Buy Down Procedure

[suzanne301]

Hi, Can anybody advise me on the buy down procedure? I have been full time with Royal Mail for 14 years and want to reduce my hours to a 30 hr contract after christmas. I have already attempted to do this once this year by asking the manager, who is no longer at our office anymore. After a few weeks he told me I had been rejected. It was all a bit vague and the union rep isn't much better.

[coxie]

They will probably let you reduce hours but buying you down is rare these days.

[britwrit]

It's done under the Managing The Surplus Framework (the MTSF, which is on this site.) Basically, it's a complicated dance under which the management and the union agree that there's a surplus of hours in an office, then decide what to do about it. One of these options is buying out the hours of those interested.

It is rare because they have to compensate you for these hours, based on your age and how long you've been with the business. There's a chart - also somewhere on this site - which shows you exactly how many weeks you'd be paid. If we're talking about eight hours or so, for someone who's been working for over a decade, it would be, I don't know, three or four thousand?

It would be a lot, in any case, and that's why your manager might be more interested in you voluntarily reducing your hours.

[Nondescript]

Would it really be wroth your while buying down to 30 hours? You'd probably still be working five days and doing the most tiring part of the job - the delivery. Just my tupepnce worth

[arnold cheshire]

You have to pay tax on buy downs now so there not has appealing now anyway

[IcanthelpthewayIam]

Are buy downs being offered in your do? And has the union agreed to a reduction of hours in your do?

[suzanne301]

Cheers guys for the info. We are on 6 day week and the hybrid split shift is a nightmare. The pressure is immense as I am sure it is for a lot of other offices. I want to keep the job as my bread and butter and an opportunity has come up to go back to night school. It's kind of now or never for me at this stage :) They haven't offered buy downs, I just wanted to put the feelers out for some info as the job isn't going to get any easier as I get older :)

[The Backbone]

Royal mail pay half the tax and Ni on buy downs.

[Theghost]

Buy down for a lie down.
I did this from 40 hours to 30,Got £3,300.
You are not allowed to go back to full time hours for 2 years,If you do then you have to pay a percentage of the money back.
I was at 30 hours for 3 months,Then circumstances changed (Baby on way ) Did 10 hours overtime every week and after the 2 years I was made back up to full time.
A few in my office moaned,But the way I see it was I took the risk dropping to 30 and it was just pure luck things changed and I got a 40 hour contract back,If I didn't get the hours back I wouldn't have been moaning,It was my decision,Just make sure its 100% what you want and can afford to do so.

[Bahia Feliz]

Cheers guys for the info. We are on 6 day week and the hybrid split shift is a nightmare.

What is this hybrid split shift? Is it delivery am,home for a few hours then a collection pm? And why is it a 6 day week?