Work won't let me change from FT to PT

[CellarDoor75]

Dc1 will be 2.5 and dc2 will be 9 months. Need 4 days a week to help reduce nursery fees, gave no family to help.

Work won't let me make this change, despite allowing another member of the team 4 days a week even though her children are both teenagers.

Is the anything I can do or do I just have to deal with it?

Allowing people to go part time is generally done not on the basis of "who needs it more" but on how much it will hurt the business.

Don't go in saying "I need this more than her". Go in saying "I have a plan for how this can be done and will be neutral or beneficial for the business".

What kind of work do you do? Could you do it in 4 long days instead of 5 normal length days? Are there separate chunks of responsibility, could you pass on some responsibilities to another person?

What Trills said.
Your employers aren't interested in why you need/want it, they might be persuaded if you can demonstrate how it will work, without leaving them short staffed (jobshare?) or without cover for things, or harming their business in some other way.

For many organisations, they would probably prefer you to do 2 1/2 or 3 days than 4. It can be difficult to cover one day's worth of work, with 2 or 2/12 up for grabs they could get someone else in part time to do the other half.

It really does depend if you do work where you have to be present (e.g. answering phones) vs work where you have to get something done (e.g. a project).

"Being present" jobs can be shared more easily than "getting things done" jobs, because they don't need all of the knowledge to be inside one person's head.

But "getting things done" jobs can be done at less traditional times (e.g. working 4 long days, or taking some work home).

Exactly what trills said.
Have you had an actual no then?
You need to do an appeal. I was told when applying for reducibg my hours to treat it like a business proposal.
you need to demonstrate how it benefits the company by you working part time ie you could still meet deadlines, you are fully trained and know the systems
How it would work- 4 days a week- offer any 4 days that suits the needs of the business most, you would be able to train other members if the team to cover duties, you could prepare a protocol of key tasks etc
You need to preempt what their excuses will be for my work it was that the needs of the business change from week to week so I stated on the form that I was flexible about which days I worked and that I was happy to be contacted anytime to advise on my days off.

Finally are you in a union? The first mention of a union and my work became very helpful

Just as another thought... The fact that they've already agreed this for someone doesn't necessarily set precedent so mean everyone should be allowed it. In fact, it could reduce your employer's ability to do it for someone else as they have already used up some flex in the system to allow person 1 to do it.

If they refused you first then allowed someone else to do it, you'd have a great pushback but previous decisions wouldve been based on team shape / resource at the time - not what every eventuality would throw up in the future.

What's "reasonable" will depend on the scale of the business / resource situation/restrictions (so a small business wouldn't be expected to be as flexible as a large one).

God luck with your proposal.

Thank you all. I will still apply even though they've unofficially told me no several times during my pregnancies (even when I didn't actually ask), but looks like I'll have to just deal with it or look for another job.