How much unpaid overtime is acceptable

[Lemonwoe]

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

@sparkle17

I can't believe how many teachers routinely work extra and routinely accept it. Teachers must be exhausted and then are expected to provide good quality education.

I think teachers mostly do accept it or they leave. The job has a lot of upsides too though! 😊 However, if you take your foot off the pedal you're liable to be put on competency and bullied out. Same as a lot of other jobs I'd imagine. It's interesting that public sector jobs are seen as "vocations" where the piss is routinely taken. However, there are many employers in the private sector who are like this too, particularly at lower levels. I know jobs in the media etc can be awful for unpaid overtime as there's such huge competition for these jobs in the first place.

None at all, my workplace believes in work/life balance, if there is an emergency/urgent situation that absolutely needs dealt with (it doesn’t happen often) we deal with it then take the hours back and have a paid afternoon/day off.

I might do the odd half hour here and there but if I do overtime then I am paid. Either that or I take it off another day. Today I stayed an extra half hour and I plan on leaving on Friday at 3 rather than half 3.

...

None. Occasionally I work later but when it’s quiet the week after, I will take some early finishes, later starts or longer lunches. My preferred working hours are 8/8.30-4.00/4.30. The earliest I will start is 7am and the latest I’ll finish is 6pm, flexing my hours accordingly. My job occasionally requires out of hours work, so anything past 6pm or on a weekend gets claimed as official toil and I will take it back when I choose. I’m happy to put in the odd hour overtime here or there or when there’s an emergency but I expect that flexibility back from my employer. I don’t need sports day off at the moment, which is why I take that time back over the next few days.

I learnt the hard way in my first job that most employers don’t care about you. I was working compressed hours, full time over 4 days. I was still doing at least 14 hours of overtime a week. I would be in the office from 7am until 7.12pm (at 7pm you were meant to sign in and declare yourself a lone worker, security came around at 7.12 and would shout at me as I was logging out and running to make my train). One day it started snowing and they were cancelling trains. I didn’t want to get stranded so told work I was leaving. They told me I had to make up the hours, even though I’d already worked my contractual hours that week and it was midday on my 3rd working day. Decided then and there, I wasn’t going to let another company take the piss out of me.

I'd be happy to flex my hours according to the needs of the business, but ultimately I'd expect to get that time back with extra days off or leaving early at other times. This is assuming there was nothing specific in my contract or job description about working extra hours at crunch time or being available for emails out of hours.

I have acquired an incredibly hard line on generalised unexpressed expectations at work. If you want to employ me for more hours, you have to actually say and we can decide if the pay and hours balance. Otherwise, I am going to do the job you explicitly hired me to do.

And this is why I prefer self-employment...!

I don’t work unless I get paid my going rate !

Obviously I work more some months and less other months as per usual business demands, but no way would I work for nothing.

I work at a University in professional services - lost count of unpaid overtime I've worked especially over the last year. Still not enough to stay on top of the workload.

i don't know what to do with this phrase "expect to do"

I earn close to 40k (fte)
My hours flux but most months I've done an extra 20 hrs over a reasonable FTE = 37.5 hr week, I suppose

I’m on £40k+ as the CEO of a charity - salary is based on 37 hours - I do probably 50 hours extra a month on average it depends on need - today I was on annual leave chauffeuring my DP to his new job (over 400 mile round trip) I still dealt with member of staff going off sick n reallocating their case load - a safeguarding alert and also dealt with a few urgent emails otherwise I would have to start even earlier tomorrow

I’m lots better at leaving on time these days, but I do work through break/lunch/before and sometimes after school.

That's awful. That's more than 50% above their contracted hours. They should be given enough funding to employ 50% more teachers

But it’s usually our own work we’re doing eg marking/making yet another powerpoint/completing paperwork only we can do/attending training/yet another pointless meeting. It isn’t tasks we can hand over.

Current job is contracted for 37.5 hours on £26.5k. I work those hours for 6 months of the year with the odd bit of overtime occasionally. The other 6 months of the year I’ll be doing approx 45 hours one week, 60 the next. No paid overtime or TOIL. It’s just the way the sector works....

My last day is on Friday then I’m having a complete change of career!

I think if your on £25k then no unpaid overtime is acceptable. £30k upwards and I would start saying it's part of the job, a few hours here and there

About four years ago I was talking about overtime and my manager who will be on £50-60k with a rumored £8k bonus piped up and said he didn't get paid for overtime. Firstly I can't remember him ever doing any and secondly if you're on that sort of salary it's expected. Some ppl want the job title, company car and salary but that's all

For me it depends on what's needed at the time. On a regular basis I won't do unpaid overtime. But there have been times I have done 20 hours unpaid overtime in a week and worked weekends if projects need it occasionally.

Also depends if I'm going for promotion/pay rise. I will work extra more often if I'm working my way up.

I was going to comment about teachers but see I've been beaten to it! Teachers hours are supposedly 32.5 per week on paper. So most ft Teachers do at least 15-20 extra.

@Minezatea

I work for the NHS. 3 days a week. I never get a lunch break, so that's 1.5 hours a week and in addition to that I guess around another 3 hours a week. So that's 20% of my paid hours and it's only that little as I am very boundaried.

The teachers issue always interests me. They are paid around the same as a newly qualified nurse. So either we consider that they are paid for 9 months of the year and hence earn a wadge more than a nurse or we consider that they basically work unevenly through the year. Someone said the average for a teacher was 15 hours a week overtime. But they then get 13 weeks leave a year whereas a nurse gets 6. Prorated that averages around 47 hours a week for 46 weeks a year. So a little less than 20% of their paid hours?

I do think teachers work hard btw and my sons have some great ones so not teaching bashing. Just trying to make sense.

In reality for all professions I think it's really cheeky to expect OT of more than an hour or two a week.

The difference is that all of teachers' 13 weeks' holiday are unpaid. Your holidays as a nurse are paid. There's the difference.

@BingBunnyIsAnnoying I suppose it's dependent on industry. My dh isn't management but is on over 60k base pay...he gets paid overtime for anything extra, And his bonus each year.

[quote Chillychangchoo]@GinJeanie

Do teachers like working for free? Well maybe they do? Otherwise they could just quit and find a new job or profession? They seem to moan a lot but then they don’t do anything to change it. The profession attracts a lot of martyrs, no one is forced into staying in any job or profession.

If it’s that bad, then quit moaning and leave.[/quote]
1 in 3 teachers is trying to. Used to be 1 in 5.

I'm a part time teacher who probably works 15 hours a week unpaid.

I do it because I love my job and I want to do the very best for my class. That's why I went into teaching.

I don't do it because I love working unpaid and there's many things I would love to pass into someone else but I can't.

The difference is that all of teachers' 13 weeks' holiday are unpaid. Your holidays as a nurse are paid. There's the difference.

You see I don't get this argument...

Teachers work what 195 days of the year? and nurses work all year round... so let's say we have a nurse on 32k and a teacher on the same. The teachers holidays may be unpaid...as they are not working, but they are actually getting paid the same as the nurse for less days. Teachers wages are spread over the year so they still "get paid"

This is not a teacher bash btw...I just don't get the "we're not paid for the holidays"argument. They are paid quite a good salary for 195 days work tbh. And I know I know...the overtime...but I'd say it evens out

NHS band 6 clinical role £37k. I work zero unpaid hours. I either get time back or (more usually) paid overtime.

I work in consultancy, so the concept of hours doesn’t mean much. I work until the job is done. Sometimes we’re insanely busy and sometimes less so.

I worked extremely long hours as a junior, on a pretty low salary. It’s how you get to the next level.

@thekeatingfive I'm also in consultancy. I think we loose out massively! We bill the client say 70 hours, yet only get paid for 40... who's winning there ;)

This is a constant battle that I have with my son. His job is on an IT help desk for an accountancy firm on about 18k. His hours are 9:30-18:00 but he usually works until 19:00 & will then go back to work for a couple of hours after he’s had dinner.
On work night out a couple of years ago his peers told him that he shouldn’t do this as it was masking a lack of staff, but he still does it. Unfortunately in March he was told that he was being given a bigger bonus (£1,000)) than the company standard for the year of £500 which makes him more inclined to work more hours.

My full time salary is £42, and I work 0.8. Pre-Covid I pretty much worked my hours other than the odd bit of work on a very busy spell. Now I work a lot more. I’m a lecturer and remote teaching is much harder in terms of prep, plus students (and management) seem to think we are available 24/7. Today I was at my desk at 8, and shut down at 5.30 - my contracted hours are 9-5. I actually told my manager that I was hoping to take my day off this week. It really stinks.