To tell you that Passport Office staff will strike for 5 weeks?

[Workyworky]

I support them.

Just thought I'd let people know to get their applications in ASAP.

I’m going away in 8 weeks for a 6-week volunteering trip, and have accidentally washed my (only 3 years old) passport 🤦‍♀️ Going to have to go and get new photos this morning to apply for a replacement online today.

I work for civil service. It's only the few who get what you're saying. I don't have a final salary pension. I get 25 days holiday. Sick pay isn't as good as you claim and has been brought inline with other employers for my sector.

I agree with the strikes for the first time ever due to the stripping down of wages and staff over the years the increase in working targets. Conditions in my department aren't good and we cannot hold onto staff because the private sector is more attractive.

Anyone who strikes doesn't get paid by their employer (obviously). The union's do have a pot of funds to assist those in long-term strike action. It's only about £35 a day.

People don't strike on a whim, they do it because they've not been listened to for years, conditions are declining and the majority of workers on the lower bands are really struggling financially.

This isn't accurate. I don't know where you've got your information from but it's incorrect.

@motherofkevinnotperry which bits are incorrect do you work in the passport office have someone close who does?

No they don't. They start on £22k and stay on that as there's no pay scale increases. Where are you all getting this information from because it's completely incorrect.

All civil servants are set productivity targets including over the pandemic. If they fail to meet them they're put on disciplinary and sacked. Again totally inaccurate information

This is a shocking hourly rate for what you do. My teenager has just started a job glass collecting and earns £11.50 an hour! And that's in the north west.

Indeed I know a lot of workers in the passport office but don't personally work in this sector.

It's not paid holiday, striking is time unpaid unless the union subs you which is about £35 a day and not everyone will get this, nor everyday. It's only reserved for long term hardship cases. They are taking a huge financial hit doing this. Losing a months wage

Most leave will be stopped/cancelled or hugely reduced for all staff during this period in an attempt to work the backlog. Overtime is stopped for those who strike, they cannot participate during the strike and for sometime after. Agency staff might be possible but at a cost that could be invested into long-term staffing so it's a waste of government money.

Those of us in the CS who WFH during the pandemic worked during COVID positive tests and illhealth because we were at home and it was encouraged due to such high workloads. We weren't sent home to do nothing. I was home schooling two children, looking after dependants and working 12 hour days having to meet targets. We didn't get anytime off as you seem to allude to. Burnout rates where very high and many staff moved on.

I don't know what these additional financial incentives are as none of us have ever had them. We don't get bonus payments or rewards etc we get our wage. A wage that's been frozen or very minimally increased for years and the lower brackets are being increased to meet minimum wage, the other grades are stagnant for many.

There's a whole host of reasons for these strikes but yes your information is inaccurate

@Nikii83 As a benefits assessor do you mean in the JC+ or DWP if so I see it in my work life how the benefit staff are under so much pressure, new incentives with no extra staff, those who can, retiring or moving into niche or other roles, and as for social security reg's they change with such regularity that staff don't have the time to keep up. But from where I am sitting working in the passport office doesn't compare to that.

I don't think passport office is just an admin there's a lot of responsibility there and a lot to learn. JC+ staff were back in work much sooner though and customer facing staff put up with a lot of abuse, their working conditions are surely worse than the passport office.

Wont get full pay from the Union, most o/t is TOIL, my ex partner was on the same pay scale as PP office workers, its shockingly low, £23k is pretty average and has had lower pay bands removed as they would have been below NMW.

WFH may be a benefit if you ve a long commute but its offset by having to pay for heating/energy costs & isolation, not everyone likes it at all.

The Tory Government dictated how their own staff had to react or behave in regard to Covid, your post seems to be suggesting the workers themselves decided Covid sickness policies, ridiculous bias.

Agreed, forced wfh is no luxury at all. The privilege is when you can choose.

yes, I was thinking that as I read through - from what I've read no-one will notice
gov't should refuse to negotiate until they agree to actually go into work in the first place.

I am not comparing what other CS staff did in the pandemic I was referring to passport office staff. You said my information was incorrect.

Now unless every passport office has their own rules I know what I am saying is correct. They sent anyone home who could be classed as vulnerable (and that was liberally applied) and they did not work, at that time they did not have the resources to set them up so some staff sat at home for months doing nothing bar some online training.

On returning to the office if they said they were positive they had to isolate and did not work and it did not affect their sick record. There was no limit on how many times they could do this and as soon as one person rang in then it opened the gateway for anyone else who had been in the office at the same time to do the same. Like a round robin. This amounts to a lot of working hours lost during the pandemic.

They do have additional incentive offers every so often and can work to earn this. They can work overtime after a strike, whilst it may seem unfair or the policy may be that staff should not be rewarded with overtime, in practice there will be overtime available even if they have to wait for a few weeks grace.

If they put their leave in now for May it is unlikely that it will be cancelled for fear as being seen as being punished for striking. This is the CS after all and although you said upthread they can be dismissed for not meeting targets. How often does this happen, how many hoops do management have to jump through to performance manage someone and how long does that take and how often does it result in dismissal? And the 22k per annum is basic without overtime so often people are earning more, 26k is still doable.

What do you suggest other countries do about their entry regulations, change them just to suit dizzy dissorganised entitled Brits?

I don't suggest they do anything.

My passport expires in November 2024. It actually says June 2025, but the extra months (renewed early last time when you still got the extra months added on) are lost. So for a lot of places I need to ensure I have a new in place by May 2024. But we often go away in Feb and/or April and/or May school holidays (which one depends in various factors) and def go away in the summer. To ensure I have a passport when I need it I will need to renew my passport in the new year, and not book anything for February just incase. That's fine, but under recent times even Easter might be risky!

I do think it's ridiculous that it can take several weeks to get a new passport however. The passport delays have been going on for years now and have got worse since covid it seems.

Whilst you can book a holiday whilst waiting for a passport it's a risky game these days. What happens if it isn't back? People don't want to risk losing their money. We should be able to guarantee that a passport will be back in xxx amount of time, especially for a standard renewal. But we can't and that just isn't good enough really.

I said they can work from home, I didn't say they were forced to and while I agree not every one enjoys working from home it's a nice option to have if it suits you, when referring to working conditions.

No where did I suggest staff decided the sickness policies it was the government, however it still amounted to a huge loss of working hours and staff did ring in testing positive on a regular basis with no requirement for evidence of that.

There is no bias

Thats nice. I travel in 8 weeks and have been waiting 5 already. 🙄

@DonnaBanana i am intrigued… do you not travel very often? Are you a sole traveller? Children?

I have taken this from civil service pension website
How much you could receive

If you earned £22,000 for 20 years, you could have an annual pension of £10,208 or £6,562 pension and a tax-free lump sum of £43,748.

After 40 years, this could be an annual pension of £20,416, or £13,124 pension and a tax-free lump sum of £87,497.

all for a 5.45% contribution, I work for the NHS and have to contribute a higher proportion for similar benefit. I think I am extremely lucky.

I think most private sector workers could only dream of a pension like that.

I’m 50 and have worked primarily part time since I was 28, full time for the 10 years before. Not always public sector, just the last 20 years almost. I was part time initially to be there when my children got home from school and then latterly due to my Parkinson’s diagnosis five years ago (which I don’t expect you to be aware of but I mention it because it is relevant as it is an example of the curveball’s life throws us which can affect the best laid plans) I’m sure I will manage, I’ve looked online today. I’ll get a small pension of approximately £3500pa from my previous employer and approx £12000pa from where I am now based on my being able to work until I’m 60. Who knows how i will be physically by the time I get to state pension age. So if someone works for the same organisation for 40 years full time paying their contributions and gets a £20k pension then they have earned it but the reality is most people don’t stay with an employer for that length of time, some can’t afford the deductions and don’t contribute and then some people get sick and can’t work as long as they might want to. But I can assure you that I won’t have a £20k pension or a £13k one with £87k in the bank either.

This. ^ The threads on here where the OP is screaming and ranting because it's late May, and little Tarquinina's passport runs out in late June and they're going to The Azores in mid June, really piss me off. As you say, why should other countries bend and flex because of people who can't be fucked to sort out their life admin?

In a local authority administer housing benefit and council tax reduction

Aww bless. Do you believe everything the Tory funded press feeds you?

Presumably you have a source for that claim? Even just a tit bit of evidence?

It was a splash across all the papers as far as I can recall

Why don’t you go get all the papers who aren’t right wing or funded by tories who reported it was all bc of lazy WFH civil servants?
How can I provide evidence of things that don’t exist? Very silly.

The delays were because of the sharp increase in demand for passports after covid that wasnt expected. You’ll find it was the MPs who were blaming home working. Just because an MP says something does not make it true.

Home office perm sec (Rycroft):

‘Media reports have criticised working arrangements in the passport office, suggesting that staff working from home are slowing down processing times. But Rycroft said staff's work locations had "precisely zero bearing on the current situation with passports, which has largely resulted from a drop in applications during the pandemic".’Source

funded by tories

evidence of this? Or just your strong belief?