Work situation - is this reasonable?

[Floofydawg]

I'm in a mid senior role in financial services. Work part time (4 days, not condensed) but still get a full time workload done. Am expected to travel around once a month for work which ends up in me doing more than my paid hours that week. I don't get that time back and I still have to get my work done.

Next Monday I've been asked to travel for a department wide 'away day' which will basically just be a talking shop. This would mean me leaving home at 6.30am and not getting back til around 8pm. I've said I'm not going and my manager is trying to pressure me. AIBU to stick to my guns?

It’s subjective opinion whether her salary is high or not. She feels it isn’t so I would tend to believe that it isn’t high for her particular industry but none of us really know do we as we don’t know the facts of her career.

It’s very much industry specific whether you can generally expect to earn more than that, even in professional jobs. Age doesn’t necessarily mean you get paid more, it’s often more to do with what extra responsibilities you have taken on, whether you have actively sought out promotions etc. People aren’t necessarily paid more than younger colleagues doing exactly the same job just because they have been around for longer.

I'm in the private sector. Public sector workers (ie local government) tend to get paid less. And I'm certainly a long way from being a director.

Public sector jobs are famously low paid compared to their private sector equivalents.

Also for further salary context, my pay band stretches from £60k to £110k. The company merged two pay bands a few years back and those of us on the previous lower band have never been given appropriate pay increases to catch them up. But the expectation is that we now work at the higher level band. So kind of like being given a promotion that a) you didn't ask for and b) you're not getting paid for.

Actually, it's not really subjective.

Whether she is low paid or not can be determined by reference to objective criteria. Employers and recruiters do this sort of benchmarking exercise all the time. It will take into account the industry, the sector, the person's qualifications, their geographic location, the number of years of experience they have, their management responsibilities and any other aspects of their salary package, all of which are objective.

Mumsnetters sticking their finger in the air and saying, "It sounds like a high salary to me" is subjective, but not relevant.

And as I said before, I think this is harmful to women, because it encourages the women asking these questions to think they should be grateful for what they have and not rock the boat, rather than insist on being paid the market rate for what they are actually doing.

So would it be fair to say that you are actually being paid half of what someone else might be getting paid to do the same job, because they're full time at the top of the salary band and you're part time at the bottom of it, but you're doing the same amount of actual work and have the same responsibilities?

For people who don’t have all the details like us it is subjective.

For the OP it shouldn’t be subjective as she should know the data so it’s a little surprising maybe that she sought the opinion of Mumsnetters without all the data. Nevertheless, she did ask for opinions so got them.

@MargotBamborough I don't know whether any of my colleagues are right at the top of the salary band because these things tend to be hush hush - they wouldn't want disquiet amongst those who are paid less. But certainly there are people doing a similar role earning at least £20 - £30k more (full time equivalent)

It's actually giving me a bit of satisfaction how much time I've wasted on MN today when I'm getting paid for working...haha

Like I said, I don't think she was actually inviting opinions on her salary. More expressing surprise that people think that is a high enough salary to justify what is being asked of her.

Small rebellions haha, love it

Are any of those people men? Could that be grounds for an equal pay claim?

Honestly, this away day is a red herring. You need to make it clear that there is a pay disparity between you and your colleagues which needs to be addressed, and, separately, that you need to either start being paid a full time salary for the full time job you are doing, or start doing 25% less work than the people who are being paid a full time salary.

She specifically asked how much would you expect to get paid for this level of commitment?

If it was a rhetorical question I apologise for not being a mind reader but the question didn’t sound rhetorical. It sounded like she wanted genuine opinions about whether other people would consider the demands of the job a fair exchange for her salary.

I think my answer was reasonable. That I personally consider it a high salary but it’s not useful to compare salaries because people have different levels of seniority/responsibilities and I’ve not been very career oriented while she may have been.

The fte is £65,000 plus. The part time salary does not count when comparing with ft employees elsewhere.

The salaries of employees and work undertaken should have been evaluated by the employer when the sections merged. Obviously equal pay is a consideration and evaluation avoids such mistakes. Therefore the OP needs to know exactly what the roles are of higher paid men. At least ask for salary discrepancies to be explained. Usually when sections merge, jobs are opened up for application and it’s clear what roles are within bands. It is also a huge bandwidth so lots of grounds for complaint.

However someone on this bandwidth should get annual reviews and know how to progress. There must be some mechanism for progression or the salary grading means nothing. What do you have to do to get more money? I would want to know how jobs are evaluated and how are salaries attached to them within the £50,000 bandwidth. I’ve not seen such a big one .

The problem with contracts that state "and additional duties/additional hours as required" is that they make a bit of a nonsense of full time/part time.

Logically, if you are employed on one of those contracts then they could employ you for an hour, and then demand a whole week's work as that is what is needed.

It sounds like they have been getting more than their pound of flesh for a while - pay bands have been merged, you are expected to work at the higher level despite being on the lower level of the pay band, there is pressure from above just to get the job done, they ignore the fact that you are 80%.

In the circumstances I'd be looking to change jobs.
There's only so much pushing back you can do.

Been there, done that, left.

Yeah I interviewed for a few jobs last year. Got quite close to getting out. But I suspect they gave the roles to younger people who they can get away with paying less. It's a bit of a shit market tbh and I'm not sure the grass is greener anywhere else.

Not having another job offer in the bad doesn't stop you from asking for a pay review though, does it?

You could go to your manager and say, "Look, I know I overreacted about the away day, it's just that this is the last straw. I've been working a full-time job for a part-time salary for X years, half the time you don't even seem to remember that I am actually part-time, I'm getting paid a lot less than other people doing exactly the same job as me and I've reached the end of my tether. Can we put some time in the diary to review both my salary and my responsibilities? I don't want to come across as bad tempered but I have had enough of essentially working at least one day per week for free."

I don’t agree. Those who put in extra effort and go the extra mile should be rewarded for that.

Just to be clear, the OP is doing a full time workload on a part time salary and would be at the bottom of her pay band even on the FTE of her salary.

Just how many extra miles do you think she should be going, and how many days do you think there are in the average week?

The timing would piss me off here. With only a week's notice, you might very well have plans before or after the normal working day. I'd expect to be given more notice of anything that was going to involve travel and a longer than usual working day.

You could go to your manager and say, "Look, I know I overreacted about the away day, it's just that this is the last straw. I've been working a full-time job for a part-time salary for X years, half the time you don't even seem to remember that I am actually part-time, I'm getting paid a lot less than other people doing exactly the same job as me and I've reached the end of my tether. Can we put some time in the diary to review both my salary and my responsibilities? I don't want to come across as bad tempered but I have had enough of essentially working at least one day per week for free.

This is worded very well - thankyou.

I’m confused that you say the company needs you more than you need them because of a recruitment crisis, yet you haven’t pushed back against them giving you full time work when you work part time hours, and not negotiated any pay rise despite the merger widening the pay scale. Surely if they can’t recruit and would want to keep you, that gives you more power than you’re asserting? I think you need to start fighting your corner about far bigger things than one away day.

At that level I would expect more than contracted hours. If she doesn’t want to that’s a legitimate choice but those wanting to progress will do more.

I've already said I don't want to progress. Why on earth would I take on more workload and pressure at my age? I'm 6 years from retirement.

She is doing more than her contracted hours. Have you even read her posts? She's literally complaining about working a full time job for a part time wage.

Just be careful because they could choose to pay you more in the expectation that you do all the away days and it sounds like you just don't want to.