Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

No one wants weekend work

541 replies

LastOrdersMaura · 21/05/2021 08:50

My friend has a cafe. It's in a central location with a good bus route, cycle route and ten mins walk from a huge university campus.
Despite the jobs being on Indeed and advertised on a local job site, no one is applying. Or they apply but say 'is there any negotiation on the days?' Why doesn't anyone want weekend work anymore? I would have thought there would have been college students, Uni students, mums/ dads who can only work when partners are home, retired people who are bored. Why is it so difficult to recruit?

OP posts:
cupsofcoffee · 22/05/2021 08:37

@ssd

I dont understand most of these posts. People don't want to work weekends as thats family time? Students don't want these hours as it would interfere with a social life when it starts again? People won't work for minimum wage?

And the best one of the lot..People want paid more at the weekend???

Grin

I mean, what planet are you on?

I mean, a normal one?

Unless I was on the bones of my arse I wouldn't give up my weekend for the minimum wage 🤷🏻‍♀️ and if I was a student of sixth former, I'd want at least one weekend day off to socialise, see friends or my boyfriend and catch up on sleep.

I wouldn't necessarily expect extra pay for weekend work (as in, I wouldn't expect more than someone who worked in the week) but I wouldn't work for NMW unless, like I said, I was absolutely desperate. It's just not worth it to me.

anxietyanonymous · 22/05/2021 08:41

Our community facebook page has this type of part time job advertised often. And also her social media page for her cafe.

I agree my gut says indeed is for career type jobs.

Job centre?

trashcansinatra · 22/05/2021 08:42

This guy had that problem; doubled the wages, got lots of applicants, made more money

www.msnbc.com/stephanie-ruhle/watch/ice-cream-parlor-raises-minimum-wage-to-15-hr-flooded-with-job-applications-112471621755

Sexnotgender · 22/05/2021 08:43

@Summercocktailsinthesnow

This is the end of cheap labour op, which is actually a very good thing in the long run for all of us. Your friend will need to pay more for weekend work, and that is entirely to be expected and is standard. She is obviously expecting to get away with paying less.
I worked in hospitality for years. No one pays you more at the weekend.
Latelatelate · 22/05/2021 08:46

@LastOrdersMaura

But she's not asking for experience. What are all the teenagers doing for jobs these days? I'm sorry but you cannot be an eighteen year old with no experience and expect to get more than MW. I'm on 50p more than that and I am responsible for peoples lives (care work.)
My DC 16/17 are looking for work and nobody is hiring under 18 weekends only, with no experience in our local area. They’d love to have a job like this.
MargosKaftan · 22/05/2021 08:50

Yep, the problem is she wants an 18 year old.

The year 13s (so upper sixth), have finished now and if looking for work, will want week day shifts, not weekend only.

If she can be flexible about hiring 16/17 year olds, she can contact all the local schools and 6th form colleges and ask if they'd share the advert. (It might cost her a voucher for the next Christmas raffle as a cost for the ad!)

forinborin · 22/05/2021 08:50

Maybe advertise in local immigrant Facebook groups, if it is a relatively metropolitan area? Many people look for a second job there.

Imnothereforthedrama · 22/05/2021 08:54

I honestly don’t know , where I live definitely someone would love that . but yes since re opening hospitality has very much been in demand . Have you shared on social media ? Someone probably knows someone who’s looking for a weekend job . Probably in the next few weeks when school / uni finished will definitely get someone.

RoseMartha · 22/05/2021 08:57

How about advertising in a local shop window and her shop window?

Also is there a local to your area job page on fb she can advertise on?

It sounds like a job that can be heard of by word of mouth.

Shareddriveagghh · 22/05/2021 08:58

Some people being a bit what does it matter about a job for sixth formers. DH was admissions tutor for a University dept that was rated at the very top of its subject. Amongst all the D of E stuff there were a few who wrote about having had a job. He was always impressed by that.

Brexit has obviously affected hospitality. Because employers could pay EU workers really cheap wages. There was a lot of hand wringing about xenophobia and Brexit. For sure some people that voted to leave were xenophobes. But I bet there were plenty who loved their hard working minimum wage cleaner from the EU.

Pandemics always force some sort of readjustment socially and economically. The lot of European peasants was ultimately improved due to labour shortages when up to 50% of the population died in the 1300’s from the bubonic plague.

Latelatelate · 22/05/2021 09:09

Some people being a bit what does it matter about a job for sixth formers. DH was admissions tutor for a University dept that was rated at the very top of its subject. Amongst all the D of E stuff there were a few who wrote about having had a job. He was always impressed by that.

It’s interesting isn’t it - Back in the ‘80s/‘90s jobs were easy to get from 16 onwards. I babysat, worked in a supermarket, a factory and at a museum/gallery. A couple of jobs on the go at a time.
Every spare minute was taken working or socialising and I did very little studying (Hence my truly awful A level results.)
My eldest DC has really put in the hours studying and has left with amazing grades. When I think about the amount of time they spent on assignments/ revision I don’t think they would have done so well if they had worked all hours like I did.
They can win can they?

Latelatelate · 22/05/2021 09:10

‘can’t’

sashh · 22/05/2021 09:19

Contact the nearest FE colleges that offer catering courses. For catering students time in a cafe is a good thing on your CV at 18. Your friend might even get lucky with teens who already have food hygiene certificates.

Icequeen01 · 22/05/2021 09:30

@LastOrdersMaura

But she's not asking for experience. What are all the teenagers doing for jobs these days? I'm sorry but you cannot be an eighteen year old with no experience and expect to get more than MW. I'm on 50p more than that and I am responsible for peoples lives (care work.)
My DS started at Tesco when he was 18 at just over £9 per hour so I think you are wrong about them not expecting anything other than the minimum wage. Waitrose and Sainsbury's are around the same I believe. When DS was 17 he worked in WHSmith for the minimum wage. He stayed until he reached 18 and was then off like a shot to somewhere which actually paid decent money.
boredbuttercup · 22/05/2021 13:09

Why would you expect to be paid more than min wage for a job that doesn't need any qualifications or experience, and minimum skill level

'minimum skill level' - i'd like to see half the arseholes who say hospitality workers have minimum skill actually trying to do our job. There is plenty of skill involved in making and serving drinks and food, handling money and payments, stock taking and rotations, opening up and closing down, and most of all dealing with idioits who look down their noses at us thinking they're 'better' and can treat us like shit.

*I dont understand most of these posts.
People don't want to work weekends as thats family time?
Students don't want these hours as it would interfere with a social life when it starts again?
People won't work for minimum wage?

And the best one of the lot..People want paid more at the weekend???

grin

I mean, what planet are you on?*

Of course weekends are 'family time' for many. Have you seen the handwringing on MN about people's DH's going out for an hour run cutting into family time. And whilst I agree that is a bit precious, working most of daylight hours for both weekend days does cut into people time to see not just their nuclear family, but other friends and family who also work normal 9-5 job hours in the week.

Do students not deserve a socail life? There's no point earning extra 'fun money' if you haven't got any time to use it because you spend all hours studying and working. As many people have told OP she might have better luck if it was one weekends day but people, yes even students, want and deserve 1 day off a week.

Of course some people will work for minimum wage but most of the time you have to be absolutely desperate and in need to do so.NMW hasn't kept up with inflation so essentially people's time in being devalued year on year. Many people have decided that their time is worth more than that now and so activaly choose to apply for jobs which offer more (all the big supermarkets, Boots, warehouse jobs, even amazon).

Why shouldn't people want paying more for unsociable hours? Less people want to work them, therefore there is more demand for labour in this time, thus the price of that labour increases, simple supply and demand. Even amazon (who seem to be the scum of the earth on MN) pay above minimum wage at base, and then pay more for weekends, and even more for overnights/stupidly early mornings.

Change in the labour market don't happen until people demand better. Sick pay, maternity leave, standard holiday allowance, staff perks, all weren't a thing at one point. Until employers found that they couldn't get good staff without offering things to attract them to their company. There is now more demand for hospitality workers than before and less people wanting to work in hospitality so employers are going to have to be more attractive and the ones that aren't are going to find themselves understaffed, possibly even so much so that they can't open. People demading better conditions, more respect in the workplace, and to actually have their time skills and effort valued isn't a bad thing at all. It's how we make good change happen. And hopefully in the future people will look back on working conditions now and be as horrified as we are when we think about working conditions 100 years ago when people could still choose not to hire based on race and the new young female staff could be fired for refusing to sleep with the boss. People demanding better is good, change which respects and values people more is good.

JassyRadlett · 22/05/2021 13:19

Why would you expect to be paid more than min wage for a job that doesn't need any qualifications or experience, and minimum skill level.

Because some are willing to pay it.

It really is as simple as that.

NMW isn’t a carefully calibrated metric to cost of living and value of labour. It’s a fairly crude metric to try to provide a wage floor (that is then topped up by wage subsidies for those who are eligible) rather than being pegged to a level of experience or level of work.

If the local market is willing to pay more (eg for an undesirable shift pattern in a city centre) then a business cannot expect to pay NMW and get good applicants.

PermanentTemporary · 22/05/2021 13:21

Who the hell advertises a Saturday job on Indeed?

HercwasanEnemyofEducation · 22/05/2021 13:23

10-4 on both days completely messes up the whole weekend for not very many hours of work. She needs 2 people and to pay more.

tattleandbagels · 22/05/2021 13:28

'minimum skill level' - i'd like to see half the arseholes who say hospitality workers have minimum skill actually trying to do our job.

but the point is that's these jobs are routinely offered to students, and people with no "skill" and no experience. Many people have tried to do these jobs. They are part of the low-paid jobs you do when you need a bit of cash at uni.

Triphazard101 · 22/05/2021 13:40

I worked in retail in the 90s and got time and a half for sundays (sunday trading was fairly new) but now it would just be normal pay.
Saturday is a normal trading day for hospitality and retail and ime has never been classed as "antisocial" hours - it's simply another day of the week.
I think possibly in retail you might be paid extra for Bank holidays or after 10pm, but saturday mornings, no way.

JassyRadlett · 22/05/2021 13:46

They are part of the low-paid jobs you do when you need a bit of cash at uni.

And as such the employer needs to make it attractive to those students, including the shifts offered, pay, whatever and not just get the hump because they’re not sufficiently grateful for NMW and whatever hours they can get.

LadyWithLapdog · 22/05/2021 16:43

@boredbuttercup well said.

Here’s my experience from the other side. This morning I looked in town for weekend jobs for my 16 year old. She couldn’t come with me as she still has a few exams. Amongst the shops with ads in the window:

  • cake shop - want full time
  • fish & chip shop - kept me waiting for so long for someone to come and talk to me, I walked out
  • noodles shop - said too young
  • coffee shop - want more hours

I didn’t look into totally dowdy and depressing places as this would be her first job and there’s no need for that. She wants Pandora, Starbucks etc. Shallow but she’s only 16.

cupsofcoffee · 22/05/2021 16:50

They are part of the low-paid jobs you do when you need a bit of cash at uni.

You're right, but most employers offer more than the bare minimum these days. Free staff meals, generous discounts on products, good pension, better pay than NMW etc.

There are very few jobs out there that just pay NMW with no perks these days. Even jobs in local takeaways offer free meals on shift.

Egghead81 · 22/05/2021 16:58

@Snakeprint

My teen daughter, along with other teens I know doesnt want to work weekends as they want to paaaaaarty, can’t say I blame them!
More than that

I positively encourage them.

My first job was out of university straight in to grad training role. Well paid.

I was utterly spoilt. Never worked.

I’m now a single parent, full time work, managing my finances very well!

I had a blissful teenage and uni experience. No money worries whatsoever.
But I worked like a Trojan at school and at uni.
Which then opened doors for grad training
I was able to work like a Trojan because I didn’t work and knew that I was able to enjoy myself with money my parents gave me when I was breaking from studies to see friends!

Egghead81 · 22/05/2021 17:00

[quote Soupforoneplease]@Snakeprint so what are they going to live on and how does this replicate real life?[/quote]
I don’t give a fig about “replicating” real life (because by real life I suspect you mean financial and work responsibilities of being an adult) for teenagers. I don’t need them to work. And I would be very happy to sub them all through teens and uni.

The work, money responsibility etc all kicks in eventually. Why hurry it along if no need