Should we have to use our annual leave entitlements from our employers to take part as leaders and instructors on ATC activities. As somebody who works days regular Monday to Friday, If I want to get a F600 or take over/hand back service accommodation I have to take time off work. Is this fair on me or does the ATC have a realistic expectation that I should give my annual leave to the ACO
In the past year FY14-15 I have given up 7 days annual leave to the ATC. This is normal for me if I want to attend annual camps or training etc Should our employers give us time off for ATC duty(and some do) or should the ATC organise training for staff that can be taken in our spare time?
it would be nice if employers gave time - and personally i think that adult ACO service can be as useful to personal/professional development as any other volunteer activity - but it definately falls on the ACO to make it as easy as possible.
to my mind the ACO has an untapped resource in the Wing and Regional HQâs - not a large one, but âgoing spareâ all the same - would it really be that difficult for those full time staff to spend friday afternoons picking up minibuses, doing take overs of accommodation or training areas, or any of the other 100 things that would make sqn life a bit easierâŚ?
itâll be amusing to hear the whining about having to do stuff outside office hours - personally i take the view that anyone who wants either a regular or FTRS job in the ACO should be required to âdonateâ the same out-of-hours time as the average OC, to be allocated by Wings to support Sqns. not only would it demonstrate these staffs genuine commitment - the same commitment they ask of us, and get all shirty when other stuff gets in the way - but it would probably have a remakable effect on the amount of drivel coming out of HQAC/RHQ/WHQâs if those who produced had to deal with itâŚ
The company I work for recognises âreservesâ and unusually âyouth organisationsâ for an extra weekâs (5 days) paid leave on top of our 5 weeks, I could try for 2 weeks, but that would be taking the mick. I personally think youth organisations should get the same recognition as reserves as this would remove a huge burden from people who volunteer like this and recognise the spare time commitment people make. it may even encourage others to volunteer, especially those who would like to but get a crap holiday entitlement and as a result donât feel able to âjoin inâ properly. If there was something that could be done for the self-employed as well who volunteer so they are able to claim a weekâs basic money or something to compensate them.
As for being expected to use holiday of course thatâs the ACOs expectation. Letâs face if volunteers stopped taking time off/out to do things in the Corps it would cease to exist, like every other youth group / team. However unlike some of the latter there probably arenât the quite well paid posts depending on it as there are in the ACO. Across the Corps weekends are treated as our spare time for training, which is OK unless you want to do a 600 or visit stores or anything else like that. It is also OK if you get weekends off. I know an increasing number of staff who donât get every weekend off (I know some who get 1 in 4 or less) due to work rotas and when they mitigate why the donât attend things because of this, it isnât recognised as a valid reason.
I would love to see our HQ Staffs ensuring that everything is good to go as it might just give them a proper insight to what is expected of us on top of everything else. The problem with the drivel is the drivel producers wouldnât deal with it, theyâd get someone else to as such they wouldnât experience the ar$e numbing mediocrity of it.
Yes we should.
(padding)
I take it, Incubus, that youâre a single man with no wife and family who would like to spend time on holiday with their husband\father?
Spot on, gunner. Just me to consider and I struggle to burn off my 29 days of annual paid holiday each year. I even tried to go on one of the Nav courses at Cranwell (until it was cancelled twice) just to eat up some time.
Despite all that, I do not believe that companies should be obliged to give employees extra holidays just because of their chosen hobby, however useful we may consider that hobby to be.
If companies choose to do so (unpaid I assume) then that is for them to decide and I have no issues whatsoever with proper reserves being granted additional time off. I do wonder though what all of the other employees with or without families would think of not getting extra time off to go caravanning, building model railways or whatever happens to float their boat while the CFAVs get a freebie.
Hahahahahaha. You must live on a quiet wing. Ours has half the staff that the next same sized wing has, and we are âat strengthâ. Youâr elucky to get your pay processed to HQAC within a fortnight let alone ânipping outâ to sign over a DTE which is two hours away.
easy solution - catch up with the rest of the world. three of the companies i contract for have a secure pay claim system that requires me to fill out an online form with an authorisation code provided by my contract manager. iâm paid within 2 days. no human input requiredâŚ
so what do RHQâs do then?
[quote=âincubus, post:6, topic:1925, full:trueâ]Despite all that, I do not believe that companies should be obliged to give employees extra holidays just because of their chosen hobby, however useful we may consider that hobby to be.
If companies choose to do so (unpaid I assume) then that is for them to decide and I have no issues whatsoever with proper reserves being granted additional time off. I do wonder though what all of the other employees with or without families would think of not getting extra time off to go caravanning, building model railways or whatever happens to float their boat while the CFAVs get a freebie.[/quote]
I donât think itâs just the cadet forces, I think itâs all bona fide youth organisations where there is a requirement to fulfil some training or other requirement. Itâs laughable that politicians make all sorts of noises about âbig societyâ and people volunteering, then does sod all to facilitate it. The biggest reason people donât volunteer unless they happened to be retired, is time. I canât see people complaining. I get a paid week and in my 30 years of getting it, no one has ever said lucky so and so or why canât i have it as well, because they realise itâs not all tea and buns. If it was everyone would be doing it. There are around 9/10 of us, the others are Scout/Guide leaders.
I do think Incy your tune would change if had wifey wanting two weeks away and then the kiddies wanting to go out and then fittiing in some hobby and the other needs of running a house, another week you could devote to that hobby would be invaluable. Iâve used my extra week doing âlong weekendsâ for DofE and activities during school holidays rather than a week at camp.
People have their priorities. Why should an employer make concessions?
Itâs called part of the âbenefits packageâ. Some companies have private medical insurance, some have company cars, others have company villas to rent at cheap rates, others offer travel tickets at zero/cheap rate (think BA/Virgin). Some companies offer nothing, itâs all part of the choices you make when you apply for a position at said company.
the obvious one being when its in their self-interest.
when i employ people i like employing people with significant outside interests, not least because someone like that is unlikely to be a clockwatcher who will to the absolute minimum neccesary - yes a reservist/CFAV will sometimes need to do other things, but what i get in return is someone who generally works hard, and well, at what they do.
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These sort of extra leave entitlements are generally buried deep in company policies and not mentioned unless specifically asked about. They may male a noise about reservists for no other reason than it ticks politically appeasing boxes. There are a lot of policies and get out clauses that arenât in the public domain.
Would you ask about it in an interview? Probably not, as you may not get the job. Would an interviewer tell you about it? Probably not as they invariably wonât know anything other than the headline âperksâ,
We get 5 days paid leave for Reserve Forces, recognised youth groups and a few other things, and another 5 days every 2 or 3 years to cover training courses and suchlike. In fact, Iâve not had an employer that didnât offer this. It made life so much easier and meant that I could commit to longer activities, courses, long weekends, etc without having to worry about losing money or losing leave.
As Plt_Off_Prune says, itâs part of the package. My pay is rather rubbish by comparison, and these employers clearly care a bit more about their employees, and about the contribution these activities make to society.
Incubus, when did caravanning ever contribute to society? 
I had an interesting, but fairly short, chat with my Companyâs Chief Executive in the summer at a Company-organised âReserves Dayâ to which ACO, SCC and ACF volunteers seem to have been invited as âfill upsâ. I asked him directly why the additional leave entitlement for active reservists didnât apply to cadet forcesâ personnel. Before I was âdismissed from his presenceâ, I got the message that if cadet forcesâ staff got extra leave as a right, then scouts, guides, cubs, local authority youth clubs and every other youth group adult volunteer staff would expect the same; that apparently wasnât a step that many big organisationâs were prepared to take.
How many does he think there are in the company?
I bet they only recognise reservists because they have to. Your junket sounds like no more than a look how good we are PR stunt and CFAV probably invited to bolster numbers.
Does he think that people will start to volunteer in droves because theyâll get an extra weekâs holiday that, if itâs anything like my company it has to be used for bona fide specific activities. If you took it as an extra week for a family holiday, youâd end up with a P45 in the post.
Have loads and loads of people joined the reserves just to get a bit more holiday? From what the reserves figures say, no.
We are a small company and any leave does impact a lot on the few (two) who cover for me.
I have however managed to negotiate a weeks extra leave providing it is either for a formal training course (ie Cranditz, or HML/MLT) or for a cadet âcampâ that I am in charge of. So just attending one doesnât count, that way it is only likely to crop up every couple of years only, so not too much of a burden on colleagues.
That burden bit is the one aspect that does seem to be forgotten when looking at extra leave at times.
The burden aspect is no different to anyone else taking holiday, being off sick or away on business, saying itâs a burden because people might get an extra week for a bona fide reason, is just playing into peopleâs hands to say no. Weâve had to do overtime when people have been off sick and if something crops up while they are on holiday. Goes with the territory IMO.
Not really, organisations use a formula that includes estimated sickness, leave, maternity-paternity leave etc⌠To help them decide staffing levels, if suddenly that formula has to change - and I worked in an office of a dozen or so, with four or five having outside volunteer interests like reserves, cadets, scouts etc⌠- then the staffing requirements might increase significantly.
For that office with that many staff with outside interests that would qualify for extra leave, as well as everyoneâs normal leave, it could equate to a whole other member of staff. And not on minimum wage eitherâŚ
Fair points GHE2 and angus.
I meant burden specifically upon individual colleagues not the company over and above the norm holiday/sickness as someone potentially getting extra âholidayâ every year could start to grate on them personally.
Company wise I agree it should all be factored into overall calculations but when as we donât get overtime pay, just the extra work (and I know that is a whole other social/employment debate) then I didnât want to be seen as taking the p.