Sunday Trading Laws

What amazes me 13 years later in this country, is that the shops are closed for 1 day per year, Christmas. However everyone is panicked if they have enough supplies for that one single day. (and I do not go to the madness queuing at Next from 2am on boxing day).

In Greece during Easter, shops are closed from Saturday noon to Wednesday or Thursday in some areas. Completely closed every Sunday and Saturday from the afternoon. And 2 1/2 days during Christmas, 1 1/2 days New Year. (plus another 4 holidays).
Never saw that panic. (nor Christmas decorations before Dec 15th).
 
Panos said:
What amazes me 13 years later in this country, is that the shops are closed for 1 day per year, Christmas. However everyone is panicked if they have enough supplies for that one single day. (and I do not go to the madness queuing at Next from 2am on boxing day).

In Greece during Easter, shops are closed from Saturday noon to Wednesday or Thursday in some areas. Completely closed every Sunday and Saturday from the afternoon. And 2 1/2 days during Christmas, 1 1/2 days New Year. (plus another 4 holidays).
Never saw that panic. (nor Christmas decorations before Dec 15th).
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And look at the state of greece :p
 
estebanrey said:
Because the 'other industries' you mentioned tend to have a reasonable need to be functioning 24/7/365 whereas there is no "need" for retail to be.

Someone having a heart attack on Xmas day needs emergency services available to them. Not quite the same as someone wanting to buy a jumper from Top Man is it?

I actually feel less intelligent having to explain that.
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There is no reason for an online gambling company to run on Christmas day, paying customer support staff to answer calls and emails, to have chat hosts sat in chat rooms talking to people and running chat games. Watching people type in to chat "just having a quick game while the kids are unwrapping their presents!"

Yet me and many of my friends have had to do just that.

it's part of the job, if people don't like their job and the hours they are contracted to work then find another job.

Granted we hated working Christmas and New Year, but the rest of the year was fair game. Getting in the car at 11pm on a Saturday night to go to tescos for food, then realising it was shut was always a kick in the nuts.

Now, my friends and I would agree that working unsociable hours sucks and I agree people shouldn't have to work them. My issue is that is shouldn't be government enforced restrictions on retail business times, it should come down to the company to decide.

They will never enforce rules like this on other industries, imagine if your ISP broke at 7pm and you knew it wouldn't be repaired until office hours the next day. So let them operate whatever hours they like just like any other business.

Panos said:
What amazes me 13 years later in this country, is that the shops are closed for 1 day per year, Christmas. However everyone is panicked if they have enough supplies for that one single day. (and I do not go to the madness queuing at Next from 2am on boxing day).

In Greece during Easter, shops are closed from Saturday noon to Wednesday or Thursday in some areas. Completely closed every Sunday and Saturday from the afternoon. And 2 1/2 days during Christmas, 1 1/2 days New Year. (plus another 4 holidays).
Never saw that panic. (nor Christmas decorations before Dec 15th).
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I never understood why people see it as panic buying. No one I know is running around panic buying because the shops are shut for 1 day. They may rush out and pick something up that they need for Christmas day, or they don't really go out over the Christmas period and get enough stuff to last but no one goes out thinking they must stock up because the shop is shut for a day.

As for boxing day, I fully agree and think they need their heads seeing too! :D
 
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Zefan said:
Straw manning at its finest :p

There's probably a very good reason as to why you feel less intelligent for explaining that, because it was unnecessary if you had understood my point and not just jumped to put words in my mouth. I'm not talking about emergency services, I'm talking about an enormous array of non-customer facing jobs that don't fall under the "it's retail so we shouldn't work Sundays" rule. They don't "need" to work on Sundays, should the government step in and put a stop to it?
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But we weren't talking about Sundays at that juncture, we were talking about Christmas Day and why you think retail workers shouldn't have special rules protecting them for even that day.

estebanrey said:
Do you think retail companies should be able to force workers to work on Christmas day? If not, then you are already supporting a government enforced restriction on trading.

Zefan said:
Yep. Why should retail workers have some sacred right to have normal public "holidays" off work?

estebanrey said:
You think people in the retail sector should be contractually obliged to work on Christmas if their employers wish to open?

Wow!

Zefan said:
Other industries work Christmas! Why should retail be ring fenced?
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AHarvey said:
There is no reason for an online gambling company to run on Christmas day, paying customer support staff to answer calls and emails, to have chat hosts sat in chat rooms talking to people and running chat games. Watching people type in to chat "just having a quick game while the kids are unwrapping their presents!"

Yet me and many of my friends have had to do just that.

it's part of the job, if people don't like their job and the hours they are contracted to work then find another job.

Granted we hated working Christmas and New Year, but the rest of the year was fair game. Getting in the car at 11pm on a Saturday night to go to tescos for food, then realising it was shut was always a kick in the nuts.

Now, my friends and I would agree that working unsociable hours sucks and I agree people shouldn't have to work them. My issue is that is shouldn't be government enforced restrictions on retail business times, it should come down to the company to decide.

They will never enforce rules like this on other industries, imagine if your ISP broke at 7pm and you knew it wouldn't be repaired until office hours the next day. So let them operate whatever hours they like just like any other business.
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It would be funny if you weren't being serious.

You understand working unsocial hours sucks but you'd still rather make more people work unsocial hours to accommodate your circumstances.

As opposed to fitting circumstances to current opening hours.
 
AHarvey said:
There is no reason for an online gambling company to run on Christmas day, paying customer support staff to answer calls and emails, to have chat hosts sat in chat rooms talking to people and running chat games. Watching people type in to chat "just having a quick game while the kids are unwrapping their presents!"
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Online gambling is pretty much automated, there isn't an actual human there spinning that virtual roulette wheel, just a bunch of code.

As for support staff, I'd be surprised if British workers are going in to work on Xmas day for gambling companies. There might be a bunch of people in India doing it but I'm guessing Christmas isn't as celebrated there.


AHarvey said:
it's part of the job, if people don't like their job and the hours they are contracted to work then find another job.
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Poor argument. Again might as well throw all workers rights in the bin then because after all if you don't like your job you can always find another one right?

AHarvey said:
Granted we hated working Christmas and New Year, but the rest of the year was fair game. Getting in the car at 11pm on a Saturday night to go to tescos for food, then realising it was shut was always a kick in the nuts.
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So you "hated" working unsociable hours yet want to thrust that on other people now you're in another job where it becomes a minor inconvenience to you?

AHarvey said:
Now, my friends and I would agree that working unsociable hours sucks and I agree people shouldn't have to work them. My issue is that is shouldn't be government enforced restrictions on retail business times, it should come down to the company to decide.
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People 'shouldn't have to work them' and 'let the company decide' are contradictory positions.

I worked in retail in the early 2000s and at that time our contracts meant working on boxing day was optional (ergo no governnment enforced restrictions just company policy at the time) and guess what? No one did and the Argos branch I worked for was shut that day every year.

Now though it's open every year on boxing day, not because the new generations all want to work it but because that option was taken out of their contracts. Hence why government restrictions are important.

AHarvey said:
They will never enforce rules like this on other industries, imagine if your ISP broke at 7pm and you knew it wouldn't be repaired until office hours the next day. So let them operate whatever hours they like just like any other business.
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Oh my God! Imagine being without the internet for several hours...how would you survive!!!

If my interwebs went down on a Sunday and I was told an engineer wasn't available until Monday I wouldn't think it that unreasonable and would be happy for them to have the same protections as retail workers.

If you're talking business critical (say I have a business that requires connectivity 24/7 otherwise jobs would be put at risk) that is differet and comes back to my argument about no one 'needing' to buy a jumper from Top Man at 8pm on a Sunday.
 
Genuine question why is it ok for the cleaners to work full shifts sunday in the tesco but not the till staff
 
Do you not understand the concept of someone being worse off if given a worse schedule to fill and that alone being the negative side.

Comparing X to Y is irrelevant when Y still has a worse scenario after the event even if that turns out to be the scenario that X already has.



*equality in all having lousy working hours is not something to aspire to.
 
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I'd selfishly quite like it if the DIY sheds stayed open maybe 9-12, but retail opening Sunday just seems to suit the ****less who have cash burning a hole, rather than making anyone's life better.

It's also a concession to Christian tradition and I feel retaining our culture is more important than making every country identical mush of burger chains and the rewriting awkward history

Say someone needs to organise child care on a Sunday because they have a shift, that would be a nightmare.
 
Swifty55 said:
I earn that and get 2 days off a week... :confused::rolleyes:
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Then you can go shopping then, sunday shopping can be good for the likes of me when i have a little more time, the rest of the week i am busy, i make this country millions of pounds so i want a little in return for my efforts :)
 
I don't really care about this decision. What I do care about is my local tesco isn't going to be 24 hour any more. It has been for years but due to them trying to save money, it's on their list of about 1 in 5 stores that is going to shut between midnight and 6am. :mad::p
 
Moses said:
In reality the executive have the Royal Prerogative powers when it comes to stuff like foreign relations/war and peace/etc. Imo it's basically irrelevant that the Queen technically has the Royal Prerogative powers, given how if she ever did anything there'd 'just' (lols) be a constitutional crisis and they'd end up being removed in a horribly convoluted and eye-wateringly expensive process.

I don't think we're really disagreeing on much! Maybe I'm misunderstanding the point (or we both are :p).
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We don't disagree - and I expressly disagree with the notion that the Queen has any real power in the lawmaking process.

I think the aforementioned vetos were to prevent any erosion of the monarch's involvement in the law making process (even if merely technical), rather than to, say, directly influence bombing of Iraq (as per the 1999 example). I understand that event has been forwarded as an example of Queen having influenced lawmaking, but I disagree that it was any 'real' influence over the 'political scope' of the bill (I.e bombing), even if there was an actual influence (I.e. Stopping a debate from happening) for the purpose of ensuring the Queen had involvement (even if technical). I suppose even the slightest erosion of long established formalities could be a slippery slope for the Monachy, from a self preservation perspective.

Hopefully I have now made sense :p
 
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marc2003 said:
I don't really care about this decision. What I do care about is my local tesco isn't going to be 24 hour any more. It has been for years but due to them trying to save money, it's on their list of about 1 in 5 stores that is going to shut between midnight and 6am. :mad::p
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Anyone work in retail in a 24 hour store? How many people actually shop at this time?

I've considered doing it once for the luls but it feels weird just doing shopping at say 2-3am. Do they have any fresh items out at this time?
 
They don't have the Deli counter open and it's just full of staff restocking the shelves, with the odd till on.

So if they are there restocking, I suppose it's no different to being open, so whatever they take is a bonus.

And there are susually other people there when I've gone in in the early hours

It's a shame this bill got defeated imo
 
MooMoo444 said:
Anyone work in retail in a 24 hour store? How many people actually shop at this time?

I've considered doing it once for the luls but it feels weird just doing shopping at say 2-3am. Do they have any fresh items out at this time?
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I sometimes pop in to our Tesco past 10-11pm, it's mostly just full of staff but there's often a dozen or so people still shopping. They close off certain sections (mostly the upstairs which is clothing and electricals) as well as the butchers counter.

As they're restocking you sometimes get really fresh stuff out, and 99% of the time there's no queues. I just wish the scan as you shop didn't shut at 10pm!
 
I'm for relaxed Sunday trading, retailers have staff and the store open for recovery and filling, opening an extra checkout doesn't add much to the running cost really.

Would see a lot of consultations and contacts change with I imagine double Sunday time being removed in most cases
 
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