Evening Working Allowance

Evening Working Allowance

Members not in receipt of any shift allowances but contracted to work in the evenings currently receive a form of allowance for working those unsociable hours. The current situation is that members who work ad-hoc night hours in the Home Office can claim Night Duty Allowance (NDA) at 25% uplift between 8-11pm and then 33.3% between 11pm-6am.

In HMPO those working the evening shift are in receipt of an uplift of 20% between 8-10pm. But in what was UKVI, and based in Liverpool and Sheffield working the evening shift attracts an uplift of 50% on the two hours between 7-9pm.

When HMPO moved from Executive Agency status to being part of the core department, although much of pay was assimilated this allowance remained unchanged. Of course, having members work similar hours for different rates of pay raises huge questions of fairness and PCS have been seeking a resolution to this for several years.

Proposals

The department have finally concluded discussions with your union and have tabled proposals. These are that the existing NDA will be adapted to an ‘annualised’ form, meaning it will not need to be applied for and paid as part of normal salary on annualised rate. This will be applied across the board to all staff who contractually work evenings, on the below basis:

• Members in HMPO will transfer to this new annualised NDA and will receive 25% enhancement rather than the current 20%.

• Members in what was UKVI currently in receipt of the EWA at 50% will retain this, whilst remaining in post.

• Any new recruits to areas working approved evening working will receive the new annualised NDA of 25%

Backdating

The payment of additional money to HMPO staff will only be backdated to the 1 July 2023, due to being linked to funds set aside from the annual pay round. Clearly such a short period of back pay is unwelcome, especially given how many years ago PCS raised the inequalities. In fact, money was set aside from pay 22/23 to deal with the evening shift issue, however, due to the Department failing to prioritise the issue and deal with it in a timeous fashion the money was lost.

Analysis

PCS notes that the levels of NDA are broadly in line with several other departments and the existing ad-hoc arrangements in the department. However, we argued to uplift the HMPO allowance to the current UKVI allowance levels. The department decided to approach things from a position of levelling down, rather than levelling up. Although those in receipt of the current allowance are protected, new joiners will be on half the rate.

We also argued that the hours of the allowance should commence at 7pm, as they do in UKVI rather than the proposed 8pm. This would have provided an extra hour of uplift. The issue of the backdating is clearly insulting to members who have waited so long for the issue to be resolved.

Members’ Meetings

Although the final offer has been published, we are now entering a period of consultation with members before responding substantively to the department. We will be holding the following meetings for members via Teams.

• Thursday 19 October 6 - 6.30pm Click here to join the meeting

• Tuesday 24 October 6 - 6.30pm Click here to join the meeting

• Wednesday 25 October 6 - 6.30pm Click here to join the meeting

30 minutes paid official time has been granted for members to attend one of these meetings.

Please try to attend one of the meetings so that we can get your views on the proposals. Alternatively contact the authors of the briefing with any questions or comments.

James Cox (Group President), Karen Alderson (Assistant Group Secretary), Mike Jones (Group Secretary)