zero hour contracts

wnb said:
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.
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having worked as a care manager whilst a student social worker, its not the LA's fault blame the health and social care bill and all the cuts from central government, LA's have had their adult social care budgets killed by the government, its disgusting, now we are in a situation where they have no choice but to buy the cheapest services in, usually from the worst companies
 
I was on a Zero-hour contract once, I enjoyed it, it should not be used as a full-time job though. I just used it to earn some £'s while job hunting..

It was good as i did my last day there before starting my full-time job and just told them on the day i was never coming back. :)... I'd liked it..

Though if people use these as full-time jobs thats there own fault.. as there not meant to be.
 
wnb said:
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.

We are looking at annualised contracts but they also have their problems. Say for example you 16 hours contract, you rota is down 1 hour per week and after a set period if you did not work your time back up to a 16 hour average you would have to pay back any monies owed.
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I do understand this, and have seen this first hand - the problem (as I see it) with zero hour contracts for employers is that it creates a sentiment of "don't care" regarding the employers attitude toward their staff.

In her contract, it said she was expected to work the re-occurring shifts that she was given. I'm sure there was wording to say that it was required that she did that. That annoyed me. The employer was basically saying "We're going to make no commitment, but you have to make a commitment to be available.. although if you cancel plans/other work to make yourself available for these shifts we may still cancel them anyway.

Due to operating like this, I see social care companies with a high staff turnover. This is ultimately bad for both the company (training costs) and the service users (inconsistency of care - or even just staff / routine). I do appreciate that money is used as metric, and that falls second to quality - the whole system is broken.
 
Doomedspeed said:
I was on a Zero-hour contract once, I enjoyed it, it should not be used as a full-time job though. I just used it to earn some £'s while job hunting..

It was good as i did my last day there before starting my full-time job and just told them on the day i was never coming back. :)... I'd liked it..

Though if people use these as full-time jobs thats there own fault.. as there not meant to be.
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This was my experience too. I was on a decent daily rate, so just made sure to budget properly when I was working, and made sure I had enough to tide me over when I wasn't.

Was nice being able to go out clubbing in the week, and if I was too hung over/couldn't be bother to work to just tell them I didn't want the calls that day :p
 
Its a royal pain this.
My partner is always in debt because 8 - 10 months of the year they give her 50 + hours then 2 months normally in Jan and Feb @ 7 hours. This is at Tesco. A joke really. But any action to enforce longer or better contracts means less jobs.

At the moment there is a lot of competition for work and employees can just make it up, you try and get someone to fight for holiday pay rights acas only get involved if you owed money and know to claim . Until workers have a choice, employers will not have to be competitive.

Whilst moving house my Mrs went on a career break between Tesco stores. She got a part time job at Roosters Piri Piri (Bromley) and they did not even hid that they don t pay holiday.

Sports Direct do pay Holiday but they have a funny system. Every 3 months they paid you a pro rata amount regardless if you took holiday or not.
 
I have just finished 5 years of zero hour contracts and it was very hard at times believe me, it was either that or nothing, some weeks you could earn a grand then nothing for weeks on end, so turned out to be very average pay in the long term:(

I don't agree with it, but i know why company's do it, it's just a sign of these tough times we live in now.

I ride the storm and have been given fulltime contract now, but it's took many years and i am well aware it could happen again, but for now i am very busy for a while and that's a good thing for holding on :)
 
My mate works like this. Hes in the NHS as a podiatrist though. And he works 3 full days a week and they're begging him to do full time. Hes still only on a 0 hours contract though. He works 3 days a week in a private clinic too.

One for the money, one for the satisfaction of helping people.

I guess it works at the higher level professional work.

Anyway, despite graduating uni 4 weeks ago. hes got a job in canada that pays silly... so visa time and hes offskies.
 
I have to say that with us most of our workers don't want to work regardless of the type of contract and when they do, they limit their work for fear of losing family credit?
 
estebanrey said:
Seems the OP didn't read his own link, otherwise he would have seen this...
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GAC said:
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.
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I can tell you now that ASDA are either lying or don't know what's going on in their stores. I used to work for ASDA and recently conversed with my old boss, he categorically stated that the summer temps were going on zero hour contracts so he could just call them back at Xmas rather than go through the recruiting process again for the Xmas temps.
 
GAC said:
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.
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Yeah, we do jack for agency workers :rolleyes:

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.
 
GAC said:
maybe you can have a word with the unison monkeys here then as they dont want to know about it.
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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.
 
Read the first few posts, and then I saw this

Judgeneo said:
I was on a zero-hour contract whilst studying my A-levels. Suited my needs perfectly.
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Same here.

i started working in a hotel on a zero hour contract (this summer btw). its summer just after my A-Levels. i have no idea how much I will work each week. Can be as little as 10 hours, or as much as 50 hours. if I'm sick, I don't get paid, but on the other hand, if I want to take a day off, I tell my boss from before and they give it to me (unpaid, obviously). it is not that bad when you think about it. It allows flexibility for you and for the employer.

The thing is, it is ideal only for people in my situation. It obviously won't be ideal for somebody who raises a family, or something of the sort. Thats why i ask, what type of people work at Sports direct if its 17-22 year olds, then i think its not that bad of a working scheme. If anything, it keeps the workers motivated to work as hard as they can, so managers will reward them with longer hours/as many hours as they want.

Sound reasonable to me. If you don't like this method of working, don't take it, simple. But there are people who just love the flexibility.

EDIT: We are obviously speaking for temporary jobs.
 
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amigafan2003 said:
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.
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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.
 
Resident said:
I can tell you now that ASDA are either lying or don't know what's going on in their stores. I used to work for ASDA and recently conversed with my old boss, he categorically stated that the summer temps were going on zero hour contracts so he could just call them back at Xmas rather than go through the recruiting process again for the Xmas temps.
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That sounds like a situation where a zero hour contract is sensible. Students have temp jobs over holidays, don't have to work during term time.
 
MadMossy said:
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.
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Nearly everyone on 30+?

That varies hugely.

I've seen about a quarter of a department get replaced over a year and all the new staff were on 12/16/20h contracts.
 
I currently have a 6 hour contract. Luckily, I'm friends with my supervisor and get on quite well with my duty manager, so I get more hours. however, the big boss has the moto "there is always someone else willing to do it".

Call in sick? your hours get halved. come in late once? you get 6 hours per week for a while.

I've had some interviews, and one tomorrow. for something that is more suited to me, and has a better environment to work.

If it wasn't for the fact I hate sitting around, that and it looks better when going for other jobs that you're currently employed, I'd leave instantly and just spend more hours looking for something else.
 
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