Change in work benefits?

[jaabaar]

Hi,

Once again another issue with my company...

Working full time I was receiving travel benefit as follows:

Yearly travel card
I pay the price of the last 2 zones
Offices pays the first 5 zones.

I am now working part time 4 days.

They want me to buy a yearly travel card (which doesnt come in "4/5") but they will pay only 4/5 of the first 5 zones. So I end up paying about 50 pounds more per month travel.

Do you think this is fair? Wanting to buy a yearly travel card to get the cheaper fares but paying only 4/5 of their part??

THanks for your opinions....

Close to tears as I have had so many issues with my company and it doesent end it seems.

(Refusing to pay me the acured 8 days bank holiday)... etc etc

Presumably all of your other benefits eg annual leave have also been reduced to take account of your part-time status? So you get 4/5 of the annual leave entitlement, for example?

It is usual to receive pro rata benefits when part-time,

'They want me to buy a yearly travel card'

Would you really prefer to buy individual tickets 4 times a week then? That would usually be more expensive than buying an annual ticket wouldn't it? It's just you are saying that their insistence on you buying an annual ticket is the problem, so that they benefit from cheaper fares. Surely you also benefit?

How about thinking of it in terms of money? When you were full time your company contributed, say, £2,500 towards your travel costs. Now you are 4/5 they should contribute 4/5 of £2,500 towards your travel costs, in other words £2,000.

Are they being fair financially? Sounds as though they probably are. Lack of good discounts on train travel is one of the irritations of being part time at work - it is not your employer's responsibility to make up for the fact that train companies don't offer part-time season tickets I'm afraid. As long as they are not contributing less on a pro rata basis than they were when you were full time they are not doing anything wrong.

LLARE: Yes that is fair what you say. But I had the benefit of them paying me the costs of zone 1-5 costs of travel. So, if you cannot buy a yearly travel card at 4/5 I would request them to buy daily tickets as it would save me a LOT of money???

FlowerytaleofNewYork: Thanks for your imput. I do understand that point. But with my company messing me about in every single aspect I guess I am too sensitive by now... Please if you dont mind, could you read below?? It is very long... What would you do in my place??
THank you.

It would be cheaper if I could buy daily tickets and they pay the zone 1-5 and I pay the rest. This would mean I pay 844 a year.

If I have to buy yearly travel card I have to pay 1380 per year.

This is my companies employee friendly profile:

A) They have refused to pay my 8 days bank holiday.

B) They have not started for me the childcare voucher scheme (which they dont have to but could)

C) They have employed 4 more people (3 to cover my maternity leave) and 1 additional as business is expanding and doing very well.
But when it comes to wages I got 0.05% so my wages are worth less in actual value.

D) In 8 years my wages have increased in actual value by 1,800 pounds per year. I work on average 1 day a week free overtime.

D) I will take over my bosse's job who is retiring plus additional manage/mentor 4 employees. Without any pay raise, he was earning more than double then me which I dont expect to receive, but at least something?

E) They asked me in for a day to discuss ongoing working matters with my departing boss. I will not get imbursed for that and had to pay my full travel fares which is £ 20.

Now after paying my nursery and travel etc I am left with about £45 pounds a week for 3.5 days work (8 years in that company - working in Trade and Finance and Logistics. worked myself up and they trust me to do my bosses job who was also director of the company). If I have to pay travel as they request my travel costs will increase by 10 pounds a week which would reduce my weekly wage to £35.

If I go to Aldis instead of Tesco......
I will save as much in a week......

I am in tears for the way I was always treated as I have put work as a priority higher then my health and family. I will just chuck it in, even if it will create a lot of problems for my company. I dont care anymore......

I forgot to mention that every second person which gets employed runs away because they cannot take the pressure and the way they are treated in the office.....

Forgot to say how I had meetings telling them I just cant cope anymore with approx 180 emails on average a day plus all the other work...... Got promises which NEVER materialised.

Then when I go on maternity leave they need 3 people to do my job. AND they keep them on to do my job I was doing while I take over bosses job....

Are you asking for advice on any of the rest of it? Just asking because it isn't relevant to your original question.

Taking your response about the travel, then yes if it is cheaper for both you and them to buy daily tickets rather than an annual one, the yes you are reasonable asking to do that instead.

Sorry FlowerytaleofNewYork. Was just wenting my upset and sadness :(. Just generally askiing if you would just leave the job...

The daily tickets are more expensive for them but cheaper for me. So of course they will not even think of buying daily tickets.

When they calculate my hourly wages they even round down the penny.........

But why should they pay more? You say they want you to buy a travelcard so they benefit from cheaper fares, but they are not benefiting particularly. Presumably they don't give a monkeys what ticket you buy either. They will pay 4/5 what they paid before, and it is just the case that it's cheaper for you to buy a travelcard with that money.
There have obviously been lots of issues but there is sometimes a tendency when that's the case to assume or perceive everything is unfair or malicious. You need to take this incident in isolation, and in itself it's perfectly fair and the right thing they are doing. Your gripe in this instance should be with the train company for not doing part time tickets, not with your employer for not picking up the difference.
In terms of whether I'd leave the job, well it depends how much you need the job and what else is out there.

The travel bit is a red herring. You are stressed to (almost) breaking point.

I think you need to draw breath and think of the following:

1. If they addressed all the concerns you raised in your additional comments, would you still be unhappy there?
2. If the answer to 1) is No, then you need to ask yourself:
3. If all these concerns do not get addressed can you bear to stay?
4. If the answer to 3 is No then you need to articulate all of your concerns in a list of 'requests'. Try not to be emotional, and try to look at each of these points from the business point of view as well as your own. Point out how your existence benefits the firm. When you have a good structure and good business points then take it to your boss and ask to discuss it.

You need to give them an incentive to fix things for you, or else they won't get fixed.

StillSquiffy: Thank you for putting the clear questions which help to focus and think!!!

1. yes

I know that I have the power to ask for anything, basically put them on the spot. As the knowledge I have is very difficult to replace (not because I am special, lol, it is just very specialised). But I am not the kind of person to do that (unfortunately).

I have come to the conclusion that 50 pounds a week clear monoey after nursery and travel is just not worth it. As I only get upset every day, am overworked every day and unappreciated.

Time to change and time to leave.

Thank you for putting the questions to me.

x