Topic: Commute Times (UK)

@ralphdibny was talking about this just yesterday to my partner. I think one hour lunches should be standard. My company only does half hour lunches, and I don't feel I get the time in the day to have a true mental break. By the time I've eaten I get 10 minutes of peace and then straight back to it.

Also, people disturbing you on your lunch break. Please don't do this.

What do you think?

@NedStarksGhost one hour all the way. Its in my contract too, one hour paid lunch.

Not sure if the place im currently assigned to does half hour lunches. Nobody's told me that that's the case but someone was iffy about not being able to find me when I came back from lunch the other day.

Probably doesn't bode well that I'm already looking for other jobs 😂.

@NedStarksGhost I'm not really willing to give up that extra half hour now because in future I may want to use it for exercise or something that could actually take up to an hour. At the moment I just use it to eat, vape, sit down outside and gas with my colleague.

@ralphdibny that is awesome, unfortunately my lunchbreak is unpaid. Haha it probably made them more annoyed you were all relaxed after a sweet one hour lunch break and they were still stressed from their half hour lunch!

Yeah you should never be willing to give that up. That time in the day is so important, I feel so sorry for those who don't get a lunchbreak due to poor work culture.

@NedStarksGhost to be honest, I'm up for shifting it around or even having a shorter break every now and then but not as a regular thing.

This job has been a weird one, it's been mostly ok and everybody's been really nice except one guy who has been just saying contradictory things, backtracking and trying to lay certain blame on me but not overtly.

Ive been trying to be more involved but I think I'm just going to keep my head down from now on and try and get out of it as soon as I find a better offer.

@NedStarksGhost @ralphdibny We have flexitime at work, so can have anything from 30 mins to 2 hours. I always try to have at least 45 mins to an hour, but if I've errands to run it can go over that. They are pretty cool about it as long as you don't start racking up the hours either way.

I've been at my current place 11 years next month so must like it lol. They are a good bunch of people and itmis probably one the better working environments I've been in.

@ralphdibny @NedStarksGhost @JohnnyShoulder We are pretty much the same here in that it’s flex. We try and stick to core hours even though we work from home as then it’s easier to know when you can contact people. The odd day I will take 30 mins but usually it’s at least at hour. Gives me chance to reset and sometimes even get a run in, which is especially good in the winter when it’s the only daylight you see.

We had a partner in Italy we were working with for a while and they had a minimum of 2 hours off as it was mandatory. They’d go home and get some lunch and chill. They did complain that they missed seeing their kids in the evenings though as they were expected to make up for it so often didn’t make it home till late.

@JohnnyShoulder @render I'm not sure I really know what flexitime is. Is it like you do 7 paid hours in a day but your lunch can be as long as you want or something??

That's good tho @johnnyshoulder , sounds good! Whenever I do these office roles, I always just seem to find that there's one person who makes an otherwise positive experience into a misery. In both instances it's been somebody who thinks they are doing me a favour by giving me the work. At least this one isn't too bad yet but I am recognising aspects from a similar person at a previous role and it's making me dread what it could turn into.

Yeah that's the thing @render , I think eventually when I'm settled in to this place that I would probably want to make the most of that hour by finding a place to do a yoga tape or go for a run or something. Just a bit of exercise that I might otherwise have missed if I am doing the almost 11 hour day including travel. They do have showers here too lol so could be convenient

Nobody said anything about my lunchbreak today though so I am probably just going to assume it's ok and stop worrying about it. If somebody's got a problem then I'm sure I will hear about it

@JohnnyShoulder we also have Flexi time but it's around when you start and finish. The contract says you have the option for an hour lunch but it's heavily discouraged, and you'd have to work the extra half hour to meet your daily hours. But equally like you my company doesn't tend to question popping out for a couple hours if you've got something on, just so long as it's not all the time.

@render Christ that sounds grim in Italy. If it was optional I'd probably forgo the 2 hours if I had to work later.

I used to eat lunch at my desk, which is just the worst mistake to make because other people then just assume that you're still on the clock, and will bring their nonsense over to you regardless. It kinda suited the environment to a degree, but I never had a proper lunch break as a result. If there's anywhere you can escape to, for however long, even if it's just a walk around the block with headphones on, then do so.

@ralphdibny Sorry to hear your new position isn't off to the best of starts, buddy. Here's hoping it improves soon, or that you can find something better sooner!

@ralphdibny It can definitely make a difference doing something at the beginning or middle of the day exercise wise. If I do a long day then it’s the last thing I want to do when I’ve finished so much prefer getting it done earlier on. Then any time I spend gaming in the evening I feel like I’ve earned.

@NedStarksGhost The Italy thing is nuts. It’s like law that started so that workers out in the field got a break during the hottest part of the day but they even apply it to office jobs. There’s just no point because everyone has air con so they all felt like it was being foisted on them for no reason.

@RogerRoger I did that for a while and like you say people don’t appreciate you aren’t working. What was annoying was that on that site there really wasn’t anywhere else to go as we didn’t have a canteen, and the only other place you could go on a rainy day was your own car.

@ralphdibny Where I work it is 7 hours 12 minutes a day which works out to 37 hours a week. It is down to each manager on how strict they are with their team, but the team I work in we are left to manage it ourselves within reason. Mangers only get involved if it gets out control. If you a shorter day just have a longer one to make the time up. Just basic common sense really, but you will surprised how many people don't understand, or at least pretend they don't lol.

Like we had someone who decided to to work a bit extra each day to rack up enough extra hours to have time off work, but it doesn't work like that in our team. You can do extra work if agreed with our manager, and then that gets paid as overtime if it is during one of or busier periods.

@NedStarksGhost heavily discouraged one hour lunches sounds so lame. It's either the rule or it isn't, otherwise it must just feel like your constantly looking over your shoulder

@RogerRoger ahh that sucks. I wouldn't mind the physical act of eating lunch at my desk and working at the same time. Just as long as it wasn't my actual lunch break. I just need up to an hour to escape the building, walk around, sit down outside, just generally get a break from the building that owns me for most of my waking hours.

Cheers, yeah hopefully it's ok and it's just teething issues. I think once they sort out what my actual position is there then I should have some more agency to manage my own day instead of relying on others to give me jobs to do.

@JohnnyShoulder hmmm interesting. I actually like the sound of that kind of specificity! Can you skip lunch altogether then and just leave 47minutes earlier than an 8 hour day? I suppose you need to have at least a 20 min break every 6 hours minimum in line with Working Time Regulations

Yeah I do get what you mean. It should be clearer from the get go. I don't think I'm personally going to say something about my situation because I don't want to lose what I have/have to pack the job in before I have something else to move on to. It's a weird one because we are all on different contracts because we are all subbed through different companies. But yeah I do get it, if it's made clear then those are the rules

@render Urgh, lunch in the car. I think we've all been there at some point. It's never fun.

@ralphdibny It always amazes me when companies hire people without a defined role already in place. I mean, how did that conversation even go? "We need to hire somebody!" "To do what?" "I don't know, we'll figure that out once they're here!" "Oh okay, sure. Go nuts."

@ralphdibny Yeah you must have a minimum 30 minutes lunch break, that and the max 2 hours, and being taken between 12 and 2 are the only things they enforce that i can think of. Think that is a good thing as it helps to prevent people getting burnt out.

I try not to have my lunch at my desk for the reasons people have already stated and that it doesn't feel like I have had break unless I escape from the office. If the weather is bad there are a few breakout pods I sometimes go into, or there was a little cafe but that has not reopened since it closed for lockdown.

40 minute drive for me. I can see a lot of people here are unhappy in their place of work and I really sympathise. I used to work at Tesco Ireland and put short it was just bloody awful, Manager was a piece of BLEEP who treated all Staff like dirt and if anyone disturbed me during my break I just ignored them regardless of who it was. To me break time is my time and work can BLEEP off.

@RubyCarbuncle I've never, ever heard anyone say "I loved working retail". Can imagine it was awful. If I worked for someone like Tesco on retail I'd take the exact same stance as you.

@RogerRoger haha in jobs like this in the past, it has usually been with the best of intentions, only for certain aspects of the role to be reduced or nixed altogether. Usually by someone higher up than the person who got me in.

I did ask about it the other day and the phrase "probationary period" got mentioned speculatively and I just glazed over. They didn't give me more money to come in and be a glorified bellhop so it's completely unknown to me what's been communicated down the various levels of beuorocracy. It's not been a great start really, broken promises and office politics are things I'm not keen on. Having so little to do allows my mind to dwell on these things as well. Hopefully they can keep me busy in the coming weeks but I think I'm going to start applying for other jobs shortly. Gotta try and take my own advice that I gave to @NedStarksGhost and punch above my weight for these job applications too. I'd really rather go into something like management where I can use my brain to solve problems instead of using my body for drone work while my mind dwells on unhelpful thoughts.

@JohnnyShoulder yeah it's definitely good to have breaks. I suffer burnout real quick if I don't. The escape thing resonates so much for me. I really hate feeling like I am "owned". I prefer to think of it transactionally in that I do this amount of work in this amount of time for this amount of money.

Here's another one, last minute start time changes? How do people feel if their manager tells them to come in 2 hours early and it's last minute. This one is probably exclusive to contracting too but how do people feel waiting until the night before to find out if your going in to work the next day?

Normally I get some notice and normally I also have a choice as to whether I can take it or leave it so I don't mind. I feel a bit more obliged to take the shifts at this new role and it's making me feel differently about the top down flexibility they are exercising as I don't feel like I can reciprocate.

@ralphdibny yeah definitely go for it. Sounds like you've got it rough there, probation period being used as a threat just plain sucks.

I'm going to apply for a job that's quite different to my current position. More of a maintenance position as opposed to development and travelling. Would be a regular place of work, regular hours. Only worry is I'd have to learn a lot of new stuff. But I believe they're willing to train.

But yeah, if I can go for it you can too man. Sometimes I think we've got to just take a leap of faith to reached the promised land of a happy job!