Friday Maths

Who wants a Friday maths lesson?  

Sorry…….I can’t hear you…….stay with me on this one……….I promise I’ll be gentle.

According to the Trade Union Congress employers saved £27.4bn ($43.9bn) through the unpaid contribution of workers and are calling on all workers to take part in a “Work Your Proper Hours Day” (catchy marketing guys!) on 26 February this year.

The figures from the TUC show that the 5 million staff undertaking unpaid overtime averaged 7 hours and 12 minutes per week.

Recent surveys also show that employees like to spend time at work doing stuff that….well isn’t….work.  Such as surfing the internet, chatting with colleagues, speaking on the phone and generally goofing around (not to mention reading witty and insightful blogs – which is ok and should not be punished under any circumstance).  

The average reported time “wasted” at work was 1.7 hours a day.  By my calculations that makes 8 and a half hours a week.  And unsurprisingly 14% of people said that they wasted time at work because……..you guessed it……their hours were too long.

I’m no champion of people working extra hours.  In fact I think anyone who is asked to work significant extra hours for no money should tell their company where to get off.  But surely it is about give and take?  Surely it is about having an adult relationship here and understanding that sometimes you need to put a little more in and in return sometimes you get a little more out? 

Now I’m no maths genius but it seems to me that according to these figures it nets out that the actually the workers owe the employers 6.5 million hours.  

I’m a reasonable guy, I don’t want to fight.  So let’s stop all the moaning and just call it quits yes?  

Who’s for a pint…..the workers are buying?