zero hour contracts

[GAC]

seems the news today has finally picked up on this disgusting way of employing people, shame its only going to be a brief mention for a day or two and then forgotten about again.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/jul/28/sports-direct-staff-zero-hour-contracts

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/300000-people-on-zero-hours-contracts-in-social-care-alone-8688796.html

now the sports direct one is bad but if the figures are correct for 300k employed within social care that's just wrong, it will be even more of a mess for whoever try's to tackle it and get them on proper contracts with actual on call payments.

just annoys me that people are willing to work such contracts rather than demanding contracted hours, the more people who swallow these contracts the more its going to spread, if they arnt made illegal i can see the vast majority of retail being zero hour in a year or two. especially with companies like asda who have 90% of their staff on 16 hour contracts to start with and work them 40 hours a week so they can save on sick and holiday pay.

 

[GAC]

I use zero hour contracts, if I did not I would be out of business. Social sevices are driving down costs where quality is an after thought with savings been the main motivator when contracting. When Social Services are marking bids 60% of the mark is on cost.

Social Care work is variable you have customers going into restbite, holidays, hospital cancelling care etc. Without zero hour contracts I would have to pay staff when they had no work on. Which could possibly mean redundacies.

see this a lot all over and tbh companies need to start being realistic when they put in for a contract rather than just trying to undercut each other to get a contract and then have to pay min wage and try and make savings elsewhere.

generally speaking though its the larger companies putting in silly contracts at a loss just to take business from smaller companies so they get that magical market share.

sita clean did it in the 90's for rubbish collecting where i live and they undercut the best next company by 20% just to take the market share.

true though local authoritys have been cutting care for years and now the countrys on its backside its falling apart. dont blame you for using such contracts as you have to go against the larger companies doing the same, hopefully if local authorities are forced to not use zero hour staff you'l be in a better position and better placed to offer part time contracts rather than zero hour.

People wonder why I'm in a union.

Workers have forgetten they have rights to fair treatment it would seem.

hahah unions yeah, iv watched unions do sod all for people on agency and zero hour contracts, all they care about is full time contracted workers. half the problems we have now with zero hour contracts are thanks to unions not giving a monkeys as it doesnt effect there main members.

 

[GAC]

I work for ASDA and have no idea what your on about, nearly everyone I work with are on contracts of 30+ hours and holiday pay is paid proportionately to the hours worked, this includes overtime.

could be different store to store, im guessing the manager has the final say on who's on what but my cousin was on a 16 hour contract for 10 years and worked the majority of weeks at 40 hours. as do a lot of people in that store. the only people he knew on 30-40 hours where managerial staff and supervisors. everyone else is 16 hours.

 

[GAC]

Seems the OP didn't read his own link, otherwise he would have seen this...

seems you didnt read either, i didnt say they used zero hour contracts but used 16 hour contracts for a lot of their staff.

like i said above my local store is full of them to save on holiday and sick pay.

 

[GAC]

i never said asda used them but I COULD SEE THEM doing so in a year or two.

as for what happened with my cousin i cant comment how it is now as he left about 2 years ago due to the lack of a real contract.

as for the 12 week thing im guessing your talking about the working time directive that was brought in. iv seen that at work in local authorities with part time staff working 10 weeks at 40 and then 3-4 at reduced levels, and then rinse and repeat.

 

[GAC]

We ended up with a (b) contract I wont go into details but an (a) contract is far better. We scored very high on quality and poorly on cost. We eventually found out the hourly price for the a large competitor and they are 23% less than our hourly rate.

In the 18 months since the contracts have started two A list providers have been suspended. The whole framework has not worked, I have done my best to take on as much work as I possibly can and I was the only provider taking on work for a 6 month period. Things got that bad the LA brought in specialist company to look at the A lsit providers recruitment process and staff retention. Meanwile I was invited into the Civic centre and thanked persoanlly for the work that I did and without us the hospital would be beyond breaking point.

It is now 7 month later and all has been forgotten. The A list providers are back on the contract and we dont get calls from social services anymore for refferals.

Am I bitter? The LA got what they wanted they saved 2 million a year and they got the cheapest providers at the cost of quailty.

same ole story when it comes to LA's though, anything to save money even if in the long run its going to cause major issues but then they will blame someone else and it will start all over again.

 

[GAC]

Yeah, we do jack for agency workers

http://blogs.mirror.co.uk/investigations/2013/01/temps-bring-first-tribunal-cas.html

Those workers were in my branch and we fought hard for them. A member is a member - regardless of employer, agency worker etc.

maybe you can have a word with the unison monkeys here then as they dont want to know about it.

 

[GAC]

If you're a member of Unison then it's probably a good idea that you have a word with them?

Of if you're not happy, how about putting yourself forward as a rep then you can do something about it yourself?

And I don't think the local reps, who are all volunteers and don't get paid any extra for it, will appreciate being called "monkeys" - show some respect.

well iv not been there for more than two years now but the guys i know there are still getting the royal run around from the unison reps when they try to bring stuff up. last i heard they had put in a complaint to regional manager ? or some such to try and get things moving.

not having a pop at all union reps as iv seen some go well out of their way to help out, but the majority iv come across seem to get the hump if your not a full time member of staff.

 

[GAC]

reading some of the replies and it just shows how much of a mess employment law and the enforcement of it is in now. funny how many contradicting views there are though, and got to say im not one bit surprised.

iv worked via agencies on and off while i worked on the bins and the abuse of the staff was rife, from trying to get out of ppe provision to trying to not pay any tax on anyone and have you as self employed, but forget to actually tell you that. its a shambles and both labour and now the condem gov have been hopeless at doing anything about it.

the temporary working time directive that came in via the eu should have sorted a lot of issues out but of course its not a fix as its just got too much wiggle room for the agencies and companies to work out ways around. the favorite one here is to have you work 12 weeks and then take a couple of weeks off before they have you back in so your time resets. and because they are doing nothing wrong no one can do anything about it.

as for what rights you should and do get on zero hour contracts its like a bad comedy sketch with how some people see them as lazy workers who dont deserve the pay and conditions and others who seem to think they get them all. every zero hour contract iv looked in to the last few weeks in the security industry has basically been the lower end, you get paid the hours you work and thats that. hell one of them even claimed if i worked there i would have to buy my own ppe and uniform (for each site i had to work, different uniforms for different shopping centres).

as for those who see the zero hour people they have employed themselves or work with as lazy layabouts, do you wonder why. they are on the worst contracts going and know no matter how hard they work they will never get taken on and could be out of work at the drop of a hat, not exactly inspiring is it. sure for students and the like its great but for people who have had to take it as that's all there is its less than ideal especially with the abuse of the system admitted to in this thread.

 

[GAC]

No they don't, what gives you the right to tell me they do?
Time and again I've heard the same story from different staff when it comes to holidays, if they have time off they don't get paid.

the gov seems to think otherwise. but again no one seems to enforce half of this stuff.

https://www.gov.uk/holiday-entitlement-rights

 

[GAC]

They should do and they can screw your employer for stat holiday pay based on hours worked, if your zero hour staff are working they are entitled to statutory holiday pay pro-rata, I think it's 2. Something days a month at full time equivalent

either way its illegal to tell them they dont get any it seems.

 

[GAC]

Sure? Because a *lot* of staff at my workplace are getting no holiday pay. In fact many of the major agencies flat out do not pay holiday pay, to any of their staff.

well tell the gov then because that page i linked says otherwise. i know from my own experience that agencies can be a tad short on telling all of the facts when it comes to holiday and ppe entitlement. if they have told them they get paid leave then they wont take it. if they refuse to pay them after being asked then that's bang out of order and illegal according to that website.

 

[GAC]

Just had a reply on The Facebooks from a friend on Zero Hours.
He definitely doesn't get holiday pay but 'thinks' he gets more per hour than the several staff on a full time contract which doesn't go down too well.
He also says he gets sick pay but it is very risky taking time off because they'll just use somebody else.

How would they work sick pay out if he never knows what he is doing from week to week?

still doesn't change the fact he should get holiday pay, higher hourly rate or not. unless he's a contractor and not on a zero hour contract then he would be self employed.

this is the big grey area which agencies and companies try and pull a fast one by employing people on a zero hour contract but have them listed as self employed but forget to tell the employee's that. if he doesn't know what he's down as id tell him to find out or he may get a nasty surprise from the tax man or when he's no longer required and trys to sign on he wont be able to claim anything.

 

[GAC]

seems its a little more wide spread than first though, shocker.

More than a million UK workers are on zero-hours contracts with no guarantees of shifts or work patterns - four times official estimates, research suggests.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23570345

 

[GAC]

Can I ask how do you know 90% of Asda workers are on 16 hour contracts?

may not be country wide but my cousins asda was that way, he said the only people who got full time contracts were the section supervisors and management. as others have said here its more wide spread than people like to let on. especially asda.

 

[GAC]

which was asda was that in? can i email you? I'm doing some research on the subject and would be interested in talking if possible.

it was the rochdale branch thankfully he's no longer there. as for emailing me no point as i didnt work there and never will iv done my stint in retail and its a joke.

if your doing research (im guessing journalist) get a job on a zero hour contract and see what actually happens. as it amazes me how the media bring on someone who's not very articulate and then have a business professional sat opposite them to rip them to shreds. god forbid the real truth of what happens got out past the minor ravings of a few students.

You still get sick pay, holiday pay, smp and spp on a zero hour contract. If you do not then your employer is breaking the law.

imagine that, companies breaking employment law. sad fact is a lot of companies and agencies break it daily. the best one is demanding employee's bring there own ppe (safety gear, boots/waterproofs etc) and forgetting to tell them they are actually entitled to holiday pay. and the best one of course abusing them when they do take time off, so they have to start at the bottom of the pile again for hours.

 

[GAC]

as iv said a couple of times. unless your are self employed you are entitled to holidays. its the law.

weather you'l get work after taking holidays is another thing, iv done that dance with agencies and local councils myself.

and dont mix up employment contract with being a contractor, your employed by the agency, your not self employed unless they are treating you as such and haven't told you.

 

[GAC]

Let's throw this in the pot.
My niece works in a warehouse on Zero Hours but only gets paid for what she does, this means she can be there for 8 hours but only get paid for 4 when the goods arrive.

yeah that's illegal if she's employed by an agency, the ONLY way that would be legal is if she was contracted directly with the company and signed on to that. and if she's done that she needs a bit of a talking to about it as i wouldn't expect anyone to be at work for 8 hours having to wait for deliveries and only get paid when actually unloading the. not her fault they cant manage the logistics side.

 

[GAC]

Which has been illegal since 2006 afaik

http://www.personneltoday.com/artic...-ruled-illegal-across-europe-working-time.htm

Maybe zero hour contracts can be treated differently, I don't know.

no it seems they just do what they like as the workers don't have a clue where they stand, same deal as a lot of agencies who will drop you when you start asking questions.

 

[GAC]

It was via a university and their HR departments are normally relatively anal about these things so I think it may be acceptable for zero hour contracts as it ensures that you get holiday pay. I believe we were also required to adhere to the rest of the Working Time Directive, but I don't think I went over 70 hours a month anyway.

did you have the option of what to do though ? or did they just tell you thats how it is.