Work 4 day week impossible as a Mum

[Storytime75]

Sorry if this is just a rant but some perspective would also be good - please be kind, feeling fragile.

I work remotely (in contract) and go into the office occasionally. I have worked 4 days a week since coming back from maternity leave and have my child one day per week.

I am trying to my best to be as accommodating as possible however this essentially means me putting in an extra 2-3 hours work every single night after my baby is in bed. I am so stressed out, and run into the ground.

Im not being a martyr, I've tried to put boundaries in place and have raised the issue of the workload with my manager and she's entirely unhelpful. In the past she has said "when I worked part time I found it really helpful to log on at 5am just blitz through my emails when no-one is bothering me, could you try that". Or "This is the problem with Mums working part-time, we expect a certain level of flexibility from you and it's usually impossible to make it work". I feel like encouraging this working pattern as the only way to get the job done is bad leadership. I do not get paid for any overtime or hours I put outside of the 4 days.

It's come to a head this week because I am expected to travel to a client on my non-working day (Tuesday). This is a 6 hour journey by train and an overnight stay. To then work the the next day with the client, and travel 6 hours back home to get back at 11pm. We do not get paid in lieu/toil for travel so that's 12 hours of my own time Im travelling on.

My issue is, in order to accommodate this for them, I will have to pay to put my child in nursery for the day. I raised this and asked what the business stance is on this as Im incurring a hefty additional cost and it's very much 'we expect you to be flexible'.

The solution is I work on the Tuesday, so I will be paid for that day. I will then travel up to the site. I will still have to pay for a full day's nursery in order to accommodate the business need for me to be there (I am unable to swap nursery days around).

Manager said 'well we're paying you for working on the Tues so we're covering your your childcare'. NO you're covering MY TIME, I am paying for the childcare. Im basically having to work an extra day, to get paid for 25% of it because the rest will go on childcare.

I understand that yes, every other day I work and my child is at nursery that is a cost I choose to incur, but that's a personal choice we've made as a family when weighing up my salary vs childcare.

Im pissed off because I feel that I'm having to pay the day of nursery fees/forfeit the day with my child in order for the business to meet the unrealistic expectations it has set to its clients, and the unrealistic expectations that staff will drop everything.

Im not expected to do it regularly, so fine. However the total lack of respect for my own time, the fact I work 4 days, the fact Im drowning in work and no one is prepared to listen, is completely disappointing. I will of course suck it up, and do the work, I just struggle so much to be firm in my opinions when management is so quick to disregard what Im saying as 'women being inflexible'.

YANBU - they are taking the piss
YABU - you need to suck it up

Thanks!

What does your contract say? I work part time and have done for a long time now, all of my contracts have specified that I have to attend upto x number of events on non-working days if they fall on a non-working day.

I wouldn't expect any job to pay childcare but I would expect them to pay for the travel time if it's that far. Or swap a day that week? I would be looking for a job somewhere else though with fixed hours that can't change.

Get some proper support and advice - consider joining a union if you haven't already. Get hold of your contract/work policies and ensure these are being followed correctly.
You shouldn't suffer a detriment as a PT employee and you are. You work 4 days a week, that is what's been agreed and they should be sticking to it. Start saying no.
As you are also pregnant, your employer needs to be very careful, as there could be some discrimination going on.

Your workplace sounds rubbish. I’ve done 30 hours at 4 days, went up to 36 over 4 days, realised it was too much so went to 34 hours over 4 days which works well. I manage but do also have a DH who works 4 days compressed.

On occasions I’ve been asked to come in in my nwd and on occasions the nursery have been able to accommodate it. But the difference is my employer gave me time in lieu for another day and were flexible with trialling different hours. I actually think you should speak to your HR about you working the extra and not getting travel time as that is outrageous and you should be paid for that.

But with me working for a flexible company, I also have to be flexible, it is rare they want me in on those extra days and they always give plenty of notice and look at alternative options first but sometimes it can’t be helped. So think while you need to tackle them on their travel policy, you probably need to look at round at other companies that have a more flexible/trusting culture

I think industries are really variable in what is normal expectations and so someone with experience of eg NHS employment procedures and practices is not going to have useful advice if you're in a sales role in the private sector. So perhaps if you could give us a rough idea of the industry area that might help? (Understand why you might not want to though).
It sounds unsustainable.

Think with your head here. You’re 4 months pregnant and I assume want to take some more mat leave on decent terms. You’ve got a relatively short time left until you go off again.

What I would probably do is say you want to go back full time and see what they say. If they agree your mat leave will be better paid and you’ve got more of a chance to save. Then once they’ve agreed ask for a risk assessment and make it clear that you can’t be doing 6 hours of travel/ 12 hour days- so you’d be doing 5 normal days in the office. You can still take leave of course and spend that with your DC. Read all relevant policies back to back. Get HR involved if necessary.

If you can’t face going full time then yes I think you just need to get better at saying no until you go off again, especially as you get more pregnant you should be risk assessed and reasonable adjustments made anyway. If you don’t want to stay long term I would but be averse to taking a few sick days if you can’t face it, and making it clear that some things are not possible when you are 5/6 months pregnant so your manager will have to find cover. E.g working on a Tuesday I would simply have said that unfortunately I don’t have childcare so either the meeting’s rescheduled or someone else would have to cover it this time.

Then when you’re on mat leave or as soon as you get back unless things have changed get something new lined up as soon as possible.

Agree with this

And yes definitely join a union first thing on Monday morning before any of the ideas on this thread are implemented!

I wouldn't expect to come in on non working days if I wasn't available (eg couldn't arrange childcare) but if I did agree to it I wouldn't expect employer to pay the extra childcare cost (or extra dog sitting cost or extra carer visits for elderly relative etc etc).

I did four days per week (law). Big mistake.

I had a bigger case load than the FT staff and often had to work through the weekend or until midnight to keep up. The pay was shit too.

I work FT now, from home, and ironically have about 10 hours more free time a week due to the lack of commute and a more reasonable workload. And I still work over my hours but within expected reasonable parameters. And we get TOIL if we want it. It’s a more senior job with double the pay too.

So your situation sucks OP. I’d be raising a grievance.

I would just say "unfortunately I am not able to work or travel for work on my non working day"

And then say nothing else. The fact is you can't do it, so don't.

It doesn't sound like you're able to fulfil the commitments of the job, it might be best all round to look elsewhere?

It's really difficult, I totally get it. I'm currently stagnating in a role because I know I can't dedicate what's needed to move elsewhere at the moment. It's a temporary set back, once the primary school years are over, I'll be hightailing it out of there!

No that's ridiculous it's your non paid non working day. Last time I went back after Mat leave I did 30 hours over 4 days, I had tge exact same work load as my colleague who did 37.5 over 5 , i just got paid less for the same output. Ive been back FT a couple of years but will be on mat leave again next year, on my return I'm planning to request 35 hours over 4 days ASAP least that way the pay will be more reflective of tge workload but u should have a day at week at home with the little one and no childcare fees that day. Sorry your manager is so terrible.

OP your manager is shit.

I have a team of 11 people and I would never treat someone like this.

Time to start thinking about a move.

What industry are you in?

You're not actually working four days (I.e. 30 hours) then, you're working ft hours compressed. Which is what a lot of women find themselves doing and then suffering burnout as a result. I agree you have to set boundaries - say that if you continue to work full time hours in four days then you want paying for full time hours, and no pro-rata leave applied. I know that's not what you want, but it starts to focus their minds if you're not actually supposed to be on compressed hours. I used to work 4 day weeks, I agreed to be flexible about this on the understanding that flexibility worked both ways. It did, and so I didn't mind the rare occasions I worked on a NWD, or worked late. It sounds like your employer is being totally unreasonable, and you need to be hardline about your boundaries. If they're still not respected, you'll need to find other work.

Check up on employment law as I'm under the impression that if a company wants you to work somewhere other than your normal place of work they have to pay travel time and for the travel.

My partner works 4 day week, and has child one day also. I absolutely don't want them to have to take a day of annual leave to cover a working day for me. We need all the leave we can get for when child is poorly etc.

It's not that I expect them to pay the nursery fees; in my first post I said yes I understand that on all the other days I am happy with paying for childcare and that we as a family have decided that it's worth it for the 4 days.

However what I do expect is them to understand that I might not want to pay for an additional days childcare. It's not just a 'but you're getting paid' situation. It's another full day of my time where I only see a certain % of the salary for it because the rest goes childcare costs. And the reason I asked for 4 days to start with was because we decided 5 days salary isn't worth it to make up the extra fees and I'd rather have the day with the baby.

Maybe I'm just being petty? I was just trying to outline the principle of it all to them 😬

HOWEVER I absolutely will look to go to FT in the meantime, as it's clearly not working for anyone! The thought of not seeing my child is sad however at the moment Im barely functioning in the time I do spend with them so reducing some of the stress will help that.

What everyone has said about travel is interesting - I did look up other MN threads on that and loads of people were saying they don't expect to get anything back in lieu/toil when they travel for work - so I'm confused on that! I checked contract and it does say 'toil will be paid for additional hours worked subject to prior written agreement'. However I think the issue is that they don't class travelling for work as 'work'.

Really appreciate you all xx

Travel definitely wouldn’t be covered unless they explicitly state it. I don’t usually get paid for my morning/afternoon commute but if I’m travelling during the day to a different location for work, it’s part of my working day therefore paid as usual, and anything over and above my hours goes on a flexi sheet to be claimed back. So there are some situations whereby if I have to travel for work and this extends my working day beyond the norm, I may find myself claiming for travel too on flexi, but this was stated when I started the role.

My husband does get paid for travel, whether that’s the usual morning and afternoon commutes or further travel if he has to go up to HQ, but that’s explicitly stated and applies within his company but isn’t standard within his industry.