Is it not mandatory to allow part time hours after birth? In my country you can demand half time hours up to child's 3. year and if you have another then until the youngest goes to school which is 6. So basically you can only work half time for 10+ years (but the pay is probably terrible then).
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Exactly that! Companies aren’t required to guarantee you can return to your old job at reduced hours. It should be that you are offered an alternative position if you want to go part time or are expected to job share. I am a contractor and in the past I used to do 4 days because I was doing my PhD. I would repeatedly get calls on my day off until I told HR that my standard rate applied if I was contacted and any overtime beyond 6pm and at weekends was charged at my usual rate. I deliberately set up on my own so I didn’t have to put up with all this bollocks . I never take holiday and I always colunteer to work bank holidays, but I never work overtime unless it is really urgent (and I mean proof that the client is screaming for it there and then) and/or I am making up hours that I have taken for appointments. I don’t think that’s unfair. I can’t afford to work 3 days a week so bollocks to you if you think I’m going to facilitate you doing it on top of my own work!
Not at all in the UK. A company is not obligated to offer you your old position part time. They are, where possible meant to facilitate reduced hours but not always in the same position. Which is our point. If you can only work part time you can’t expect to be in a senior position that requires 40 hours a week minimum. It simply isn’t practical or fair on everyone else! Either way, I’m not picking up the slack!
No point moaning ladies, you have brought it on yourselves. For example when one of the receptionists cones back to work after having a baby, we have to accommodate all their bullshit demands, otherwise they make some bullshit complaint about sex discrimination and that is a hassle to deal with.
Their demands are unreasonable in a small workplace but fighting some bullshit discrimination charge is even more stressful and costly in terms of money and mental health.
Their demands are unreasonable in a small workplace but fighting some bullshit discrimination charge is even more stressful and costly in terms of money and mental health.
This is probably going to make me unpopular, but this is something that has really caused me stress over the pandemic, in that because I don’t have kids I have been expected to pick up a huge amount of extra work to accommodate parents who have had to manage their kids’ schooling at home. I want to make it clear that I don’t blame the parents - there is a huge, huge issue that the Government’s own pandemic preparedness never even really modelled what would happen if all schools had to close - but there has just been this underlying assumption that childfree people can and should pick up the slack to make sure stuff happens. At the start of the pandemic I was in a team that had a huge number of parents (most part-time) and the expectation was that all of our ‘business as usual’ work could and should carry on, as well as us accommodating all of the extra work that pandemic created. I ended up putting in a huge amount of (unpaid) overtime - by that I mean many, many hundreds of extra hours - and it’s never really been acknowledged. I am totally exhausted now, but again I can’t take leave yet as it’s the summer and the parents in the team get priority. Like I said, it’s not the parents I blame but this unspoken and pervasive assumption that if you don’t have kids, you’re happy to work extra and you’re always around to pick up the slack. The last eighteen months have shown me how unfair and damaging that is - my mental and physical health have both suffered.
I don’t have a problem with parental leave, and even though I‘ve chosen not to have kids I am glad I live in a country where there is reasonable provision for maternity support. I think the issue is more Government policy and the way most companies always choose the cheapest option - which is often not to temporarily replace a staff member but to distribute their work amongst others and hope for the best. I don’t believe that anyone should be discriminated against because they’ve chosen to be a parent, but it’s like anything, is the balance and burden managed correctly? Not necessarily, on either side.
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I also feel common sense needs to prevail with parents though. How can one be expected to fulfill a high-powered 40/50 hour week job in 3 days? Don’t get me wrong, I am also glad we live in a country with decent maternity leave and opportunities for working parents, but come on now? I used to have this argument with my ex who desperately wanted kids but knew full well I would have to go back to my 50 hour week to be able to afford it and he certainly wasn’t giving up his 10-hour shift work job either, which if something happened on shift he would never be allowed to leave regardless of the situation. Poor kid! No way was I prepared to do that. If I was going to do it, one of us needed to be at home. I just would not want any child of mine to be closer to the nanny/day care than their own parents and I certainly would not cut corners in my career or child’s life to try and do the same role part time.
There is this narrative that having kids shouldn’t effect a women’s career but it does. It has to unless the father takes on the care from day dot.
Something has to give when you have kids, it’s either your job/wage/career of you go back full time and you get a nanny/caregiver/cleaner to take on those roles. You cannot have it all. I’m sorry but it’s no physically possible.
If you don’t want to set your career back by 10 or so years don’t have kids. Don’t expect non child having colleges to pick up after your choice.
I do also think it’s proper taking the piss to have midwife appointments at 11.30 during your 3 days. I always made appointments on my non-working day or now I ensure I get before 9am or as early or late as possible to avoid taking too much time out and I always make up the time!
Some interesting childfree news articles:
The challenges of being a childfree woman in Egypt
CNN why more women are deciding not to have kids
The challenges of being a childfree woman in Egypt
CNN why more women are deciding not to have kids
I agree! In my place they do it on purpose on the days they are working as our company pays you to attend maternity appointments. The appointment could be a half an hour but they book it for the afternoon and just don’t come back.It maddens me
I always really wanted kids. I did have a few 'what the hell am I doing/will I regret this' moments when pregnant with my first. Now pregnant with baby2. Hardest but best thing I ever did.
I recycle, buy mainly preloved clothes and toys for my kid/kids, have a reusable water bottle so just because I've added to an overpopulated world, I make sustainable changes elsewhere.
Absolutely understand how people would choose to remain childfree and good for them. My best friend is one such lady.
I recycle, buy mainly preloved clothes and toys for my kid/kids, have a reusable water bottle so just because I've added to an overpopulated world, I make sustainable changes elsewhere.
Absolutely understand how people would choose to remain childfree and good for them. My best friend is one such lady.
I agree but it’s not something that there’s an honest discussion about. It comes back to the ‘having it all’ perception - you really can’t but sometimes there is a perhaps unreasonable expectation that the world should bend over backwards to accommodate everyone’s wants and needs. Even the most flexible, supportive employer has to have limits but the problem is that nobody wants to have this discussion or risk enforcing the rules, so what happens is that employers outsource the work to everyone else in a team or company and it can end up being pretty unfair. There are some really awful examples of maternity (and paternity) discrimination and that absolutely should not happen, but it’s a difficult line to walk, especially for smaller businesses. But there are things that can work, like job-shares and companies making part-time roles truly part-time. So often I see part-time employees with a full-time workload and the expectation is that they just make it work. That’s not fair either.
My previous comment was not directed at anyone in specific, but was about experiences we had in running a busy doctors surgery.
It is always easier to let a potential "trouble maker" have their way and let the other staff suffer than be firm with the individual. Here I am talking about small companies with less than 10 staff.
Apparently my initial post was considered as goading.
It is always easier to let a potential "trouble maker" have their way and let the other staff suffer than be firm with the individual. Here I am talking about small companies with less than 10 staff.
Apparently my initial post was considered as goading.
It was the same for me. I ended up leaving the job. Between that and colleagues being put on furlough, it was exhausting. I don't blame the parents either but like you say, there was no acknowledgement of people who were picking up the slack and at that point, keeping companies afloat. I'm not fussed if someone needs to attend antenatal appointments during working hours (especially if this is allowed as per their contract) but it's frustrating the same allowances are never made to people without kids. You're made to feel like a prick for asking for half an hour to go to the bloody dentist.
Gotta love the patronising responses from people telling us otherwise though
just FYI some midwives in certain NHS trusts only run their routine appointments on certain days, for example my midwife only runs the check up appointments on a Tuesday at the local clinic, so I have to go on a Tuesday, I don’t get to pick which time slot I get either unfortunately, doesn’t work like that in many NHS trusts you have to take the appointments you are given.
As I understand it, you have a right to request part time hours, which the employer must reasonably consider, but it is not guaranteed.
I’m sure there are others on here who are more savvy with employment law than I am who will know the exact and up to date rules.
That is correct and they do not have to offer you the same role at reduced hours but are expected to try and find an alternative. They are not obliged though.
So why can’t she swap her work days this week then?
Honestly some of the posts on this thread are just plain vitriol and offence towards working parents,
maybe It’s not as simple for her to just swap her days anyway, how do you know she hasn’t got other caring responsibilities on her other days, like providing care for an elderly or sick relative or other young children for which she has no childcare options for on those days, not everyone has the flexibility within their personal circumstances to change their working days
Well maybe she can swap her workdays if her work are happy for that to happen, I have no idea, but there was an assumption being that she just chose her midwife appointment for a working day, I’m just pointing out it doesn’t work like that, those appointments are necessary and you don’t usually get to choose what day you go on, that’s why employers are legally obliged to give the time off for them
maybe It’s not as simple for her to just swap her days anyway, how do you know she hasn’t got other caring responsibilities on her other days, like providing care for an elderly or sick relative or other young children for which she has no childcare options for on those days, not everyone has the flexibility within their personal circumstances to change their working days
Because I know her! And it affects other people so it’s a fair point!
Myself and 2 colleagues all requested to go part time and we're all refused. This is a secondary school. A very poorly managed one, that's been in and out of special measures for years mind!
Very few places seem to get this right. It’s either everyone can go part-time and sod the consequences to the business, or nobody can go part-time and sod the consequences to the staff, or just the parents get to go part-time and sod the morale (not to mention that non-parents may have other responsibilities too). It is harder work to manage it properly and I think that’s part of the problem.
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