Returning from maternity leave pregnant!

[bristols]

I will be 15 weeks pregnant when I go back to work from my maternity leave. Does anyone know how that will affect my next lot of maternity leave (if at all)?

Also, I need to meet with my manager in the next couple of weeks to discuss hours etc. When should I tell her? Do you think I should tell her after my 12 week scan, or when I actually go back to work. I know that legally I don't have to say anything until much later on but I don't want to make things difficult for her. Or for me.

I had 3 sprogs in 3 years, so I was pregnant each time I went back. The length of time you have to return to work after maternity leave so you don't have to pay any money back is crucial! I returned to work for the NHS for 11 weeks and then left. I was hounded like a dog for £3000 for over a year because I should have returned to work for 12 weeks - I only worked 11. I then had to re apply for a job a year later (for just 3 months contract) so that I didnt have to pay back the money. All a complete pain in the backside.

Just be careful you do exactly what is stipulated in your maternity policy or you could lose out.

Yes, very true aboutwhat they pay over and above the 6 weeks at 90% pay and then the £112 a week. Are we, tax payers, giving NHS workers a much better deal than we in the private sector get? Why? I suppose we have to pay it to keep people working for the NHS. How enhanced is it over that statutory right I mention above? No wonder our taxes are so high.

out of interest xenia NHS workers pay and conditions are not favourable compared to private sector largely because succesive governments exploit the vocational nature of the employment

very quickly the average graduate wage exceeds the wage of NHS workers

HCA and untrained staff paid a pittance no bonus system
no paid for jollies/parties/client do's
maybe free pens from the smithKline rep if u are really lucky

SM,half pay for 6 months compared to 90% pay for 6 weeks is pretty good but some private sector employers who need to keep some very good staff do pay more than the statutory minimum. I suppose it's a market force issue - if you want staff to stay you pay what you need to. If they're ten a penny and easily replaced you pay the statutory minimum. I was talking to someone who is involved with local authority contracted out cleaning and the packages (basically minimum wage) those cleaners get in the private sector are so poor. But I agree we need NHS workers. It's the third largest employer on the planet after the red army and the Indian Civil service I think which I find astonishing give how small the UK is to many countries.

NHS in upheaval at the mo for many reasons

Graduate nurses and SALT,OT,Physios unable to secure posts after training.yet the work needs done

the medical staff training place allocation scheme debacle. recent BMA survey revealed many SpR feeling low and ^demotivated

we are unhappy bunnies at the mo.

I got 6 weeks at 90% (with no SMP) and then 20 weeks with half pay plus SMP. I have taken the other 6 months off unpaid. I receive no bonuses and my pay rise each year doesn't even cover inflation. We don't even get a contribution towards our christmas party. I love my job, but I do not do it for the money!

Xenia - I'm sorry you are upset about this. I think the NHS needs to be favourable on this issue because it is such a female dominated organisation.

SM - agree. I have many doctor friends who have no job to go to in August. I know many student nurses who have spent the past three years training to find there are no jobs. It's not a good, or happy, situation.

no one works NHS for the money

as i said successive governments exploit the vocational nature of the job and overall staff good will

NHS employees are skilled, competent,capeable workers who are underpaid, overworked..but its hard to change direction once u invest the time/intellectual effort to train

i dont know i would recommend a NHS career the way i feel at the mo...but im feeling disheartened

as bristol correctly said
heehaw bonus or perks

You're right, SM. We are taken advantage of because, ultimately, we are there for the care of the patient. I wouldn't like to think of how many hours of unpaid overtime I have done by staying late at the end of my shift because something needs doing and there's just no one else to do it.

Anyway, this is turning into a whole other thread

Had my brother done law not medicine he might in London now be on 5 x (and possibly a lot more) what he's paid as an NHS consultant. I certainly agree it's vocational and in a bit of a mess. Low paid state work which is mostly staffed by women... it was ever thus. I wonder when we'll get to a position of low paid state work vocationally based which is mostly male employed.

I get where Xenia is coming from, at face value it does look like NHS workers get a good deal but when you look deeper it doesn't work out so well. When I decided to work for the NHS, I effectively 'agreed' to take lower pay for my entire life than my collegaues in the private sector. It was an informed choice, based on the trade off of lower pay for better sick pay, maternity pay, pension (for which I put a higher proportion of my salary away than most of my contemporaries) etc, etc. I see it as a bit like a savings account where the 'savings' are creamed off even before I receive my paycheque and are then used when I fall ill, get pg, become bereaved etc.

Bristols - I have a friend who's been pg twice now each time she's gone back to work. Both times she's been on fixed term contracts that they've renewed while she's benn pg. Not all employers are idiots - sometimes they know a good memer of staff when they find one!

Yes, so when my brother saw his pension fund being robbed of £250k (if you average salaries over 40 years rather than go by a consultant's final salary at age 65) he felt the deal he'd done was undermined. In a sense you make that bargain but the rules could change at any time. Huge risk.

(sorry, dodn't quite get to my point there did I! It was that on the whole, although it looks like NHS workers get a good deal financially, I think we're generally a bit worse off - but that's OK with me because I'd prefer to have job security at the moment. though even NHS jobs aren't so secure now... maybe I should move!)

Xenia - did your brother not qualify for the pension protection the NHS pt in place for people who had signed up before they changed it? (can't remember the exact date - just that I missed getting the deal by a few moths. grr.) Dh did, and he started in 2003.

I can't remember. May be he did. I just remember his comment a while back when the changes were going ahead.

I think it's a bit rich for any mother to start begrudging another mother 'better' maternity benefits. Having been there and done that I'd have thought that you'd be pleased that someone else was able to take more time off with their LO. Especially a nurse. Public sector workers get very few perks and incentives, the least we can ask for is a reasonable deal somewhere along the way! And personally no, I don't begrudge my taxes going towards it.

salient point

Absolutely agree, MissM

The better maternity rights you give women the worse you do them long term because then the sexism of women at home and men at work is engrained. Giving men and women non transferable rights though is okay as long as you make the men take as long off as the women.

I don't buy that argument at all. Are you implying that because men only get two weeks paternity leave that women should have the same? I doubt you didn't not take your maternity leave as a protest at it being sexist.

Bristols - just to let you know that I started back today after 13 months maternity leave and am 19 weeks pregnant. I was dreading it, but actually it's been ok - in fact, I think I enjoy working more now than I did before I had my DD, and I've only got 4 months to go if it gets difficult! I hope the same happens to you.

I was also in this situation 18 months ago. I went back full time already 12 wks pregnant again and got all maternity rights again. Statutory that is. I felt terrible on the employer though. I kept it quiet as long as I could but it lost me a lot of sleep worrying that they would go mad. It was winter so easy to keep a jacket on and cover up bump - they thought I just hadn't lost the weight from last time. In the end they were brilliant cos they knew how long it took for me to have ds1.