NHS Banding entry vs top of band - HR bods

[Curlysueunder]

Just posting on behalf of my sister who has started with the NHS as a band 3 administrator. She is at the bottom of the band, so entry level. Her colleagues are at the top of band 3 as have been in the role some time and are clearly experienced. Question is should she be expected to undertake the work they do considering them being at the top of the band because they have 2+ years experience and my sister has less than 2 years.

No idea how it all works. I did suggest she spoke to HR (her manager is not particularly nice by all accounts) but she was reluctant to being a new starter.

Yes, she will - if she has the same job description as them. There will be a period of training where she’ll be supported into the role, but the roles and responsibilities are generally the same whether you’re new or not esp at B3 level - the only exception might be if someone has additional, band-appropriate tasks that are specifically set out. I’m trying to remember what the name of this is - some of my team have them, they sit alongside the JDs and have gone through staff side.

Yes - Thats how it works in NHS and other similar employers. You get pay increases based on length of service. If you google NHS Pay its all explained

Surely though the fact that they are the top of the band (more than 2 years experience) she shouldn't be expected straightway to carry out these tasks. Seems very unfair.The JD was very limited. The person spec listed skills she isn't even using or will need to have.All odd to me as an outsider.

She worked previously for the NHS for 18 years, 5 years ago as the top of the band 3.

Can you give an example of something that she doesn’t think that she should be doing?

As they are the same band they have the same responsibilities.

Yes they will be expected to do the same work and have the same responsibilities if they are the same band and job description.
If your sis is new then there will be an induction period and possibly a probation depending on the trust but if the jd is the same their job is the same.
Incremental rises for services doesn't mean you're expected to do more or different tasks. If the job was substantially different they would be diff bands.

Well the JD was very vague and more department focused than anything but she is essentially supporting team on oncologist/cns etc. They have asked her to organise their rotas and add/amend shifts which she feels is out of her depth and is not something the other b3s do but then from what my sister has said all of the other b3 admin seem to do various tasks that to her are either b2 or a b4 or 5. Seems terribly managed.

My sis has less than 2 years experience in this post but had 18 years previous experience in b3 admin. This was 8 years ago. Should she have been put at the top of her band. I felt not as she left the NHS for 8 years.

If your sister feels she has the relevant number of years experience she needs to speak to the recruiting manager and ask if could be taken into consideration. Different orgs will have different processes for this moving up the band may be straight forward in that the manager can make this decision or the case if agreed may go to some kind of exceptions panel for consideration. I would have thought this conversation would have been had at the offer stage rather than offer accepted as this implies your sister accepted the contractual offer based on the bottom of the band. Regarding your sister performing different duties than the rest of the team if the manager agrees she can request for her role to be re evaluated if the current JD is too generic and not reflective of her responsibilities although this can be refused.

I'm a band 4 in Scotland. They are slowly but surely reducing many band 4s when they leave and making the post a 3. A lot of medical secretary posts are being changed to clinical secretary but it's pretty much the same job. The roles are very mixed and you will be asked to do a wide range of jobs.

The increments within the band are to give employees a boost each year as they have gained more experience - a new start is expected to be able to do (after suitable training) the same as a similar role at the top of their band increment. If someone comes back in with great experience of the role they will sometimes start you at the top increment (I did) but that has to be arranged before commencement.

I'm not in NHS but another pay banded profession. As PP have said, it's purely based on length of service.

You would expect any new member of staff to be trained and supported until they understood how to do their tasks. But people on the top of the scale do not have to do more work than those at the bottom of the scale. They are just rewarded for theoretically being more experienced, quicker, more efficient, more knowledgeable etc at those same tasks.

If she left the NHS 8 years ago then that counts as a break in service - so people would usually start at the bottom again, unless they can negotiate something.

You sister can request her role is rebanded and go through that process but in my experience this is rarely successful for A&C roles. She’d have to show that the additional tasks take her into a B4 but there are many points associated with each bands - depending on where her B3 sits on that scale she may have to jump many points to get to a 4.

It sounds like her team have a core B3 job description and then additional tasks as some of my team do - this means that a new job description doesn’t have to be written and go through staff side every time someone is allocated an additional task when business needs change.

I have asked her and there is no formal JD for the job which in my mind leaves the whole team open to abuse. How can she decipher which tasks are band 3 and which tasks are band 4? She has looked at NHS employer job profiles but it all seems very vague. From the outside looking in it seems as though the whole thing is open to abuse. Surely, she should not be penalised for not doing a band 4?task (staff rota) effectively, first time round after 4 months in the job.

@SirChenjins when you say 'there are many points associated with each bands - depending on where her B3 sits on that scale she may have to jump many points to get to a 4'

how does she ascertain where her band 3 sits on the scale? and how do we find out the points associated with her band.

Seems they are putting an awful lot of pressure on her considering her little amount of time in the post. It can take up to 18 months at least some times to become acclimatised to jobs and this by what I've heard is not your regular administration job.

I would suggest a job as part of a team which involves working well with others might not be for her if this is the way she's feeling. Such pettiness makes team work difficult

If she feels she needs more training she should ask and be clear what she doesn't understand or ask for more time to learn. The attitude of "that's not my job" is poor teamwork and petty and will not go down well with colleagues or line managers

its about length of time, when I joined the Nhs they took into account my previous pay to work out my pay scale within my banding.

for my banding we all do the same level of work hold same risks etc just some people are top of banding pay wise due to how long they have been there others at bottom.

it’s now reviewed every two years it’s no longer straight move to next pay level on the banding it’s done via an formal meeting.

It shouldn't take 18 months to learn the tasks of a band 3 (or frankly even band 4, 5 or 6). Surely she just asks for some guidance the first couple of times doing the rota, then the next few times does it herself but asks someone to check her work.

Yeah the NHS are cheeky beggars, they start everyone at the bottom of their band system. I'd trained in the NHS and had many years of experience working abroad they still started me on the same as a newly qualified nurse straight out of Uni. When I mentioned it they look all confused and say that's what everyone starts at. But they were happy to use my 30 years of experience to help out the new nurses. So I went to private for top band 6 instead.

The new nhs banding system takes away overlap between bands but it does mean 2 years before an increase which is a long time.

It is just length of service, you are expected to do the job from the off after induction.

Don’t think there is much negotiation generally unless there has been recent top band experience.

Welcome to the new NHS, where no matter how much previous service you have, if you have left the NHS and come back in, you are put at the bottom of the band and it is at least 2 years before you get an increment (previously it was annually and more or less automatic). It's then five years in post before you get another increment (at some higher bands you don't get an increment after two years, you now have to wait for the five year point). This is, as I understand it, what Unison "negotiated", coming into force just before that little pandemic thing. It's only now that people are starting to realise what it actually means.

In theory, the statement is that people reach the top of the band faster than they would have but I have my doubts and can't help wondering what dodgy government deal was really brokered and who benefitted as it's such an obvious attempt at making salary savings. Existing NHS staff who stay in the same band still get annual increments but if they get promoted to a higher band, even at the same Trust, they then have to play the two year/five year game.

Previous experience outside the NHS also now counts for a lot less, if anything, than it used to in terms of where you will be put on the scale when you start as well. The most extreme I personally encountered was a senior matron whose previous NHS service and having run a major hospital unit in the Middle East were deemed irrelevant and she had to start again at the bottom of Band 6. The pension isn't as good as it was either and workloads are insane. I reckon they'll be coming for the annual leave allowances after five and ten years reckonable service next.

Thanks for your posts.My sis has had a good read.She is, and we are both in agreement a really good team player and will go above and beyond for everyone. In fairness, I'm not there to see how the role, environment, colleagues are but from what I have heard in comparison to other NHS roles she previously had this seems completely dire and the whole departmental attitude is appalling (won't go into details here).My advice to her is to look internally for other positions, I'm sure they can't all be the same. At least one would hope.

I saw mine as part of my rebanding, I’m not sure if it’s something you can just ask to see or whether it’s just something that forms part of the rebanding application. You sister needs to see her job match report and it’s worth looking at the NHS job evaluation handbook - but it will all be explained if/when she goes for a rebanding. Just beware - it can be an emotionally draining process.

Thank you. She has found the job matching profiles as part of the NHS employer handbook, I think it's more a case of something for her to refer to than go in all guns blazing. Thanks for all your help.

She’ll need to see a copy of her own job match report - that will show how it was matched to a 3 and whether it’s a ‘high’ 3, ie whether she might get it to 4 reasonably easily, or whether it’s a low 3, in which case it will be harder.