Please help me decide on my going back to work hours

[BumperliciousIsOneHotMother]

I return to work in April (an office based job) part time. DD will be 9 mo and DH is going to look after her while I am at work. he is going to work sun-tues, I am going work weds to fri.

Originally I intended to work 3x9h days. I asked the payroll people to figure out my monthly salary for 27 and 24 hours. They just rang and it turns out the difference between them is £110 a month so I am wondering whether it is worth the extra money.

On the upside £110 is £110, we are going to be pretty poor as DH is going part time too. And it's just an hour a day.

On the other hand it's not just 9 hours, it's 9 hours plus half hour lunch break, half hour each way getting to and from work so that's 10.5 hours, meaning I wouldn't get back to DD till about 6pm or so. I won't see much of her, however I will be spending 4 whole days with her.

Financially we are going to be stretched, however my income for doing 24 hours would be about the same as I have been living on on maternity leave (I got 6 mo full pay, 3 months SMP, averaged it out, saved some of the full pay and topped it up so i had the same amount each month). However DH's wages will be going down.

I guess my question is: is the £110 worth doing the extra hours, making my day longer. (Oh did I mention I will still be bfing?) And if not how can I make back or save that £100? We are already budgeting as much as possible my www.mumsnet.com/Talk/2422/446847?stamp=080129130428 no buying thread - help! I find myself incapable of making a decision myself!

Thanks you if you made it this far!

Sorry my thread

I do 24hrs a week, 3x8hr days including 1/2hr lunch and 1/2hr travelling at either end, plus dropping off dd with in-laws and collecting. I find that quite a long day, especially when I've got to get things ready for the next day; food, shopping, washing etc. And it doesn't give me alot of time with dd on the days I'm working and the time I'm with her is spent cooking tea etc. So I wouldn't do an extra hour. But if you haven't got to drop/off and collect and you can get DH to do tea etc on your working days then around an hour of quality time might be enough with your ds. I'd think through the money carefully, you've been living on the lower wage while you're on ML but will your costs go up when you return to work, e.g. petrol? Is there anyway you can do some work at home, I do a couple of hours a week at home which then adds up so I take one day per month off with accrued hours (this is beacuse of childcare). Or do 8.5 hours? I do 8 although 7.4 is our standard, negotiated on my return to work when I calculated what we needed to live on. Good luck with wahtever you decide to do.

if you tried going with the 27 hours and then found it too much and wanted to drop to 24, what would the reaction be? They do sound like pretty flexible employers. Alternatively, could you work one of the days from home.