How much unpaid overtime is acceptable

[Lemonwoe]

Just curious. At a salary of £40k, how much unpaid overtime would you expect to do?

None on 40k.

It was expected in minimum wage jobs though.

Zero.

I am fortunate enough to work with a manager who queries why people need to be working overtime. Presenteeism is seen as inefficiency. The work is not time critical or particularly taxing enough to require frequent overtime. The odd five minutes over just to wrap something up is acceptable. Anything over that and questions start getting asked about why someone can't finish their work in the allocated time.

Zero.

Occasional overtime to get the job done is fine.

Anything done at weekends or excessively late etc I charge for. That time is not free.

I work on an hourly wage as school support staff. I only get paid for about 12 hours a week but end up working at least and extra 2 hours every week unpaid. They cannot afford to take on any more staff as it is.

1-2 hours a week if they're lucky. I spend more time at work than I need to, but get paid extra for that in the form of a TLR and my hours don't exceed the money I get for that. Teacher here who has opted out of BS.

I’m not a teacher btw! There seems to be a lot of teachers who work extra hours: is that offset by the longer holidays ? Or are the holidays unpaid?

I work probably an extra hour or so per day: but keep getting more work dumped on me even though I’ve flagged I’m working at capacity. I don’t mind a bit extra work if it’s important or time critical, but this seems to be expected as BAU.

Other colleagues are doing ridiculously long hours: mostly working well i to the night: sometimes only catching a few hours sleep: this is why I’m questioning whether I’m doing the right thing.

£60k - head of finance.
I get to work an hour early, through choice, and start then. Mind you, a leisurely start at my own pace.
So, about 5 hours per week.
Plus I keep an eye on emails out of hours.

I often wonder, when employers say "whatever is needed" actually mean - if they really thought about it.

Earlier in my career (in manufacturing finance) I used to resent the skilled tradespeople getting paid for every hour, and taking more than me (the mug) on a flat salary.

It seems a lot of the public sector (teaching / NHS) runs on free overtime for guilt.

In the private sector, if you died tomorrow, your job would be advertised before you were even buried.

I think it depends on the job, and in any salaried role you will be expected to do the odd bit of overtime/unsociable hours to get the job done. But it should be occasional. If it is a regular thing you have to ask whether the company is under resourced and need more people, or whether you need to manage your time better and discuss priorities with your manager to see what can get dropped.

I used to be in the office 45 mins early every day, so 3hrs 45 per week, but in return I expected to go to annual sports day (a morning) without using up leave, I expected to leave on time or even 5 mins early for parent's evening and if ds was ill I expected to be allowed to flex without anyone grumbling.
A working relationship is better with a bit of give and take IMO.

[quote lostlife]Depends on your role and the sector
A teacher on £25- 35k typically does 18 hours a week according to the Dfe (paid for 32 rounded- does 50)
assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/855933/teacher_workload_survey_2019_main_report_amended.pdf[/quote]
That's awful. That's more than 50% above their contracted hours. They should be given enough funding to employ 50% more teachers.

No wonder so many teachers are leaving the profession.

I'm not paid anything like £40k, but if I do any extra hours, I take TOIL. My manager insists on it! We've started turning down new work, too, and if the projects that refer clients to us don't like it, they can pay for more hours. They can't expect to get 25 hours work a week from me when they're only funding 17!

I’m junior management I don’t do any unpaid overtime.
DH is senior management in banking and he doesn’t do much either, maybe 3-4 hours a month, he’s WFH still and it’s easier to switch off. When he was in the office he would often work a couple of hours a day over his hours, especially if he worked through lunch. He was promoted during lockdown and his new manager is all about home/work balance.

I do 2-3 hours a week. Work in childcare part time, but have the same workload as a full timer (if that makes sense!) so have no choice but to generally work extra from home. Doesn't feel overly fair but it is what it is! I'm only on just above minimum wage too

I'm on a bit more and I probably work an extra 30 mins per day on average, but will work an extra 2-3 hours on the rare day if there is a deadline.

My work is extremely flexible though so while I generally do log on at 7:30am and log off at 5:30pm, I do also take an hour for a workout and another 20-30 mins to pick up my daughter.

So I don't really give them a lot of unpaid extra at all. It's not expected in my team either as a standard, only if we get extremely busy and are pushed for time then it's all hands on deck.

I feel I have lucked out in that respect.

Absolutely none. I don’t work for nothing. If I have to do overtime, my boss is paying for it

@Caplin I don’t think it’s time management: I think the more I do, the more work will get given to me ! Everyone i come across in the company seems stretched and stressed.

I’ve got no appetite for promotion...

Depends on your industry, I know a lot of young graduates in Big 4 and consulting type roles doing 20 plus hours unpaid overtime a week for your salary (or less if in the regions)

Public sector, lost count. It's actually much better now I work full time over 4 days , I was working just as long days over 5 and just racking up too much TOIL to take. I would say on the other hand if I've ever had an appointment, when my grandad was in hospital, when I have had to pick DS up from nursery early etc, they never question it and when I said to my manager I'll make it up (half day because DS had a loose nappy at nursery....), she just said you do plenty around here don't worry about it. Which is nice. People go to sports day, nativities etc so it probably balances to some extent and I like the flexibility

I'm in local council, so someone in the team that I'm in would probably be doing 5-10 hours unpaid overtime each week.

1. I do absolutely none.

I'm a nurse, I do around one hour per week. Our ward manager is fantastic at looking after her staff and always ensures that we record any extra time worked (beyond 15 mins) and take this as TOIL.

My first salaried job we were expected to do anywhere from 35 to 120 hours a week. 60-80 was normal. Sometimes I had meetings scheduled at 3am on weekends and this was before telecommuting. The benefit of this job was that it was a career stepping stone and if you could survive it, you could move on to much better things. Some people stayed in the same field and kept the same hours in exchange for insanely high salaries. I took the resume and went somewhere with sane hours (where overtime is rare) and really good salaries.

TLDR: it depends on the job.

None for me. Salary is for 40hrs a week, if I work more, I get paid overtime

It's hard to say for me because every hour extra I work I can finish an hour earlier on another day as I work Flexi time.

If I work weekends I get paid extra

@Lockdownlifting12344555

Depends on your role… teacher?

I'm a retired teacher. The work at home,in the evening,weekends,holidays was endless. However,a lot of people do not believe it.