills in.

So are they expecting you to pop out halfway through flambéing your duck to make a cuppa, clear some table and stick a wash on or is it more that if the kitchen is quiet but there's lots on for coffee, they expect you to lend a hand?

Tbf if they employed you as a chef on nmw, I don't think they'll put it up because you're now doing more "unskilled" jobs. You're still only working the same no of hours. If there's 40 hours of work for you to do on the kitchen, it doesn't make sense to back up the kitchen orders so you can make coffee.

If you're quiet and there's 3 chefs and 2 FOH, I don't think helping out is so extraordinary an expectation that you warrant extra money.

Sorry op, I really don't see how you can expect a wage rose to be a chef when they employed you as a chef

Having worked in restaurants I can see both sides. They are trying to stay afloat. Distancing, shorter hours etc make that very difficult. They have done their best to ensure you have a job.

But equally it is catering. Keep looking, always easier to get a job if you have a job, then go in and help them. Grab the opportunity and act like a natural supervisor. Make yourself indispensable, then negotiate a pay increase.

If I was exhausted and trying to keep things going, and a new start came up saying I was working them too hard and to give them a pay rise, I would tell them to walk.

Another thing to consider, when things are up and running, is to ask them to consider commission.

Be aware, there may be a circuit breaker in October and you may need furlough again....