Background
I’m on a 48 hour week salary.
Multi-drop driver in Scotland.
My company has never been any good at managing drivers hours over the 17 week period. Quite a few drivers often find ourselves owed 100 hours + near the end of the reference period. The company, in an effort to tackle this problem, have started a policy of zeroing hours
By that i mean using this,
“Any holidays provided in addition to the pro-rata 4 weeks’ statutory leave, to which all workers are entitles, will count as zero hours and may be used to average working time. The 4-weeks statutory holiday entitlement will count as 48 hours per week or 8 hours per day in the calculations of average working time.”
I have 2 problems with this, the first being that i’m sure the statutory holiday entitlement was changed to 5.6 weeks on the 1st April 2009. The second is that, lets say in the 1st week of the 17 week reference period i take a 1 week holiday and the rest i work 51 hours every week. I’d then think i’m owed 48 hours, but no, they’ve decided to zero my hours and therefore owe me no time. That does not seem right to me and surely not legal. I find it all quite hard to put into words, so apologies if i have not made this clear enough.
If anyone would like more info before giving me an answer, i’m happy to answer any questions.
I did get a bit lost with that but It’s near my bed time, but if you’re owed that amount of hours that’s ridiculous, we are salaried too but our hours are strictly monitored, I think you’re company needs to sort themselves out quickly.
hitch:
Holiday weeks count 48 hours towards working time
48 for some reason i have 45 in my head. But you’re right if you have a holiday that is included in the working time directive.
I just want to ask one thing are you taking away your breaks and poa because if you’re breaking 48hrs over a 17 week average you must be doing mega hours.
I do about 52-53 every week usually, take away 5 hours in breaks then take away poa usually 3-4hours built up im always well under 48hrs. Only at Christmas on a few occasions have i touch the maximum limit of 60 working hours.
Under the RTD, statutory annual leave, sick leave and maternity/paternity leave may NOT be used to reduce the average working time in any given reference period.
Under the RTD, statutory annual leave, sick leave and maternity/paternity leave may NOT be used to reduce the average working time in any given reference period.
Under the RTD, statutory annual leave, sick leave and maternity/paternity leave may NOT be used to reduce the average working time in any given reference period.
Fileep:
Who police’s this rule? I personally have never heard of anyone being ‘done’ for it!
I dont quite know, wheelnut on here posted an article that said vosa had no prosecuted as single person over it ever.
I went over 60hrs once and i got my baws felt for it from a transport coordinator that isnt even at my site, at my company it must get monitored some where down south.
Maybe its the company that gets into trouble and not the driver for a change?
From what I gather, you can only work a maximum of 60 hours per week - BUT - you can be on duty, break or POA for the rest of the time upto a maximum on a regular week of 84 hours! Am I correct thinking this?
I always deduct breaks before handing my time sheets in. A couple of years ago before i knew about the 60 hour limit, they had me working over 70 hours at times. Luckily i found out about the 60 hour limit before VOSA stopped me. As we are multi drop, we don’t use POA, because we’re either driving, handballing or doing paperwork. We just use the crossed hammers and rest bed.
We had a problem over holiday hours a short while ago, (booking 40 not 48) and thanks to people on here I got the run down on the regs. 4 weeks is the statutory leave for the purposes of calculating wtd, any over that (including the extra statutory 1.6) can be zeroed.
I made a lot of phone calls today about it as it has p***ed me right off. VOSA, The Dept for Transport, ACAS, UNITE and ACAS are a waste of space, but i found out the following.
Although every worker in the UK is entitled to 5.6 weeks’ paid annual holiday since 2009, the Road Transport Directive has not been brought into line with this legislation. Drivers have four weeks of statutory holiday. Anything above that is classed as non-statutory and can therefore be put down as zero on time sheets.
I get 25 days holiday, plus 10 bank holidays this year, taking me to 35 days holiday. That means that the 15 days over and above the 20 days statutory leave are classed as non-statutory. So if i somehow managed to work 60 hours a week for 12 weeks in a row, i’d expect to be owed 144 hours (15 days), but no, they could legally wipe them out and owe me no time.
It’s a ballache going over this to people, half the people i phoned had no clue about it and they’re the ones i’m meant to go to for advice. My companys HR woman summed it up, “They are breaking no laws, even though it isn’t ethically sound.”
When i got back to the depot i then found out from a driver friendly supervisor that i can refuse to work over 12 hours and that i can refuse to work well over my 48 hour week as long as i do 49 hours.
If they want to play hardball, let them.
PS - When i told a few of the other drivers, they said they’d just go on the sick to recoup any time lost, lol. Not a road i’d like to go down.
Malky80:
So if i somehow managed to work 60 hours a week for 12 weeks in a row, i’d expect to be owed 144 hours (15 days), but no, they could legally wipe them out and owe me no time.
