northwichcat
Veteran Member
It’s common in all sorts of industries to incentivise people to work overtime, work anti social hours etc. I’m not sure why people expect the railway to be any different.
However inevitably people will also want to spend time with loved ones/friends over the festive season, so there is a need for more of an incentive at this time of year - especially where the employer has chosen to keep Sundays outside the working week thus being entirely reliant on overtime to provide the service, as seems to be the case with Northern. It would be interesting to know whether the refusal to provide an incentive comes from management or the DfT.
In some industries you may get a higher than normal hourly rate for overtime e.g. 1.5 times the normal hourly wage, or you may get normal pay for a shorter shift e.g. you get paid the same for 9-4 on a Sun as you get for 9-6 on a Thurs.
However, a random figure of £100 as an additional incentive for working Christmas Eve when there may already be an incentive for volunteering to work a Sunday shift wouldn't be normal practice.
For some people money alone won't be an incentive. For example, if you have relatives visiting from abroad for just 1 week from 24-31 Dec then the employer offering £250 might not be tempting. Not having to work from 25-31 Dec in exchange for working 24 Dec might be a different matter.
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