Colleague reported me for this comment AIBU?

[user8766098]

OK hope I can explain this without outing myself.

I work part time and have my lunch at 11.30, the full timers all go for lunch at 1.30. Yesterday an urgent project came up that had to be finished by 3pm.
I had already had my lunch as it hadn't come through by then. Some of the full timers decided to take their lunches after 3pm to complete the project.
One of my colleagues kept complaining about how hungry she was I replied - Im feeling hungry now too, I can't moan though Ive had lunch and I'm finishing soon.
She reported me to my manager for rubbing it in the full timers faces that I was finishing and had my lunch 🤣

She should have had lunch when she was hungry this much. She is an adult and should take of herself.

Maybe she should have had her hot porridge at her desk that morning and worked through

@ReadySteadyTwins what you write may well apply to people whose part time hours involve an early finish. They will also apply to the many parents who have to leave before their childcare finishes as well as simply can't stay till 7pm. Many part time people work days rather than reduced hours - so there at the end 3 days a week etc.
I'm part time and regularly work evenings and weekends. I don't think the culture of hours and hours of unpaid work is good for anyone, really.

I think your comment was unnecessary. But I also think your colleague making a complaint was also unnecessary. You sounded goady.

@ReadySteadyTwins

You need to take these problems up with your manager not blame part time staff for doing their part time hours.
You’re coming across as incredibly bitter.

Speak to your manager. You’re obviously feeling overwhelmed.

*Yes we all know this. By disappearing at 4 though, they always miss the "we all need to stay and pull together." So the people finishing at 5 are seen as the employees who have an expectation to put in the extra graft. For which they aren't paid. But do it as the "team effort."

Well, no. They shouldn't and don't have to. This isn't a reasonable expectation, particularly for those who have childcare responsibilities and need to leave to collect children on time. That would be my response. Is my manager prepared to pay the late pick up fee to my child's nursery? Probably not. So I'm leaving on time.

@ReadySteadyTwins

Part time people are not these poor little people on half the salary. They are on the same salary, but work half the hours. Hour per hour, they're on the same.

Why people get pissed off, is in incidents like this, when all the full time people (earning the same hourly rate) end up pulling their weight far more. It's the full timers, at 5pm who always end up with the "we need to stay until this is done" and working til 7pm, while the part timer walks out at 4pm because "that's when they finish" and is never there at the end of the day when the problems happen.

Here, OP gets her fill of food, then sits there with this "I'm ok, Jack" attitude. You lot are hungry, and having to meet a deadline, but I've eaten and going home before the problem is fixed.

The full timers being paid hour by hour, the same as OP, are the ones that have to forgo their food. That have to get the job done. OP couldn't give a toss. She's there for her lesser hours, not a team effort. And they have picked up on that. That will be what the "report" about her will be. Hence the mention of "part time."

No one's calling in HR over today's incident alone. This will be a backstory of them being sick of her shit.

Wow. Op has chosen to work part time hours, full timers have chosen to work full time hours. Full time people do not pull their weight far more. If they are having to stay an extra 2 hours until work is done they need to be sorting that out with management, not holding it against the staff member who has worked their hours and gone home at their finish time. The part timer has probably worked full time at some point in their career and covered extra hours to finish the job. I speak as a part timer who gets fed up hearing how hard full timers work, how lucky I am to have a day or two off a week, how lucky I am my children are grown up and independent so I don't have to worry about childcare. Yes this is all true but it's not a case of being lucky, I've worked full time and juggled childcare. I've covered extra hours at the end of the day and not once did I begrudge the part timer going home at their finish time or the fact they didn't work 5 days a week. I am older now and in a position where I can afford to work part time, why should I be made to feel guilty for that?

[quote AllTheUsernamesAreAlreadyTaken]@ReadySteadyTwins

You need to take these problems up with your manager not blame part time staff for doing their part time hours.
You’re coming across as incredibly bitter.

Speak to your manager. You’re obviously feeling overwhelmed.[/quote]
I am a SAHM. I used to work both full time. And part time. I've managed teams of staff.

I know exactly how little the part timers pull their weight. Not all. But most. This "I don't get paid to do what the full timers do, so fuck putting in anything to help the team." No, you don't get paid for not being at work, funny that. You get paid exactly the same equivalently, for the hours you do. And this entitles you to be the laziest member of the team. Oh, do fuck off dear.

Imagine Sally is paid £10 an hour. And Susan is paid £10 an hour. They both have two children.

At the end of Sally's hours, she is asked to help meet team deadlines, and to help her colleagues she does this. Susan can see the level of work, but leaves at the end of her hours, regardless of the rest of the team.

The only difference between Sally and Susan is 15hrs extra per week that Sally does, and is paid for, Susan doesn't do.

Sally is paid for 40hrs a week. But can sometimes work up to 50. Unpaid, but someone has to get the job done.

Susan is paid for 25 hours a week. Susan couldn't give a flying fuck how hard the rest of her colleagues are pulling together, on the basis she doesn't get paid for the 15 hours she doesn't work. Susan never stays a moment more. Knowing that others will pick up her portion of any deadline that appears, because someone has too, and it sure ain't gonna be Selfish Sue. Susan will watch everyone else do overtime to benefit the team she is part of. But "I'm part time innit" is her idea of justifying why the team should carry her, and she is entitled to never assist.

"Sally's a mug then isn't she" will be another line trotted out by Susan to further justify why she's no team player, when everyone else supports each other.

And as PP have stated, this is their experience as well.

@steppingcarefully

Entirely agree! Well said.

The only difference between Sally and Susan is 15hrs extra per week that Sally does, and is paid for, Susan doesn't do.

I'd argue that the difference between Sally and Susan, is that Sally is unable to implement healthy boundaries around her working hours whereas Susan sees the importance of (rightly) doing this.

@ReadySteadyTwins

As a manager, would you be prepared to pay the late collection fees for children then, to your employees' respective childcare providers, for the times they were late for collecting their children due to staying past their hours to be a "team player"?

Tell her she can rub it on payday when she gets a full time wage! Absolutely ridiculous complaint

Susan is paid for 25 hours a week. Susan couldn't give a flying fuck how hard the rest of her colleagues are pulling together, on the basis she doesn't get paid for the 15 hours she doesn't work. Susan never stays a moment more.

Or... Susan is paid for 25 hours a week. Susan made this decision (an option open to others, too), in recognition of her need for a work-life balance. She accepts the lower salary that goes with this, as a trade off for working fewer hours. Susan never stays a moment more because she honours these work-life boundaries that she has created for herself.

I'd argue that the difference between Sally and Susan, is that Sally is unable to implement healthy boundaries around her working hours whereas Susan sees the importance of (rightly) doing this.

In an ideal world, sure.

In the real world, Sally and Susan can see the deadline that needs to be met by the end of the day, looming, and not on target, at 2pm.

Susan just fucks off at 2pm. Because she's got fuck all consideration for Sally and good ole Sally will as usual pick up her slack"healthy boundaries" and "childcare". Susan could call her partner and ask if he could collect the kids today. That would mean Susan helping out her colleague to achieve their joint goal, without getting anything herself. That's not Susan's bag.

Sally is left at 2pm, to complete 5 hours work on her own. Sally has to call her partner to let him know she won't be leaving any time soon, so can he get some food in for the kids. Because Sally knows if this deadline isn't met, she's on the chopping block, as is Susan. So she can do fuck all like Susan, and risk her own job. Or she can complete the deadline, and keep her job. And lazy Sue rides on her coat tails. Fully justified of course. Because part time.

[quote careerchangemaybe]@ReadySteadyTwins

As a manager, would you be prepared to pay the late collection fees for children then, to your employees' respective childcare providers, for the times they were late for collecting their children due to staying past their hours to be a "team player"? [/quote]
When the rest of the team manage to pull together on the odd occasions it's required, then "I can't because I'm part time" is bullshit. It's always the part timers who just "can't". Always. As if the people who work full time have such magically easy lives in comparison that they can stay at work for as long as they like, whenever they like. No, it's an absolute ball ache for everyone. But it's only ever the part timers who can't. As if anyone full time doesn't have other commitments. More commitments.

Part time doesn't make you exempt from ever having to help your other colleagues out. Well, it does to part timers. Then they try and deflect that people must be jealous of them, if anyone points out how they are happy to benefit from others working to help the team out, but never contribute themselves.

I work part time. I achieve, on average, 200% against my monthly target. I have colleagues who work full time who can barely meet theirs. The work is exactly the same. My target is only four cases fewer than full timers. I stay later if I have to. I work unpaid overtime when full timers don't. If the overtime is paid I only get premium rate once I've worked up up full time hours. Don't pull my weight? Don't think all part timers are the same because of your own experiences. You sound bitter.

@ReadySteadyTwins that doesn't answer my question, at all.

Regardless of whether an employee works full or part time, would you as their manager be prepared to pay any late collection fees to childcare providers accrued by them as a result of them staying at work past their hours (whatever their hours may be) in the interests of helping the team to meet a deadline?

If the answer is no, then many employees are not able to stay past their hours and for good reasons. They shouldn't be made to feel guilty for "not being a team player". I can't stand that sort of guilt tripping bullshit. People have lives outside of work and if they need to leave at their finish time - irrespective of whether they work full or part time hours - then that's the way it is.

And it's not "I can't because I'm part time". It's "I can't because I have commitments outside of work and I need to leave on time". There should be no further explanation required.

This is why I love working from home

I'm a sensitive kind of person and I think she was ridiculous reporting you. How is this even an issue?

In most workplaces, people make all sorts of comments all the time. Some nice, some not great, some neutral. Its madness to take offence for no reason. You could literally take offence to anything.

I also disagree with the pp saying part timers don't do their fair share and don't pick up the slack. Not true. I work 3 days but it's like squeezing a full time job into fewer days. I'm usually busier than some full timers as a result.

I'd have just replied "lucky you" whilst realising as a grown adult I could have taken my unpaid lunch at the time I should and if the project was sent to late to complete emailed a manger about the actual issue

Shes a Silly bitch .. ignore her

@careerchangemaybe

And it's not "I can't because I'm part time". It's "I can't because I have commitments outside of work and I need to leave on time". There should be no further explanation required.

Alas, it is the attitude of the part time.

Whilst I completely agree, Susan, finishing at 3pm, is off to pick her kids up....so is Sally, at 5pm.

But miraculously, Sally is able to make a phonecall and say "mum/nan/husband/etc we've got a situation at work and the more of us that chip in the quicker it gets done, can you please pick up DC?"

Susan? Oh, no. Susan won't ever contemplate even asking. Just watches everyone else pull together.

*But miraculously, Sally is able to make a phonecall and say "mum/nan/husband/etc we've got a situation at work and the more of us that chip in the quicker it gets done, can you please pick up DC?"

Susan? Oh, no. Susan won't ever contemplate even asking. Just watches everyone else pull together.*

Or maybe Susan has no local family support at all?? No one to call in these situations?? (My situation - hence why I have to leave on time and I make no apologies for it!) Sally is lucky to have an extended family support network!

@itsgettingweird

I'd have just replied "lucky you" whilst realising as a grown adult I could have taken my unpaid lunch at the time I should and if the project was sent to late to complete emailed a manger about the actual issue

Yep!