How much downtime do you get in your day?

[JenniferYellowHat1980]

It occurred to me today that it was a good job I didn’t have time for a coffee during my working day as I don’t have time for a piss I get 30 mins unpaid break and no paid breaks at all (NHS). I currently have a cushion in front of my lunch break so that I can catch up with clinics overrunning from the morning, but that’s about to go. I will get 30 mins if I can fit it in over a 8.5 hour shift.

So just out of interest, what’s ‘normal’? I know that if I get my 30 mins I have my legal entitlement, but out of pure nosiness I wonder how mean / standard that is. Also whether you have time to make drinks or go to the loo during working time.

I work in care, no breaks even in a 14 hour shift.

I get a lot. Maybe too much.

Law firm. We get 30 mins unpaid for an 8 hour shift. I always take 20 mins and go for a walk most of our staff don’t take a break or use up the 30 mins on cigarette breaks. We all eat lunch at our desks whilst working

We are all expected to do unpaid overtime too

Well there’s a water cooler in the waiting area but it’s having time to get to it. I can’t drink hot drinks and there really isn’t time at lunch to do so.

An hours lunch every day, free to make drinks and go loo when we like..... and I spend a large part of my time with nought to do!

Hidihi, what do you do?!

I have an unpaid lunch hour. The reality is I grab a sandwich at my desk and eat it while working so I can leave dead on time to pick kids up. I am fairly senior in prof services this is standard. The only people who take the allocated unpaid hour are very junior.

NHS, 30 minutes lunch, start at 8am, finish at 4pm. Can make tea and go to loo as much as I like.

In private sector, I had tea and loo on tap but often came in early, worked through lunch and stayed late.

I am better off where I am TBH.

Op, why don't you leave and go back to teaching. You post a lot about how unhappy you are in the NHS,

I am entitled to an hours unpaid lunch break
I rarely take an hour, and I normally eat at my desk
I manage a nursery so there are always interruptions to my breaks
I can have a drink or something to eat whenever I want and sometimes I eat my lunch with the children and we have a lovely chat

Lunch al desko as they say.
Haven’t had a proper lunch break in about 15 years. (Teacher)

I can have as much downtime as I like, and do make coffee/go to the loo whenever I want to. Sometimes I chat to colleagues about non-work stuff too. However, the bottom line is, the work still needs to get done, so if I waste time in the day, I'll have to stay late or take it home with me, so it's in my interests to keep the down time to a minimum. Usually, I tend to work through my lunchtime to make back some of the time, and I get into work an hour earlier than I need to in order to get a head start.

Can you not take a water bottle in with you? Refill it at lunch. In terms of toilet breaks surely you can quickly nip out in between appointments?
I rarely get any kind of break. I'm a restaurant manager and will usually be the only manager on shift meaning if anyone needs anything/ questions anything/ customer issues or queries I have to deal with it whether I'm "on a break" or not. Sometimes I get 5 mins to eat if I'm lucky. Often when it's busy I won't pee for 8 hours. It's just the way it is.

I get 40 mins unpaid a day but there are often meetings scheduled in that time and I am expected to work through lunch. Occasionally I take 20 mins. I am contracted for 19.5 hours a week and including unpaid overtime I work approx 38 hours a week, sometimes more but never less.

TA here, 8:30 until 3:30 (more like 8 till 4) with supposedly half an hour lunch break which usually ends up being ten minutes shovelling a sandwich in or eating a hot dinner with the children in the dining hall.

No down time until the kids have gone home but that’s the life 😊

@JenniferYellowHat1980 I work in the City... lots of changes and location being moved etc.... pretty sure we will be laid off at some point but I think they hope we will just first! Lol but I won’t!

I have plenty of time on an average day to get a drink or go to the loo, but I am pretty much never "off" I was sending emails at 10pm the last couple of nights and need to work on a memo over the weekend. I'm a lawyer.

Thanks for the patronising advice zippy. Haven’t you got anything better to do than trawl people’s previous threads? I am a bit disappointed to find there’s not much scope for me in the NHS, yes, but that wasn’t what the thread was about.

I remember you JenniferYellowHat1980 because, like you, I changed direction to become an OT Assistant.

I wasn't being patronising. You are clearly unhappy. You previously mentioned low salary, lack of opportunity to progress within the OT Assistant role, the cost to retrain as an OT and now the lack of loo and refreshment breaks.

It's pretty hard to march into a decent job on £35k+ without prior experience/training. You either have to suck it up and stick with the programme to get off the bottom rung of the ladder or you go back to your previous life.

I get paid for 35hrs, which includes 15 mins paid break in morning, 30 mins unpaid lunch. I work 40hrs in the office eating at desk, never take morning break, and only occasionally taking lunch when there is a visitor I want to catch up with.

But I think there is a big difference between an office environment when you can stop chat or have a coffee on the go and other jobs where you are on your feet all day.

I get paid for 37.50 a week - so I’m there 40 hours but get half an hour unpaid lunch a day. Also get a 10 minute paid break but we can go and get coffee/grab a biscuit or use the toilet whenever we want so long as there’s cover on the shop floor.

I work for a small national retail chain who treat their staff pretty well.

Stopping for a few minutes to drink some water and pee. I think you need to just do it. What will happen if you did this?

I’m sorry Zippy, I nodded your tone. That was really rude of me. I never ended up going down that route as funding where I love (not England) means I can’t access loans and can’t meet the criteria for bursary. It really sucks after giving up a well paid career to retrain in the NHS (not that I wanted to stay in teaching).

Nodded? Misread

If I stopped for a few mins to drink water and pee I’d get even further behind with my appointments. They are occasionally simple things I can deal with in the time allowed but often can take two or three times longer. It’s the luck of the draw and depends what the problem is.