I.T Folks - Help with being on call
- Thread starter Sam
- Start date
Permabanned
- Joined
- 28 Dec 2009
- Posts
- 13,052
- Location
- london
The company i work for started an out of hours service and we could cover it from home it was from 6pm to 11pm but there was hardly any calls coming through and they paid a flat rate of £75 a night before tax.
So i would go home after work and sit on the pc anyway and earn an extra £300 for the week. I had about 3 calls in a week though. If it was busy they said they would have paid overtime rates. Time and half and double after 9pm. But that was after an early shift from 8am to 4:30pm.
So i would go home after work and sit on the pc anyway and earn an extra £300 for the week. I had about 3 calls in a week though. If it was busy they said they would have paid overtime rates. Time and half and double after 9pm. But that was after an early shift from 8am to 4:30pm.
Last edited:
I would be wanting a not inconsiderable amount of money to be on call - ~1/2 time.
I did it for a few days as part of a big project go live and hated it. Couldn't relax or enjoy my evening/weekend as it felt I was still working.
Thankfully my job is such I've only needed to do that once in 4 years
I did it for a few days as part of a big project go live and hated it. Couldn't relax or enjoy my evening/weekend as it felt I was still working.
Thankfully my job is such I've only needed to do that once in 4 years
Man of Honour
- Joined
- 17 Nov 2003
- Posts
- 36,747
- Location
- Southampton, UK
For the people who have stated rates, how many calls do you usually get?
Also, if you are called out in the middle of the night, what is the policy for going to work the next day?
Also, if you are called out in the middle of the night, what is the policy for going to work the next day?
**same issue also advise needed**
See our Service desk are getting a little confused too.
Currently we are contracted to work 37.5 hours a week mon-sun per rota basis.
Usually if we're working a weekend we work mon-wed and have thur-fri off and work sat-sun.
We get an extra 2% of our wage for been on standby for the weekend person just in case the call in sick we have to go in and then just get the day paid at overtime rates.
The new way of working there wanting us to do is work normal 37.5 hours a week, mon-fri and then on the weekend take a mobile with us, have all calls diverted to that and we have to answer the phone between 0830 - 1630 sat-sun. If we or rather when we get a call as we always do we have to be able to either get to work or home and log the call down and offer assistance if possible (our desk do no field support work, another team that is not on call at all ever!) then we go back to our daily routine until we get another call and then travel to work/home to log it and so on until 1630.
The way there wanting to pay is for this is now increase our standby % from 2% to 4% this is 2% to be on call in case the weekend worker calls in sick and a further 2% for been available to answer phones at the weekend. If we get any calls we get paid for an hours work, now if any other calls come in that hour regardless of how many trips we make to the office we still only get paid for one hour.
Myself im not keen on the idea as i could be back and forth to the office x amounts of times for a single hours pay, and unlike you guys that are on calls for say server failures and such where its likely you wouldnt get a call, its 100% that we will have calls coming in as its just normal working hours and staff expect to call the service desk.
Does this seem at all normal? I know its different for companies but as we work for a big health care place (not hard to guess who) there are no set procedures in place for IT on call staff so our manager is making it up and having the board approve it.
I think our HR's on call only covers health professionals and its obviously only on call if they are needed to go into work, my arguments was that we are not on call jsut in case were needed we are in fact working normally and expected to take calls all day and as such should be paid for the full amount of time we are needed to be sat near a PC/the office.
Sorry if im hijacking but pointless starting another thread for the same topic!
See our Service desk are getting a little confused too.
Currently we are contracted to work 37.5 hours a week mon-sun per rota basis.
Usually if we're working a weekend we work mon-wed and have thur-fri off and work sat-sun.
We get an extra 2% of our wage for been on standby for the weekend person just in case the call in sick we have to go in and then just get the day paid at overtime rates.
The new way of working there wanting us to do is work normal 37.5 hours a week, mon-fri and then on the weekend take a mobile with us, have all calls diverted to that and we have to answer the phone between 0830 - 1630 sat-sun. If we or rather when we get a call as we always do we have to be able to either get to work or home and log the call down and offer assistance if possible (our desk do no field support work, another team that is not on call at all ever!) then we go back to our daily routine until we get another call and then travel to work/home to log it and so on until 1630.
The way there wanting to pay is for this is now increase our standby % from 2% to 4% this is 2% to be on call in case the weekend worker calls in sick and a further 2% for been available to answer phones at the weekend. If we get any calls we get paid for an hours work, now if any other calls come in that hour regardless of how many trips we make to the office we still only get paid for one hour.
Myself im not keen on the idea as i could be back and forth to the office x amounts of times for a single hours pay, and unlike you guys that are on calls for say server failures and such where its likely you wouldnt get a call, its 100% that we will have calls coming in as its just normal working hours and staff expect to call the service desk.
Does this seem at all normal? I know its different for companies but as we work for a big health care place (not hard to guess who) there are no set procedures in place for IT on call staff so our manager is making it up and having the board approve it.
I think our HR's on call only covers health professionals and its obviously only on call if they are needed to go into work, my arguments was that we are not on call jsut in case were needed we are in fact working normally and expected to take calls all day and as such should be paid for the full amount of time we are needed to be sat near a PC/the office.
Sorry if im hijacking but pointless starting another thread for the same topic!
Associate
- Joined
- 13 Nov 2007
- Posts
- 2,427
A guy I knew worked at a place which paid about £250 to be on the call-roster every month, which entailed 24/7 support from Monday to Monday. In cases of weekend and overtime work, double-time pay applied.
It depends on the scenario around the actual callout. If they've been in for hours within 8 hours of their normal start time, they wouldn't be expecting in at their usual start time.
There's an EU directive that states you should get 11 unbroken hours between shifts. It is, however, unpaid. So you need to have some form of agreement with your employer.
No, none of it. It sounds like a helpdesk manager trying to do something on the cheap.
Man of Honour
- Joined
- 17 Nov 2003
- Posts
- 36,747
- Location
- Southampton, UK
My company has offered on call work from 1am to 9am for a flat fee of £200 per week. I didn't feel this was enough so did opt for it. You obviously know more about the EU WTD, if I was called up at 3am and did 3 hours work, could I insist on 11 hours rest?
This is the current policy:
It is all at the discretion of your line manager at that point. If you do refer to the WTD you can insist on not appearing in the office until 11 hours after you finished, but any time you have missed from that normal day of work would be unpaid.
The rights do change on the nature of your job type and various other scenarios too.
The rights do change on the nature of your job type and various other scenarios too.
Man of Honour
- Joined
- 17 Nov 2003
- Posts
- 36,747
- Location
- Southampton, UK
Thanks Gilly
This thread has reaffirmed my belief that we didn't get a particularly good deal.
Last edited:
Unless you're on an extreme amount of money (in which case you wouldn't need the on-call) that's pittance.
I dont get any extra, and Im effectively on call all the time, (well I can either be asked to work a night shift or a day shift so its effectively like being on call out) one of the reasons im leaving
Not surprised.
Burnsy, when I was a technician (I'm still on-call but as an escalation point so never expected to attend the office unless someone dies or something!) I was first paid a flat rate % of my wage, with additional payments for any callouts. This was changed to an hourly rate of £3/£4. £3 for mon-sat and £4 for sunday. That's covering 6pm until 8am week nights and 24 hours sat and sun, so you can work out what that brings in (IIRC about £390 for the week).
Callouts were 1.5x hourly rate. With an average of one 4 hour call per week (on a 22k salary (our technician average)) gives about £460 for a week with a single average on-call week. Some gave more overtime, some no calls at all. Luck of the draw.
Burnsy, when I was a technician (I'm still on-call but as an escalation point so never expected to attend the office unless someone dies or something!) I was first paid a flat rate % of my wage, with additional payments for any callouts. This was changed to an hourly rate of £3/£4. £3 for mon-sat and £4 for sunday. That's covering 6pm until 8am week nights and 24 hours sat and sun, so you can work out what that brings in (IIRC about £390 for the week).
Callouts were 1.5x hourly rate. With an average of one 4 hour call per week (on a 22k salary (our technician average)) gives about £460 for a week with a single average on-call week. Some gave more overtime, some no calls at all. Luck of the draw.
Man of Honour
- Joined
- 17 Nov 2003
- Posts
- 36,747
- Location
- Southampton, UK
The company isn't expecting a very high call volume at all, maybe a couple of handfuls a year. However, the work will likely be third line high priority requests. Although most of the time it'll be £200 for doing nothing, if and when a call does come in I didn't think I could motivate myself for £40 per night as I know it'll be very stressful.
I know the company is looking to expand it's out of hours service, so the pay and conditions may change to something I can go for, but at the moment it doesn't interest me, but it's nice to be able to compare it against others' experiences.
The on call fee here is £300/week, regardless of how many calls you get. A poor fee and insulting valuation of someones free time if you ask me.Wrong answer ...
This is new for my company, hence why I’m asking other peoples experience’s to get an idea. OK peoples job roles are different and therefor command different premiums however it will still be handy to get some sort of idea as at the moment i dont have a clue.
Im thinking for me to even be arsed to go on call id want £200 per week + fee per call handled
I am doing on call, one week on and one week off, generally I only ever get out of hours call on Saturday and Sunday (during the day)
I get an extra
£4800 per year for this (although this is taxable) so probably works out at about
£250-£260 per month (take home) extra for me for 2 weeks on call (thats just the additional money we get, without getting any calls) if I do get a call then its time and a half per hour then extra.
Generally on an average week, I usually get around 3-5 calls on a Saturday, and around 1-3 calls on a Sunday. And tend not to get any calls in the weekday evenings then.
I get an extra
£4800 per year for this (although this is taxable) so probably works out at about
£250-£260 per month (take home) extra for me for 2 weeks on call (thats just the additional money we get, without getting any calls) if I do get a call then its time and a half per hour then extra.
Generally on an average week, I usually get around 3-5 calls on a Saturday, and around 1-3 calls on a Sunday. And tend not to get any calls in the weekday evenings then.
Last edited:
Soldato
- Joined
- 22 Feb 2010
- Posts
- 5,277
- Location
- Southampton
I get £4 an hour on call sat / sun for 10 hours a day without even getting a call out!
one weekend on one weekend off that is
one weekend on one weekend off that is
Last edited:
Soldato
- Joined
- 30 Sep 2006
- Posts
- 5,286
- Location
- Midlands, UK
Have i read this right, some of you I.T. guys only get approx. £3-£4 per hour and that's ON CALL rate?
Have i missed something here (skim read the thread) or isn't that way under the min wage.
Makes me feel almost guilty for how much i get paid, but then i'm not really phone support, i'm 'everything' suport so to speak.
I too, work 8-5pm with lunch. I'm not officially on call but as i'm the sole I.T. support dude in the company if there's an issue, i get called on my personal mobile. Nothing was every written into my contract about this so i use a nice little android app called BLACKLIST, which ***** off any unwanted numbers!
Have i missed something here (skim read the thread) or isn't that way under the min wage.
Makes me feel almost guilty for how much i get paid, but then i'm not really phone support, i'm 'everything' suport so to speak.
I too, work 8-5pm with lunch. I'm not officially on call but as i'm the sole I.T. support dude in the company if there's an issue, i get called on my personal mobile. Nothing was every written into my contract about this so i use a nice little android app called BLACKLIST, which ***** off any unwanted numbers!
Last edited: