Legal shift pattern?

[funkyrich]

 In order to save paying out as much overtime money,the food factory I work for adjusted the afternoon shift pattern as follows:

Mon - weds=13.30 till 21.25 pm

Thurs= day off

Fri=13.00 till 20.24pm then we are expected to double back on ourselves and work saturday morning from 6.00am till 13.50! Is this right? These last  two days are to close together and it ruins my weekend!

[Bob A Job]

Unfortunatley yes, they can change the hours that way.

its working less than 16 hours in a 24 hour period, and you have a day of either side (assuming you dont work Sunday). Thats 'ok' by European Law.

Yet another company cutting costs by abusing moral issues, and workers happiness. You cant escape from it nowdays.

[Sasha13]

I always thought that by law you had to have 11 hours off between the end of one shift and the start of the next - which would make this shift pattern illegal. Am I talking rubbish?

[twiglet4frog]

i just been on the DTI working rights of employees and it states u must be given 11 hours free from work to refresh every 24 hours, in other words, u can only work 13 hours in a 24 hour period, it however doesnt make clear when that 24 hours is and as u have shown from 1pm through to 1pm next day u have only 9 and a half hours free from work so it may be worth your while checking out your rights as to how it works out for the weekend shift

[Bob A Job]

if i remember rightly, the 11 hours dont have to be consecutive, provided the total working hours over a 72 hour period do not exceed 21 hours. or something like that.

but it may have changed.