Civil servants to call for four-day working week

Strumms

I did a four day week, on paper it’s great, 3 day weekends…. The biggest plus is if you want to take a week off work, you only use 4 days leave.

Problem is or as I experienced … your first day off on your weekends you are exhausted…. You’ve just crammed around 40 hours work into 4 days, instead of 5… so maybe 11 hour days including unpaid lunches as it was for me.

that takes its toll on you. I was off Saturday, Sunday and Monday…. It was Sunday afternoon before you’d start to feel rested… Saturdays I was generally a right off…

They can get fecked if they are looking for a 4 day 32 hour week 🥸

ParkRunner

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120561333#Comment_120561333

Thankfully we had a successful industrialist Henry Ford to champion the 5 day working week just as the state was being established

StevenToast

Id scrap the bank holidays and turn friday into the weekend.

Bank holidays are a nightmare because everyone tries to cram their holidays in at the same time leading to crowds everywhere....

A 3 day weekend would spread out holidays throughout the year.....

prunudo

4 day weeks sound great in theory, they're brought to you by the same advocates as 'working from home will be the new norm'.

Something has to give, either staff are exhausted because they're pushing themselves to do 39 hrs work in 32. If they only are to do 32hrs at reduced wages then their wallet suffers. If they do 32hrs at full pay the buisness profitability suffers. If productivity suffers the business suffers.

I know the thread is about civil service but if it starts there, the public service will follow and biggest thing I can see coming from a 4 day week is higher prices and a further eroding of services.

I.R.Y.E.D

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120561333#Comment_120561333

I know at least five that do.

One of them works 8 to 4 Monday to Saturday every week as per their contract while their two colleagues work Sunday to Friday in alternate patterns. Their pay scale is the same as everyone else but they get additional holidays to cover the added working days.

Two others clock on average 55 to 60 hours a week due to staffing levels and not being able to attract staff due to the salary in the private sector equivalent roles. Due to their grade they are not eligible for overtime/TIL, so are working those additional hours for free. The only option would be to hire contractors who would still be earning well more than they would but their PO won't have any of it.

Personally as a private sector worker I don't work over my hours ever if I am not being paid.

I.R.Y.E.D

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120561468#Comment_120561468

Working from home is something that has been the norm for years even before covid in a good few sectors. The four day week is also being successfully done in a few companies going by the thread.

Things change and people and businesses especially successful ones know how to adapt.

prunudo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120561652#Comment_120561652

Just because it works for some, doesn't mean its applicable to all. There is often a level of smugness with these suggestions about reducing how much we work or work practice's.

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to work a 4 day week, but for an awful lots of businesses and professions its not going to work. As I said, something will give, there will be knock on effects, whether thats price rises or paycuts, it wont all be a bed of roses.

I.R.Y.E.D

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120561747#Comment_120561747

Depends on you really. If its working for a number of companies already there will be data available on their pricing etc if you want to look for it.

A good mate of mine works for himself doing gates and railings and does a three day week.

He can make what he needs to live comfortably alongside his missus working as a secretary in a doctors. At this stage in his late 40s he is saying that he'd rather take a hit in the pocket than work more days. Now I argue that given he does voluntary work with kids two days a week that he is doing a five day week, but that depends on what you view as work.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120561451#Comment_120561451

I always hated Bank Holiday weekends, everything overcrowded, hotels & flights more expensive.

Everyone has a choice in their career path, ie working 5 days as a front line worker or 4 days a week, maybe with umpteen benefits, in a non frontline position. Well guess what will happen, even less people will want to fill our frontline careers and service industries. So the logic of saying “well that’s your own choice” doesn’t bode well for society as a whole.

AyeGer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120559068#Comment_120559068

Public servants have recently seen their hours reduced from 37 back to 35 hours per week. Thankfully the government agreed with the unions request to return to the 35 hr week, a move in the right direction imo. In general people need to be working less not more.

Nobody on their deathbed ever said I regret not working more hours.

When the 37+ hour rule came in where I was working it simply meant we arrived earlier right in the middle of rush hour. As it was 2 of my working days each week involved leaving some unsavoury locations at 8.15pm, never nice in winter. I didn’t like the rush hour commute but I did actually like getting to start doing my job a whole hour before the public poured in as that was the only time you could actually get complex tasks done. Otherwise it was non-stop interruption by customers when you’d be multitasking. And we were there to actually serve customers. When I say 37+, it was sometimes impossible to get time back which was owed, due to staff shortage since downturn.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120561639#Comment_120561639

I also know quite a few that do. Not all civil servants are admin grades, there are many technical (not IT) and professional grades as well, who do not work desk jobs or standard weeks and routinely work 6 days. Extra hours worked aren't even counted, let alone paid for.

(eta) actually that is probably why the proposal is being raised by the AHCPS.

AyeGer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120561341#Comment_120561341

Four 8 hour shifts with an hour for lunch would be my idea of a 4 day week at 90% of current pay.

For an office worker that would be 4 9:00am to 5:00pm days. 1:00pm to 2:00pm lunch.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120562542#Comment_120562542

That would be a 10% cut in gross income for a 8.55% reduction in hours though.

(Every percent of pay matters! Considering how hard we have to fight for them).

Lunch should remain at minimum 30 minutes for those who prefer to work through.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120562452#Comment_120562452

Sorry, but that simply doesn't follow.

If it did, why haven't those who have been choosing frontline careers been abandoning their choices for the last 20+ years?

Because that's how long the option to work a reduced week has been available in the Civil Service already.

If anything, the CS are unable to recruit and retain civil servants, despite these "umpteen" benefits you speak off.

30 mins lunch was what we got where I worked, to keep premises open through lunch the 3 staff had to stagger lunch so that there was always 2 people staffing quite a sizeable premises. This was inalterable unless place was to be closed and the local authority was not going to have that happen.

I can't speak for Local Authorities.

But in most civil service departments, the Flexible Working Hours scheme already allow staff to choose their own working hours between 8am and 7pm with a minimum of 30 minutes for lunch break. Public-facing offices already organise cover over their opening hours, while allowing staff their breaks.

Within FWH working 35 hours in four days is very achievable, with no loss of working hours or income for the staff - and no reduction in public office opening hours or "services" to the public.

One outcome I could see is a reduction in CS staff working up flexi leave every month, as it would be more difficult to work up those extra hours as well. But they won't need it, if they are already on a four day week.

I really haven't seen any convincing arguments yet to oppose this.

HerrKuehn

If they are talking about keeping hours the same with a 4 day week, are they just talking about increased flexi time then? So you could do an additional 8 hrs in the 4 days of the week.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120566272#Comment_120566272

I wasn't at the conference on Friday so haven't read what the exact proposal is yet.

The flexi bands already allow working up to 10.5 hours a day - 8am to 7pm (with minimum 30 mins for lunch).

The maximum flexi hours you are allowed build up in any four week period is 11.5 hours over your target hours. Work up more flexi hours than that and you lose them.

(eta) Anyway, it seems DPER had "no comment" 😏 so I can't see it happening anytime soon!

https://twitter.com/i/status/1654545920946470918

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120558545#Comment_120558545

Bollocks.

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120558821#Comment_120558821

Yet another self-appointed expert 🙄

Overtime is non-existent in most of the civil service.

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120559068#Comment_120559068

Look up the word "roster".

astrofool

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120567083#Comment_120567083

Great rebuttal...

But thanks for drawing even more attention to the famously low productivity of the civil service.

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120560272#Comment_120560272

Clearly you have no idea about the reality of public sector pay deals - they've been below inflation for many years now.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120558378#Comment_120558378

What a stupid comment.

Paper after paper show that there is diminishing returns for longer hours. It's been a constant point of the 4 day week movement so your either being contrary, for the sake of it, or had your head in the sand.

Or, you just feel like you know more than all the research papers ob this matter

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120561157#Comment_120561157

The pay cuts 2007-2009 were a hell of a lot more than 1 or 2%. You also need to factor in that pay "deals" are usually well behind inflation.

Dyr

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120567187#Comment_120567187

LOL research papers. Is that why the private sector have raced to embrace the four day week? Or perhaps they still need the public secotr to teach them lessons in productivity. 😂

Of course no-one mentioned longer hours, just less people working the same amount of hours.

Dyr

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120567187#Comment_120567187

And given this deluge of papers by academics why is it that private businesses are not rushing to implement a four day week?

Apparently you know more than them.

Wompa1

I've been working a 4 day week for the last 18 months or so. I get just as much done. They may as well trial it.