The Lemon Fool

DAK why these are considered a good idea in some industries?

I've never met anyone who isn't desperate to ditch these. I can just about see the argument in catering but the other jobs I know of, it doesn't make sense and certainly deters applicants.

Just wondered what the thinking was.

Not sure if it's still the case, but when I was involved in the bus industry in the seventies and eighties, they were considered necessary to provide the required service levels without needing part time workers.

The nature of a weekday service with peaks in the morning and the afternoon meant that drivers and conductors (remember them? ) worked earlies, lates and splits over a three week cycle (not sure of the order at this point).

Sunnypad wrote: I can just about see the argument in catering but the other jobs I know of, it doesn't make sense and certainly deters applicants.

Would be helpful if you gave examples of the non-catering jobs that you know do this.

AF62 wrote:

Sunnypad wrote: I can just about see the argument in catering but the other jobs I know of, it doesn't make sense and certainly deters applicants.

Would be helpful if you gave examples of the non-catering jobs that you know do this.

I've seen warehouse work advertise split shifts in the last couple of years. Mainly for delivery companies, where you need to sort stuff and load the vans in them morning early, and empty them and sort stuff for onwards travel in the evening.

Paul

staffordian wrote:Not sure if it's still the case, but when I was involved in the bus industry in the seventies and eighties, they were considered necessary to provide the required service levels without needing part time workers.

The nature of a weekday service with peaks in the morning and the afternoon meant that drivers and conductors (remember them? ) worked earlies, lates and splits over a three week cycle (not sure of the order at this point).

I'm thinking of split shifts on the same day.

Tbh, hospitality can sometimes be very odd if they don't have a set pattern but that's a different problem on top of split shifts.

Other examples that I know with a split in the daytime - security, warehouse, delivery.

Something else that's been mentioned to me by delivery drivers is that supermarkets don't like them covering the same or similar routes. This is in London. I would have thought there'd be practical benefits to having drivers learn a route.

Sunnypad wrote:

staffordian wrote:Not sure if it's still the case, but when I was involved in the bus industry in the seventies and eighties, they were considered necessary to provide the required service levels without needing part time workers.

The nature of a weekday service with peaks in the morning and the afternoon meant that drivers and conductors (remember them? ) worked earlies, lates and splits over a three week cycle (not sure of the order at this point).

I'm thinking of split shifts on the same day.

Yes, that's what the split shifts were. In to cover the morning peak, home, then in for the afternoon peak.

But this split work would not be every week, just one in three.

Sunnypad wrote:

staffordian wrote:
Other examples that I know with a split in the daytime - security, warehouse, delivery.

The NHS wouldn't function without split shifts.

Mike, how so?

Sunnypad wrote:Mike, how so?

I believe doctors,nurses and other front line staff are required to work double shifts with a few hours rest in between but that is probably not what you have in mind. Where split shifts occur is when on call staff are required to stay on the hospital premises for their 8 hour day or night stint until they are called to work, then retire to their on call room (if one is available) and again wait to be called. Unless they are actually called upon to work they do not get paid other than an on call allowance which in some hospitals amounts to less than the cost of travel and parking your car. The upshot is that their weekend is disrupted for a shift which theoretically costs them money. Such shifts are additional to their regular contracted hours which require staff to work a selection of days and nights.

I suppose this kind of arrangement is not exactly what you had in mind but it is an example how work is sometimes split for front line workers. However, practices vary so greatly I do not know whether this system is universal even though I suspect it is.

Mike
No, it's not what I was thinking

My father was a doctor so I am familiar with the pattern

I think it's a very different thing for doctors than min wage jobs.

This strays into politics so I'll stop there.

Mike88 wrote:

Sunnypad wrote:Mike, how so?

I believe doctors,nurses and other front line staff are required to work double shifts with a few hours rest in between but that is probably not what you have in mind. Where split shifts occur is when on call staff are required to stay on the hospital premises for their 8 hour day or night stint until they are called to work, then retire to their on call room (if one is available) and again wait to be called. Unless they are actually called upon to work they do not get paid other than an on call allowance which in some hospitals amounts to less than the cost of travel and parking your car. The upshot is that their weekend is disrupted for a shift which theoretically costs them money. Such shifts are additional to their regular contracted hours which require staff to work a selection of days and nights.

I suppose this kind of arrangement is not exactly what you had in mind but it is an example how work is sometimes split for front line workers. However, practices vary so greatly I do not know whether this system is universal even though I suspect it is.

My wife has 20 years experience working as a nurse for different NHS trusts. This shift pattern isn't one she recognises. They may exist, as you say, practices may vary.

However if there are areas of the NHS that don't have this "split shift" arrangement its very hard to believe, as claimed

Mike88 wrote:
The NHS wouldn't function without split shifts.

The NHS, or at least those parts of it that organise shifts as you describe would change those arrangements. The NHS would function.

Sunnypad wrote:Something else that's been mentioned to me by delivery drivers is that supermarkets don't like them covering the same or similar routes. This is in London. I would have thought there'd be practical benefits to having drivers learn a route.

Perhaps, for a variety of reasons, the supermarkets don't want the same delivery drivers visiting the same households every week.

Sunnypad wrote:I'm thinking of split shifts on the same day.

Tbh, hospitality can sometimes be very odd if they don't have a set pattern but that's a different problem on top of split shifts.

Other examples that I know with a split in the daytime - security, warehouse, delivery.

I can't see anything specific in those industries which would require split shifts, so it is likely something unique to the operation of the individual companies.

If anything, unless the role was one that needed specific training then I would have expected the explosion of zero hours contracts to have reduced the need for split shifts; simply hire 'Bob' to do the three hours in the morning and 'Jane' to do the four hours in the evening.

Not sure how it would work in the densely populated cities but my experience in the 'burbs the supermarket route planner wouldn't have to preclude drivers revisiting it would occur naturally. I drove for Sainsbury's about 6 or 7 years back so things might have changed but our shift times were fixed, routes never were. With at least half a dozen drivers out for 4 hour stints morning, afternoon and evening and a wide 10mile radius or so catchment area dropping at 10 - 15 customers the likelihood of even similar routes being regular seems improbable. You would, over time, revisit the same customers occasionally but never like a delivery round.
As a customer of deliveries from the supermarkets I have my shopping delivered at different times of the day and different days of the week.

dealtn wrote:

Mike88 wrote:

Sunnypad wrote:Mike, how so?

I believe doctors,nurses and other front line staff are required to work double shifts with a few hours rest in between but that is probably not what you have in mind. Where split shifts occur is when on call staff are required to stay on the hospital premises for their 8 hour day or night stint until they are called to work, then retire to their on call room (if one is available) and again wait to be called. Unless they are actually called upon to work they do not get paid other than an on call allowance which in some hospitals amounts to less than the cost of travel and parking your car. The upshot is that their weekend is disrupted for a shift which theoretically costs them money. Such shifts are additional to their regular contracted hours which require staff to work a selection of days and nights.

I suppose this kind of arrangement is not exactly what you had in mind but it is an example how work is sometimes split for front line workers. However, practices vary so greatly I do not know whether this system is universal even though I suspect it is.

My wife has 20 years experience working as a nurse for different NHS trusts. This shift pattern isn't one she recognises. They may exist, as you say, practices may vary.

However if there are areas of the NHS that don't have this "split shift" arrangement its very hard to believe, as claimed

Mike88 wrote:
The NHS wouldn't function without split shifts.

The NHS, or at least those parts of it that organise shifts as you describe would change those arrangements. The NHS would function.

The on call arrangements I have described exist in the two hospital trusts where my son and his partner have worked. I believe that, if staff refused to work such shifts, the NHS would find it extremely difficult to function especially in evenings, nights and weekends. That is the point I was attempting to make.