To turn down a job because they refused flexible working even though it was higher paid.

[SummerFlops]

I have been offered a job which is more money. Not massively loads. It's in my home town so no travel costs. So taking into account that and the slightly higher pay, I would be better off by £190 per month.

I asked if I could work flexibly in the mornings and afternoons to do a school run for one academic year so till July 2023. I would make the time up by working earlier from home and later in the evening. School run takes 20 mins max there and back so 40 mins of the day total.

The reason why I asked was so that I could help out my partner who has to do 2 school runs at different schools so pretty hectic. No after school club possible. This is just for this academic year and then she will be fine as eldest will be in secondary and can make own way.

The manager refused saying that that isn't what they do and there's an expectation that everyone needs to be in the office and available at any time if anything comes up. Like what i have no idea - I am not an ER doctor or anything. She also insinuated that I wasn't committed to the job by asking this.

Looks like they don't have a flexible working culture and I feel like turning the offer down but at the same time the extra money would be nice too!

YABU - of course they don't have to accept your request and you're being silly for expecting it.

YANBU - they don't seem like a forward thinking organisation and they'll be other stuff stuck in the dark ages. Run for the hills.

We have people working from home but taking time out for school runs is a no-go it's deemed as working from home not a childcare solution and our policy is quite strict on this.

This too. I wfh 100% but have childcare in place outside the home for 9-5.

The responses on this thread are 99% pointless because we don't know what your job is or what the impact would be on your team, on clients or on the general public if you were away for 20 mins twice a day.

As a pp said, it's all very well for posters to sit in a middle class wfh bubble and say airily "oooh it's as if the pandemic never happened" and accuse employers of being "dinosaurs" if they're not flexible.
You do realise most public facing roles carried on during the majority of Covid, right? And some never stopped at all. The bins were collected, shelves were stacked, police were on the streets, social workers were out in communities, estate agents were doing house viewings, roads were resurfaced, etc etc.

On the same lines, I bet most posters wouldn't be best pleased if you called to make an urgent child protection referral at 3pm and couldn't do it as the duty social worker was out picking up her kids. Or if your estate agent needed 20 mins out at 3.30pm on completion date so you couldn't pick up the keys to your new house. Etc.

It may be fine "in tech" to work very flexibly, but many roles simply don't allow it. I manage a very large service with some people who are public facing and some who aren't. We're as flexible as we can be with everyone, but the fact is we have to be staffed during core hours and we can't just pick up that work later. So if a new member of staff wanted 20 mins out twice a day I would have to consider very carefully the impact on the rest of my team as, if others put in the same request, I couldn't say yes to them all.

Yes, flexible working is marvellous for those who can do it. But let's not assume everybody can wfh please.

I’d be very surprised if the actual impact on your working time was just 20 minutes each time. Realistically you don’t get stuck into things properly when you’re keeping an eye on the clock for having to leave in a minute, and it’s hard to imagine you can genuinely leave your desk and be back within 20 minutes if it’s too far for your child to walk themselves. It takes me a good five minutes from my desk to the street in my office building!

I am fairy senior in an extremely flexible company and am a big fan of flexible working practices but honestly, I would raise an eyebrow (understatement actually) if someone I interviewed asked to do this twice a day every day. Because I think you’re being wildly unrealistic and massively underestimating the actual impact on your productivity of this arrangement. As is the case with your prospective boss, it would give me major red flags about you.

There’s flexibility and then there’s piss taking and sorry but for me, this strays into the latter. Flexibility is great. An overwhelming sense of entitlement whereby employees see it as unnecessary to have basic childcare arrangements in place, is not.

I’m clearly in the minority going by this thread but I believe flexibility is for unexpected situations, illness, emergencies. It’s not an excuse for working in a piecemeal way every day which realistically, will affect your performance.

I thought legally employers have to look at being flexible?

I would urge caution however loosing money for a partner?
And his children?

I do something similar. I work 34 hours.

Log on at 7.30 at home. Once DD has left for school I drive to work. I leave work at 2.30 to be home for her and I log back in at home until I finish around 5

It's very lacking in forward planning of their behalf if I'm honest.

Good workers can be hard to come by so if you come across one, a year of doing two 20 minutes drop off/pick ups is nothing in the long run as long as the work is caught up and completed.

If the OP was asking on a permanent basis I'd see their issue but this is not the case and this is partly the reason some companies struggle to find staff, especially good ones!

YANBU. I've taken a big pay cut before to move from a completely inflexible but very well paid job to a salary 1/3 less but with a flexible working culture. At this stage that flexibility is worth more to me than the money, but that is my situation

I'd turn it down. God knows what else they aren't flexible on ... ridiculous attitude they have

I'm surprised to see quite a few dinosaurs on MN!

Hmmm.

I actually do run a company.

An afternoon off for a root canal does NOT fall under discretionary fun leave, in anyone's book.

Had you said 'school assembly', I could have seen your point.

This example does not pain you in a good light, @TheDoorIsOpen.

I’d say thanks but nope. The world has changed and I would never consider a company that didn’t embrace flexible or remote working. Their loss!

I'm not a dinosaur, @SummerFlops.

Far from it.

However, an interviewee asking to pick up primary aged children mid-work day would raise every eyebrow I had.

Who is providing the after school childcare?

If they need picking up, surely they need looking after?

This is a ridiculous hill to die on. I can't imagine many employers thinking this is a reasonable ask, unless it's a hugely niche field and the employee is the most sought after.

Trust is earned, not given. The decisions I make for a known employee who's work ethic I'm sure of, could be very different to someone I have no experience of.

The law is fairly toothless. Companies who are good with flexibility tend to be doing so because they feel it's in their interests. It's more about getting the staff you want than anything else.

I’d turn down the job too because of culture and all that. But if I felt naughty, I’d swap my request from flexible working to unpaid parental leave for 1hr per day. By law you get up to 18 weeks per year and there’s no requirement to have worked for an employer to request it. It’s until the child turns 18 and is for any non-emergency need, ie an appointment. Doing the school run would qualify imho, and would only use up 190hrs of your 720hrs entitlement.

Just to clarify a few things

• this isn't a customer facing role. Noone will need to cover for me. No impact to anyone.

• I would work an hour at home. Do school run. Go to office. Do school run and then work from home after

• my dp does all school runs on days I go into the office / have meetings. Her work is very flexible. I just wanted to support her as this year it's just a bit hectic.

People saying not everyone can have flexibility in their jobs are being obtuse. If your job can be done from home / flexibly - those are the jobs we're talking about. Not the bloody ER doctor or the Tesco checkout operator!

Well you wouldn't get employed as your comprehension isn't really up to much.

Where have you read that you can take Parental Leave in hours?

See, www.gov.uk/parental-leave

Sorry I misspoke earlier, it’s 18 wks per child. Not per year.

On Gov.uk

”You must take parental leave as whole weeks (eg 1 week or 2 weeks) rather than individual days, unless your employer agrees otherwise or if your child is disabled. You don’t have to take all the leave at once.”

So if your employer agrees to doing it by hours, you can. :)

YANBU more employers need to get on board with flexible working. I’m lucky, my boss lets me work flexibly and I can come and go as I please so long as I get my hours in and the job is done well.

@Discovereads

And this employer, who's said no to any flexible working, is going to do that, are they?

@CantFindTheBeat

My dp looks after the children once they are at home as she had finished work by then. Childcare is not an issue.

You'd risk losing good people for a temp flexibility arrangement? Madness. Sorry but I think you might be exactly the type of manager I wouldn't want.

Well, be sure to let me know should I ever interview you, @SummerFlops.

More companies are moving away from presenteeism and trusting their employees to just get their work done. Sadly it sounds like your new place isn't one of them. At least you know before you started.

Also agree some of the responses on here are ridiculous. Yes what the op is asking for isn't that unusual since the pandemic. Wake up.

It's a bit of both. Given how most employers attitudes towards flexible working have changed post-pandemic, it's not unreasonable for you to ask about flexible working (though I think you were a bit foolish to tell a propsective employer it's for childcare reasons - I probably would have asked if their policies have changed, like so many other companies, to allow WFH 2-3 days per week), but it's not unreasonable for them to say no when there are lots of people looking for work. Employers often pick the easiest option, not necessarily the best. If they interviewed other candidates with a similar skill-set and experience as you, but the other candidates were willing to work the set hours from the office, I can see why they'd choose someone who was a closer fit to their requirements.

Their approach does speak volumes about their culture and how they judge and value employees though...so it sounds like it probably wouldn't have been a good fit for you anyway.