Do part timers get paid lunch hours ? Calling HR professionals.

[kaz33]

I am a solicitor who has previously worked full time. My stated hours are 9.30am to 5.30pm, though you are expected of course to work longer hours than this.

As part of my return to work I have asked to have slightly shorter standard hours of 9am to 4pm, this will be a deduction from standard hours of 40 to 35 hours a week. This has been agreed. I will still be required to work longer hours if work needs to be done.

However , I have just received my amended contract from my firm with my new renumeration. They have calculated that my hours are dropping from 35 to 30 hours as obviously they have decided that I do not get paid for lunch. So I will get less money once they have prorated my existing salary. To be fair we are only talking just over a £1000 before tax but I am interested is this normal ?

As I understand the only people that don't get paid for lunch breaks are pretty menial jobs. I am considering accepting this on the basis that if I work over lunch time I can leave at 3pm !!!!

Kazz33, is there anyone you work with who works 'full time' and gets paid lunch breaks? if so, then the law states that that you should get the benefit of paid lunch breaks too - albeit, pro-rata. e.g if a f-t employee gets an hour per day as a paid lunch break, and you work four fifths of the hours worked by the f-t employee, you should get four fifths of an hour per day as a paid lunch break.

Does that make sense?

On the question of whether you have to have a break, the Working Time Regulations state that adult employees (ie those aged 18 and over) must have a 20 minute rest break for every 6 hours worked.

Good luck

All my employees that work a 7 hr shift get a paid, one hour lunch break, less than 7hrs get 30mins. never occurred to me not to pay for the lunch hour, seems really mean not too really.

Easily said about the breaks - but actually the rules only say "Employers must make sure that workers can take their rest, but are not required to make sure they do take their rest". There are plenty of ways for employers who want to to get round those regulations by nominally allowing you the breaks and then creating an environment where it is very much not in your interests to take them.

If your emplyers are saying you worked a 35 hour week then it seems like you did not get a paid lunch break. Even though you were in the office 40 hours s week I suspect your original contract said your working week was 35 hours.

So changing your hours as you state will result in a 30 hour week. And yes that should mean you can leave at 3.00 instead of 4.00. You only have to have a lunch break if you work in excess of 6 hours.

Your employer will have to agree the change in hours again though - they are entitled to refuse it if there are legitimate business reaons for doing so. e.g. no cover in the office between 3 and 4.

HTH

Hi Kaz33
Thank you for your question which I can gladly answer. I am a former HR manager of a law firm.

Standard operating hours of law firms in the UK are 9.30am until 5.30pm (Monday to Friday with 1 hour unpaid intended as a lunch break) - a 35 hour working week.
By law if you work more than 6 hours in a row a company has a legal obligation to provide a 20 minute break (which is usually unpaid) no later than the point at which you have worked 6 hours.

Most include this in a 1 hour lunch break or for simplicity round the 20 minutes to 30 minutes for lunch as frankly 20 minutes is not enough time to properly eat and rest in a full days work.

You have requested flexible working and wish to work 9am until 4pm (which is 30 hours of work, with 5 hours intended as lunch breaks).

Your firm have not been very creative or communicated with you. You should have had a conversation around the request and had everything clarified before a new contract was issued to you.
You don't actually need a new contract you could have had an addendum to your existing contract, because in say 1 year you are eligible to make another flexible working request or you may even wish to return to your original contract. A new contract comes with additional risks, does it document your continuous employment date? Also a contract should clearly state that lunchbreaks are unpaid purely as clarification.

As the firm operate standard hours from 9.30 (and therefore the practice manager/first aider might not be at work at this time it's more of a risk to consider allowing these as a regular pattern of working) I would have suggested:

Start 9.30 (rather than 9am) and take a 30 minute lunch (to take into account the 20 minute legal break requirement) and leave at 4pm as you wished.

Or better in both parties favour, work 9am until 4pm with 30 minute lunch, with this option you work 32.5 hours and only miss out on 2.5 hours of productivity and salary.

However dependant on a risk assessment being conducted and considerations being made your suggestion 9am until 4pm (taking the hour each day for lunch) would also work well.

I think you need to consider more the benefits of taking the hour long lunch break - 30 minutes isn't really long enough to take a break away from your desk, eat, go for a walk, exercise etc. An hour break will rejuvenate and refresh you and set you up for the afternoon and the evening with your family.

If you wish for me to loook over your employment contract and advise do reply back.

I work full time and no paid lunch hour. We were told by HR that under the European Working Directive after 6 hours you have to take a break of at least 20 mins. The lunch break is in addition to contractural hours.

I work part time. 30 hours.

The WTD says something about an unpaid half hour break over 6 hours work.

So if I decide to work 5 hours one day and 7 hours the next, I have no break the first day and I have to be at work 7.5 hours the following day, half an hour of which is unpaid.

Sorry, I meant my workplace interprets the WTD as unpaid, half hour break for every six hours of paid work.

If I try to submit a timesheet where I've not worked a break, the accounting software deducts half an hour from the total to account for the break I must have had.

The vast majority of us don't have a break and lie about our hours so that we're paid for the actual hours we've worked.

It's supposed to encourage a healthier, less stressful workplace apparently.

Surely legally they arent allowed to penalise a PTer?

I think you need to see a FT contract. If it states 40hpw, salary 50k or 40hpw (35hpw actual) salary 50k these are two different things with one inc paid lunch and the other not.

This is a zombie thread - presumably the OP has resolved the PT issue in the last 14 years!!

The idea of MarcHRGuru trawling the internet for 14 year old mumsnet threads to post on so that he can set all the poor clueless women right with his superior knowledge has really made me .

I work in payroll. No one in my firm from an unskilled labourer to the MD are paid for their lunch (half hour). However the men on site do get a paid 10 min breakfast break.