Unfair pay? What do you think?

[MissFindMuck]

I work in the voluntary sector for a small but extremely overstretched early intervention mental health support with young people.
There are 4 of us in the team currently. I was brought in through a role which is still within the charity but salary is funded through a different pot of money in the charity. Therefore my job title is slightly different as is my contract - I'm supposed to work with young people 18-25 who are struggling with their mental health and support them into work related occupations. However, since beginning it has become clear that my role was created to be the same worker as the other 3 members of the team. There is absolutely no difference in our daily job roles.

In a team of 4, I am the only one who is a qualified health care professional and with extensive experience working with those struggling with mental health crisis. The other workers are fab, they come from different backgrounds and I don't doubt they do a good job also.. However, all young people at high risk of suicide or harm are allocated to me. 2 of the other workers will only work with low risk clients. We work the same hours, in the same environment, following the same processes.. But because I am on a different contract to them I am paid less.
I feel like this is unfair, especially considering I take on a lot more stress with young people who often struggle to keep themselves safe and my colleagues regularly pass over these young people to me as they lack confidence to support them themselves.

I feel like I should be atleast on the same wage as them. They get 23600 and I get 22100. Although it's not a huge difference I feel the principle of it is not right.

Do I have a right to raise this with HR? I've mentioned it to my manager (who is also their manager) who said that there is nothing she can do about it apparently.

Any advice?
Thank you :)

You can mention anything you like, but I don't expect that you'll get what you want. The bottom line is that you are funded differently, the job has a salary attached to it, and whilst it may not be fair it isn't illegal.

It does seem unfair yes, although not illegal. I would raise it as a polite enquiry with HR (if they have a job evaluation system it may be that your JD ought to be banded differently) - but at the end of the day if there is only so much funding there may be very little they can do - other than maybe try and share the workload a bit more fairly (but from what you say that has its own issues too). Hope you get it sorted!

Thanks for your responses. I expect that they will say my contract is different but my contract also says that I am to work with 18-25 year olds who are NEET when in reality I work with 13-25 year olds with a variety of needs. I'm not doing anything on my contract but everything on the same as the rest of the teams. I don't want to rock the boat, but I just feel undervalued.

It does seem unfair, but not sure what you can do about it. The only thing I can think of is that you suggest to your manager that you might offer some sort of training to your colleagues to give them more confidence in dealing with the more stressful of your clients - they’re never going to gain experience otherwise - to spread the load a little.