NHS workers (non medical)

[Freshstarts22]

How are they as employers with things like flexible working, approving annual leave ect? Sorry not really aibu but need to make some quick decisions.

Unless the job is described as flexible working they will be expecting you to do the hours and days listed. Otherwise, formal Flexible working you can only request formally after you’ve been there 12m but your manager might agree informal flexible working, not guaranteed though. Depends what type of flexible working you’re talking about, your role and the team dynamics.

annual leave approval in 10 plus years I’ve never had anything rejected or even questioned. As long as you’re sensible and discuss with your colleagues your preferred dates before requesting I wouldn’t know why anyone would be difficult About approving. Ie don’t assume you can book the full 2 weeks over Christmas off just because you applied for it first, or all of half term just because you have kids etc.

what’s your intended role and what’s the hours advertised?

Annual leave approval has never been a process but depending on the team you are joining there may be rules eg need a minimum of 4 in the office at any one time. Flexible working, depends what you mean by that. Flexible working requests to go part time or work condensed hours are routinely approved but working flex time in the day or changing hours every day are more difficult. They would like you to have set hours or at least that is my experience. However I have seen from here that there is vase differences between Trusts and teams so this may not help you with your decision.

It varies very much between teams and roles. In my position there is quite a lot of scope to work flexibly as long as the work (and the hours) gets done... However we are also expected to be flexible ourselves. My normal working hours are 8.30 - 4.30, but I have been known to have to attend a meeting at 8.00 or not to finish until 6.30 because that is the only time we have been able to get people together. For a ward clerk or medical secretarial role there is much less flexibility as you need to be there when you are needed. Most offices with have forecasting hours when they expect people to be there. There isn't much point in having somebody there to answer phones, for instance, when people aren't going to be phoning in. So the short answer is that it depends what job it is.

Varies. I’ve worked in two roles in scotland, one was fully flexi and one wasn’t. Both have been ok with me working less than full time hours. Sympathetic with time off for child issues etc.

My manager is great but I guess this depends on the manager your work for.

The flexible working request is no longer after 1 year. You can request straight away. I am clinical but had to ask several times for reduced hours, it was only agreed once I told them I'd have to leave.

Ime, not great.

I think you need to call and ask.

Are you in a position where you’re choosing between two roles? Can you tell them you need a couple of days?

My Trust aims to be as flexible as it can be for each staff role. My department is a bit less keen, but generally quite flexible. My immediate line manager is very flexible. So, my experience has been positive overall.

Hugely variable depending on the banding and organisation I'd say. My last two organisations were pretty flexible, but this was band 8 level. I'd say 7 or lower much less flex.

Really depends. I lead 2 teams and try to be as flexible as reasonably possible. Staff have been granted a range of flexible working requests.
Again leave I try and approve where ever I can. School holidays are always tricky as there are usually a large number of people that want to take leave so we have to make sure it's fair. E.g. can't always have Xmas and new year off. Those that worked Christmas last year will have priority if requested this year. Obviously there are sometimes exceptions and these will always been considered.

Depends on trust, manager, your jobs role, pay grade etc.. bit like how longs a piece of string

Flexible working well friends very much what you are doing. Some office based admin there may be potential, but something like a reception or ward clark where there needs to be someone at a desk during clinic hours to deal with clinic specific admin or patient flow then flexibility is limited and that is down to the needs of the service.

Annual leave again depends on the team and how many you can have off at once and depends how the ward or manager deals with it, we can't really answer that question.

Really depends. I'm an AHP and my job is super flexible, I work funny hours to manage my health, partly from home, can take my leave when I want (but manage my own diary so need to have some common sense) My partner is an administrator and it's not flexible at all, very set hours, always needs to be in the office (despite not really needing to be...) Limited when he can take leave etc.

Depends on the role, I've had two NHS roles who offer "flexible working", first expected me to work 8-5 and do unpaid overtime despite it not being in my contract. Ended up leaving because I wasn't happy to work for free.
Current role I can start any time up to 9am as long as I do 8 hours. Early finish on a Friday if work is finished and no problems requesting holidays.

To me it depends on if your line manager is a nut job or not

In our dept band 8 and above can have holidays when they want, much of Christmas off (or Easter, eid etc) and to work Flexi hours, part-time or WFH. The rest us put in for leave with fingers and toes crossed too valuable to be away as guess who does all the patient related work

And yet it's the band 8s on call weekends, evenings and bank holidays, so they clearly do cover some valuable work...

i guess that’s patient facing band 8’s that are on call? I work in workforce transformation in the head office and the band 8’s aren’t on call for anything at the weekend!

Operational managers are not patient facing but they do on calls. It's expected from band 8a. They have to be able to get to the hospital within an hour at all times when on call, and it's for 24 hours at a time. They get paid peanuts for it, works out something like £40 a go. Some of it is easy to advise about on the phone, but other times people have to go and deal with issues.

There are usually different levels of on call, my last place did bronze, silver and gold. Bronze would be band 8a/b/c Silver bands 8d/9 and gold was director. The bronze gets to deal with everything and if they can't it gets escalated up the chain. By silver level, even the likes of finance managers are covering the on call rota.

Again I am sure it varies everywhere. But I wouldn't fancy a job in a trust if it meant I had to do on call. DH and I only have one day off a week together and so I couldn't cover on calls on a Saturday and I'd have to pay £62 for a day of nursery to do a Wednesday. The money for doing on call wouldn't cover half of that after tax/NI/pension

To be fair my on call (8b ops manager) is like 1 day a month and one weekend (24 hours) every 2m. The day oncall you stay home until 3pm not working, have to be onsite 3-11pm then oncall from home until 9am. The weekend we get the day back the week after. But as PP said, it’s peanuts for the additional responsibility- like £24 or something.

i think Trusts, roles and policies vary massively trust to trust

So it’s a band 4 patient facing role. Not admin or anything like that. It’s all new to me and I’m coming from a term time job.
Its standard 9-5 shifts. The thing I’m worried about is being able to take annual leave when I request at Xmas ect as I’m a single parent.

Will your service be open over Christmas?

Annual leave as a full week/weeks over xmas and ny is not allowed in my trust. Only for exceptional circumstances. This allows for everyone to have a day or 2 leave over the festivities.

Plus we can only have 3 weeks of school hols per year in total. Again, to allow a fair allocation between workers.

If there's a minimum staff level (usually is for patient facing) you probably won't be able to take all school hols off especially if there's other parents in the team. Usually they're good at letting you have it if they have enough staff in but even people without kids usually want some time at Christmas so it's unlikely you'd get all of it perhaps a few days each

What department is it, is it open all year. You cannot guarantee xmas off, or during school holidays. You will not be the only person with caring responsibilities but you can put requests in which managers try to accommodate but they have to be fair.