Employment advice needed on working hours contract signing

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drunat

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Hi. Looking for recommendations on where I can get good employment advise or advise here on my situation. I have applied for a new role in my company (I work here 20y) and have been offered it - in terms of rank its a promotion with some increase in salary and benefits. The area of work is interesting so it would be disappointing for me to loose it/not accept it. I discovered that the terms of contracts that I've been asked to sign changed in regards to overtime provisions. I work 4 day week i.e 28h (get 4/5th of salary). In my previous role, while I often would work overtime, I never claimed overtime pay and we had a gentleman agreement with my manager that I can claim time in lieu. Turns out my new role is a lot more demanding and short staffed and I envisage having to work long hours regularly like the rest of the team (working full time). I envisage it will be totally unrealistic to claim time in lieu.

Now to change in contract: my old contract states that if required to work overtime, it is paid at overtime rate i.e. everything over my 28 hours would be paid overtime. The overtime provision in the new contract is removed completely, though I did manage to negotiate additional pay for extra 7h to eliminate part time bias as compared to full time employee. The contract also explicitly states "you may be required to work additional hours at evenings, weekend at no additional pay... your remuneration package reflects the fact that no additional remuneration will be paid". I understand, given this provision, and in accordance to Irish law, I can be asked to work up to 49h week at no additional pay, in spite of m contract stating 28h week?
To note, to me, my additional benefits do not cover the extra stress and extra hours required to work overtime in this role. . So I guess the questions are: What can I do to change the terms? Do I have any power to argue against new terms or do I just have to accept because HR say so. Would really love a good legal advise so if someone can recommend a firm would appreciate. Thank you in advance
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Its quite common for people to move from an overtime, hourly paid role with overtime into a salary position where overtime is not paid. I've done it as part of career progression and I'm sure plenty of other people on here have done so as well.

Work has changed post the pandemic and has moved more and more to an outcome based solution and away from the 9-5 clock in/clock out. That requires both employers and employees to be flexible. For example, I have a home worker in my team, gets up at 6am, does and hour and half work, then gets the kids to school and is back working from around half 9 to half 2 when she logs off, does the school run and then logs back in to tidy up. She's done by 3.30, it suits her, it suits me and the job is done. If I need another half hour because we're delayed, I'll ask and get it but if everything is done at 2 o'clock on a Friday and she wants to log off, fine be me also. She's doesn't even need to ask as it is about outcomes, not hours.

If I was your new manager and you rocked up with a solicitor in tow to discuss your T&C's I'd withdraw the offer. You wouldn't be worth the hassle is the most polite way of putting it. So rather then "demanding" and "going legal" you should be sitting down with the manager and asking them, how to make this work. For example
  • You've mentioned they are short staffed, what are his plans to address this? Is it to make up the time with your additional hours?
  • How often does he anticipate evening/weekend working? There may come a time in your career when you need to do this to get a project or deal finished but it shouldn't be the norm
  • What kind of flexibility is he offering? What is the ability you have to manage your time?
  • What are the bonus/Share options etc for the role. I don't get overtime despite working more then my contracted hours every week, but I will get a bigger bonus at the end of the year
  • How flexible is he on salary?
And if you don't like his answers, you don't have to take the role.
 
Peanuts20 said:
Its quite common for people to move from an overtime, hourly paid role with overtime into a salary position where overtime is not paid. I've done it as part of career progression and I'm sure plenty of other people on here have done so as well.

Work has changed post the pandemic and has moved more and more to an outcome based solution and away from the 9-5 clock in/clock out. That requires both employers and employees to be flexible. For example, I have a home worker in my team, gets up at 6am, does and hour and half work, then gets the kids to school and is back working from around half 9 to half 2 when she logs off, does the school run and then logs back in to tidy up. She's done by 3.30, it suits her, it suits me and the job is done. If I need another half hour because we're delayed, I'll ask and get it but if everything is done at 2 o'clock on a Friday and she wants to log off, fine be me also. She's doesn't even need to ask as it is about outcomes, not hours.

If I was your new manager and you rocked up with a solicitor in tow to discuss your T&C's I'd withdraw the offer. You wouldn't be worth the hassle is the most polite way of putting it. So rather then "demanding" and "going legal" you should be sitting down with the manager and asking them, how to make this work. For example
  • You've mentioned they are short staffed, what are his plans to address this? Is it to make up the time with your additional hours?
  • How often does he anticipate evening/weekend working? There may come a time in your career when you need to do this to get a project or deal finished but it shouldn't be the norm
  • What kind of flexibility is he offering? What is the ability you have to manage your time?
  • What are the bonus/Share options etc for the role. I don't get overtime despite working more then my contracted hours every week, but I will get a bigger bonus at the end of the year
  • How flexible is he on salary?
And if you don't like his answers, you don't have to take the role.
Click to expand...
Thank you for your advice.

I have always been on a salaried role, not paid by an hour. I've been on 4 day week (paid 4/5th of my salary) for many years now, first on a parental leave basis but for a few years now I am part time as per contract with annual salary stated. The role is within a new team, everything is very unsettled and people are leaving faster than new ones being hired as I see it exactly because of high demands of the roles. There is no adjustment to the fact that they are hiring the person on 4 day week, essentially what needs to be done needs to be done... Last 4 weeks I worked on average 15h day i.e. 60h week which is absolutely not sustainable and it will be up to me to set the boundaries because if I don't demands will never ease.

Salary has already been negotiated and I've been told that terms of contract would remain the same, but as you can see overtime provisions changed hence my question. Work is interesting, but very stressful and demanding and so for the hours I will end up working with no overtime it'll be like I am taking a pay cut per hour worked really... No bonuses.

Already spoke to my new manager and I do think they will be reasonable but resource is very tight and inevitably I will be asked to do over and above.

Looking for advise on how to handle overtime negotiation with HR
 
Before you begin negotiations, you need to establish what your issue really is and what your bottom line is on this issue. What exactly do you want to negotiate? - the extent of additional hours involved or the fact that you won’t get anything in return in terms of pay or time in lieu? Would you work a limited number of unpaid hours for free? Would you work a higher number of hours if you were getting payment or time off? Be clear on what you would be willing to accept.

From what you say, the initial value of the promotion is likely to diminish if, as you anticipate, you’ll be expected to work considerable additional hours for no additional remuneration. There’s a point at which you know this leaves you worse off, either in terms of a reduced hourly rate of pay (taking all the combined hours into account) or the impact that the new role has on your free time.

You seem to have a pretty clear idea of the impact the new role will have on you i.e. that it would involve a lot of additional unpaid hours. The question you have to ask is whether you would ultimately be prepared to accept this scenario for the sake of a promotion. If not, there’s nothing unreasonable about telling HR that while you’re very grateful to be offered the position, you would need some clarity on the extent of additional hours involved. There would be nothing wrong in saying that without this, you’re not sure you could commit to the position.

Similarly, if they provide clarity, and it’s not to your liking, there’s nothing wrong with turning down the offer.

What would be unreasonable on your part however, would be to accept the position and then seek to renegotiate the terms of the contract.

There’s nothing worse than being in a role you’re not happy in and it makes sense that you remove any ambiguity regarding expectations before you accept the role. Approach HR from this angle.
 
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It sounds like you are already in the role, if you have worked 15 hr per day for the last 4 weeks?
Salaried workers tend not to get overtime, so it sounds like you were not salaried in you old job, but hourly paid, especially if you kept track of every hour extra you worked and took it in lieu, and more specifically it was stated in your contract that you would get paid overtime for every hour over 28 that you worked.
You are I think confusing the working time act with your contract, you have not signed up to work 49 hr a week.

So you are contracted to work a 4 day week, 7 hr per day but the last 4 weeks you have worked 15 hr per day. You have already pointed out the unfairness of this compared to full time staff on 35 hr per week who I assume are also doing 15 hours a day, so 75 hr per week but they at least are being paid for 35, and have now negotiated a 35 hr per week salary. Did you agree you would work the 35 hours in four days or 5 days? And is this now a permanent arrangement?

So the next step is to sit down with your line manager and say I don’t mind helping out by staying late if there is urgent work every now and then, and this is covered in my contract. But I cannot work 15 hours every day, I have commitments outside of work, and for the past four week I have called in ever favour from family and friends to cover these commitments but it is unsustainable. Today I have a hard stop at 5 pm, and then go home at 5 pm. The key is not to get drawn into discussions about what your commitments are.

I would also follow Salvador's advice above and get clarity from HR by what they mean about the extent of the additional hours needed. I bet they don’t mean an extra 8 hours per day, every day.

You need to train you manager to expect 35 hours work from you each week and they either hire more staff or let the work roll over.
 
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