A 9 hour day not too long?

[itsalwaysthesame]

Hi, I'm looking to compress my working week to 4 days from 5. In order to do so I'd be working 9-6pm, my job is hybrid so I am always home for school pick up, currently meant to finish at 4pm but I never do, it's always around 5-6pm

Friends and work colleagues are saying it's too much of a long day and my manager won't approve it, I've been in the role a year, others for over 10 years, maybe they have a point? Mimi don't think 9 hour day X 4 a week is too long?

It's not too long but as a manager I would need to be able to be convinced you actually had the capacity to work properly until 6, school pick ups, supervising children etc doesn't count towards the hours. Wfh (or hybrid) is something that is easily abused which would be my concern. Dp doesn't have hybrid except in exceptional occasions for this reason, simply didn't work

When I worked in retail 9-6 was pretty standard, with a total of 1.5hrs break in that.

Currently work in an office, after having DS I negotiated to do my 32hrs over four days, so 8 hours a day plus a minimum 30 minute break. Worked really well for me, things changed when Covid hit and I started WFH.

I agree. Most of my jobs have been 8hrs + a mandatory unpaid 1hr lunch (not including overtime in this which I worked v often), so at a minimum I’d be at the office for 9hrs a day. 9-6pm is a short day for me.

Seeing as OP currently stays late every night to do her job (over five days) - it doesn't sound like it would be that difficult to justify why she can't drop her hours even further.

But firstly, do they know she works later? And secondly if it’s an issue that she works beyond her ‘formal’ end time, then that’s a performance issue they should have brought up but haven’t – so they can’t bring it up now.

A relative of mine does 8/6 shifts at the nursery she works at with 1 hour 30 commute each way. Not every day but it absolutely does her in.
I honestly think it depends on the job. A very physical one like that is not really comparable to a sit down job and a shorter commute.

Surely the point of compressed hours is (often) 4 longer days then day 5 as non-working, in which case the OP’s proposal sounds ok to me?

Blimey! Where do people work who think 9 hours is a long day?? I want their job 🤣🤣

I teach (primary) and am in my classroom by 7am and never leave until around 6pm. Rarely get even 5 minutes to myself from the second I'm in the door and haven't actually eaten lunch since about 1995! Not even joking, sadly 😢

Work day isn't even done when I leave school premises either...so I'd say 9 hours over 4 days is an absolute dream!! Ignore the negative naysayers, go for it!! 🙌🏼

You might find it will help your case if you can make clear to your manager

• that you can manage to leave your last appointment, do school pickup, hand your child off to evening childcare, and be at your desk ready to work, all within the half hour break (sorry I might have misunderstood and it might be longer)
• what your childcare arrangements are for when you are back home i.e. that you won’t be juggling childcare and work.

It's around a 34 hour working week - assuming you can do the school run in a 30 min lunch break.
Do you need to increase the hours slightly?

Either way, it's not hard for a business to justify needing someone available five days a week rather than four.

It is hard to justify as they need to provide hard proof it won’t work – often the only way a business can legitimately do that is by giving her a trial period and gathering evidence of harm to the business. They can’t just say they don’t think it will work or base it on other people. If they need someone working for the 5th day they need to prove why they can’t either recruit someone for it reorganise workloads.

It’s incredibly difficult to legitimately decline flexi working requests. I’ve been through absolutely loads of cases of requests in different jobs.

I have approved 2 10 hr days and 3 5 hr days so 9hrs seems fine to me

I'm currently working 8 till 6, 3 days a week.

It's ok

I agree with those saying that 9 hours isn't unusual.

I'm a teacher. I currently get into school around 7.30 and leave about 6 because I'm trying to avoid taking work home with me.

What proportion of your time is meant to be spent on home visits in people's homes? And could you realistically meet that target if working over four rather than five days.

Seems fine to me!

YANBU. That’s what I do, NHS

I work 9 hours a day minimum as a teacher. Any less feels like a short day (and is also a bonus 😂).

I work 35 hours over 4 days. 2 days in the office and 2 days longer at home. I take 30 mins break instead of 1 hour and do:
9.30-5.30 in office - 7.5 hours
8-6 at home - 9.5 hours
8-6 at home - 9 5 hours
8.30-5.30 - office - 8.5 hours

Works fine no issues all good. Done it for years. The day goes quick I find.

It’s a normal day. I used to work 9-6 hours 5 days a week in my previous role

Years ago instead of 9-5 i was able to do 8-6 4 days.

Things you might need to think about. What happens about your home visits on the 5th day? What happens about your home visits after 3pm? If the answer doesn’t involve putting them onto your colleagues then it might work.

Did you miss where OP is a carer in the community? They can't just not have someone show up on the fifth day, so I'm sure they'd be able to argue that a) existing employees can't take on any extra work and b) clients need continuity of care so hiring one person for one day's worth of visits isn't going to work out.

I think you might get a more favourable response if your non-working day is Monday not Friday.

If the reality is almost 6pm now, might it end up being say 7-7.30pm?