Tesco to drop extra payment for Sunday working!

[PassingStranger]

It says they will increase wages though in general.

No more extra for working Sundays though!

Yeah my company stopped doing this like 15 years ago. Its actually a much riskier job than Tesco involves lone working till the middle of the night. All for the minimum wage. And then you have to see people in Sainsbury's/Tesco who get paid more and spend most their time standing around chatting and still finding something to moan about

I think it is sad.

Just because other retailers don't pay it, doesn't make it "right" or a good thing that Tesco are removing money from people who have come to rely on it over the years.

Not unreasonable for them to stop the Sunday payment and also not unreasonable for workers to decide it’s not worth it and find another job. It’s a business so not sure why you are surprised they are looking after their interests. Good that they will raise overall pay though.

Do you think the same about cafes, pubs, public transport, museums, country parks....

I am not surprised. If they can staff the shops without paying extra of course they'll.

It’s not really their responsibility that someone relies on it, there’s no reason someone working an anti social shift on a Tuesday should receive less pay than someone choosing to work on a Sunday.

And they have not paid it to new hires for some time for that reason.

But people who went into Sunday working many years ago because of the enhancement (in their employment contract) and rely on it to pay their bills, have seen it eroded - despite those initial promises - and now removed.
So people working a shift in the week will get a payrise, and those working a Sunday will get a paycut.

People are being treated badly and I find that sad (though not surprising).

I also think it is a bit off that others don't get why it is a problem... having less money at the end of the week - for having put themselves forward/been persuaded to work Sundays for extra money 20 years ago.

Sainsburys don't get extra for working Sundays.

Why would they pay extra for Sundays

NHS wards, especially those that rely heavily on bank/agency staff, really struggle to fill up weekend rotas. Effectively they’re paying, usually, nurses extra to come in on their days off because otherwise there’d be no staff. The alternative is to rota permanent staff to largely work weekends, but that’s a sure fire way to ruin staff morale and lead to people leaving for community jobs which are 9-5, weekdays only. This way you work some weekends and you can pick up some extra ones for more money, it’s a choice.
It’s easy to say that weekends off is outdated but most nurses have family that work traditional patterns and which they’d never see if forced to work every weekend. Do those that think the NHS shouldn’t pay extra for weekends also think that they shouldn’t pay extra for nights? I mean, it’s part of the job you sign up for…

But for many people, working on a Sunday means they can juggle childcare - enabling someone to stay home with kids in the week and work the weekend. For others, someone working in say a NT property or restaurant means other families can go and spend the day out together. For lots of us being able to shop on a Sunday helps split chores across the weekend and means we can have a day out on Saturday or Sunday without having to cram chores into a single weekend day.

I don't want to go back to the days when nothing was open on a Sunday. Does anyone really?

The way things are going, employees will soon be expected to pay their employer for working for them.

I think the reality is there is a decent supply of workers willing to work for regular pay on a Sunday. If there were less workers they’d be able to command higher wages. This isn’t necessarily true across all jobs. I suspect the more skills you have the higher the price for out of hours labour. My plumber would charge a hefty premium for a weekend call out.

True.

I worked at Sainsbury’s in the late 90s/early 00s and Sundays were double pay. So I’d often volunteer to do 4 hours as it was easy money. Wouldn’t bother if it was normal pay. One of my friends had a really jammy contract of only working Sundays which the rest of us worked Saturdays. If I had known that when signing up I would have said I could only do Sundays!

We shouldn't wonder why young people don't sign up for these careers anymore.

Most young people are very aware of choosing a job with proper conditions and pay. And I think it's great that they ask questions. A lot of people are f*cked in their work. NHS was great and fair to work for. Today? Just don't.

Another one surprised that anyone was still paid extra for Sundays in supermarket retail. I worked Sundays at ASDA in the early 00s and there was no extra pay for those shifts back then (but maybe it was because I was in Scotland so no Sunday opening restrictions anyway?)

Is it the retailers themselves "shifting the paradigm" or did they just move in line with society's shift?

Extra time on Sunday was to compensate for the fact that most people worked m-f and Sunday was a traditionally the day of rest, plus a day of worship in our majority Christian country.

Now very few people go to church on Sundays and people work varied hours so appreciate flexibility in opening hours. If anything for most shops it would make more sense for something like Monday or Wednesday to be a closed day, or, in the case of clothes shops, to be open 12-8pm every day not 9-5.

It seems a bit odd to blame Tesco for flexible working and atheism!

I used to work a weekend job and my boss always bitched that she couldn't find enough cover for Sundays...no shit sherlock, its a shit day to work which is why it was always paid more. Thing with supermarkets is they know to overemploy, keep people short on hours, and then they have to take sunday shifts to make ends meet.

I know someone who was getting it in 2019.

Threads like this make me very glad I live where I do, where supermarkets are open 8am to 10pm on a Sunday just like every other day of the week. Going to England and having to remember things are either shut or will be shut early on Sundays is always a bit of a culture shock.

Yes I do actually. Any job that involves 24/7 7 day a week rota should not be paid any extra for the hours they are contracted to work.

I didn’t know you have a right to opt out of Sunday working. I wonder if other people are the same.

@Katypp Good luck ever staffing a ward ever again. On my inpatient MH ward we can barely staff nights even with substantial antisocial pay-and that’s relying on permanent staff doing paid overtime. Contracts are for 37.5 hours a week, including some weekends and nights, but the only way to make staffing work, as I said above, would have permanent staff only working weekends and nights. Would you work weekends/nights for no extra pay if you could work 9-5 Monday to Friday?

I am a bit puzzled that staff get a choice, tbh.
I have always worked in industries where weekend working was the norm and you just accepted it was part and parcel of the job.

No, I think Sundays should be more hours if anything. It makes it so much easier to organise people not on zero hours contracts and give them a consistent number of hours.