Working overtime for a lower rate of pay then contracted hours pay

[cheshirekitty]

Can anyone help me please. I work in the NHS as a nurse. If I am required to work over my contracted hours (I am PT and work 24 hours) I would put it on my timesheet and be paid my hourly rate.

Our hospital is now going to change this. |It is making everyone go on the nurse bank and is topping the rate for band 5 (my band) at £22,150 pa pro rata. My current salary is 22,850 full time, so if i work extra hours it will be at a lower hourly rate.

Is this legal?

I think it may be as long as your existing contract does not specify the higher rate and as long as you are not being discriminated again - e.g if part timers are paid less sometimes that's illegal. It is probably the unions have negotiated or had to agree this.

I remember my brother a doctor years ago was on something like £1 an hour for over time (!) but I think they sorted all that. Mind you plenty of jobs pay nothing for over time.

What if they had only picked on nurses (mostly female) to do this? Should I ask if mostly male (electricians, plumbers etc) will be on a lower rate of hourly pay as well?

They are only concerned with the amount of money being spent on bank nurses. If they staffed the wards properly they would not have a huge bank nurse payment.

Also, if I do them a favour ie a nurse does not turn up for duty and I cover for her, I will be getting less for doing exactly the same job I was doing 5 mins ago. I just cannot get my head around the nickel and diming going about in the NHS especially with the people on the lower pay bands.

This is a bit crap, cos I am on the same increment of band 5 and still get the same rate for bank work. The mad thing is I bet you do exactly the same job with the same responsibility. In some ways I think you should get paid more for bank as it is so hard to go on other wards that you don't know and take the level of responsibility that is expected.

Mostly I am thinking of when I cover for holidays etc in the unit where I work. I am tempted to tell them what to do with the extra hours, but it would only hurt my colleagues as they would probably be told they could not have their hols, and my colleagues are a brilliant bunch.

It is mainly only affecting older nurses who have years of experience but chose to stay on band 5 bedside nursing.

Go to your Union rep. I think this comes under changing your ts&cs and they should have consulted with the workforce (specifically the unions) about this. This means you will have had communication syaing they were thinking about it and asking for feedback (or via forums) and then announcing it. It does sound from what you describe that they are cutting your wages????? Would this issue affect a full time person in the same way?

It would affect a full time person who choses to work over their 37.5 hours. I think it is a sneaky conniving thing to do (typical of NHS managers).