The place I work at has been working 8 hour days since, well, forever. The thing is, we have also been working mandatory overtime, either 5 or 8 hours on Saturdays for at least 40 of 52 weeks. Our fleet leaves Monday mornings and needs to go out. I understand this and nothing can be done about that. However, we have a weekend shift to help alleviate the overtime burden, but it is severely understaffed. They work four 10 hour days over the weekend, overlapping with the regular 8 hour shifts. Some days we have so many people working that we run out of equipment. We have about 30 employees working each of the three 8 hour shifts and only 16 working the weekend shifts. They rely on the mandatory overtime to fill the void on the weekends.

I proposed that we change the shift times from five 8 hour days to four 10 hour days and the weekend shifts work three 12 hour days. This way we could have 30 people working on each shift, seven days a week. Severely decreasing the need for mandatory overtime. The four hours of dead time could be used for the die hards that want to work overtime and/or maintenance to do PM's or repairs without holding up production.

So...what say y'all? Yes or no? Do I have a decent case or am I not seeing the big picture? Anyone that has experience in this?

I obviously can't speak to the specifics of your operation, but it seems like you are on the right track.

In the Army we call it "troops to task." Outline all the tasks to be done for the week and how long it will take, match employees up to them.

Seems like 4x10s, the weekend shifts being 12s (maybe, or maybe they do 4x10s as well, some Sun-Wed others Wed-Sat?) and perhaps some schedule alteration should fix the problem. Some workers may do Mon-Thu, others Tue-Fri, you could stagger start and end times as well.

I would suggest putting a small team together to work it out. Team should have a current M-F 8hr employee, a weekender, a supervisor, and an HR rep (who knows overtime rules etc.) and sponsored by a manager with decision-making authority. Take a half day and hash it out, all stakeholders were represented for their expertise (and buy-in to the solution).

Our PD used to work 4-10's for years. It was a very inefficient schedule. The boss only liked it because everyone worked on Teusday which was Court Day. He figured it would save on overtime but it never did. Two hours of overlap with shifts meant no lack of coverage on the road. Every other month we got weekends off. You worked one month T-F and the next S-T. It was nice for the officers but bad for management.

I so miss 8 or 10 hour shifts. Used to work 5 eight hour nights, 6 on Saturday and consistant 5 on Sunday. Now all I see in my local are logistics jobs or paper bag making and, most are 3rd shift x 12 hours. Some folks have 19 days on and 1 day off, some have 19 days on and 2 days off. Thats some horrid work weeks. I cant do it. My F'n trade has gone down the tubes for staying here.

quote:

Originally posted by Wreckless:
Our PD used to work 4-10's for years. It was a very inefficient schedule. The boss only liked it because everyone worked on Teusday which was Court Day. He figured it would save on overtime but it never did. Two hours of overlap with shifts meant no lack of coverage on the road. Every other month we got weekends off. You worked one month T-F and the next S-T. It was nice for the officers but bad for management.

Depends on man power, regular day off rotations, and shift hours.
We work have worked 4 10s on Patrol for much longer than I have worked here and it has worked great.

Three days a off is great.

I have worked in shops that were on 4 10s, and it is an awesome schedule. Three days off every week rules. We broke our tech team up so we had guys doing Mon - Thurs and Tues - Fri. So the company got 50 hours of tech coverage for 40 hours pay. We all loved it.

The question is very specific.

I work 10 hour shifts currently. I’ve worked 8s, 10s, 12s, and 24s (which sometimes turned into 36s, 48s, and even 72s). 10s are my favorite, if you don’t have duties that pull you in on days off, it’s fantastic.

That extra day off is also a day less of commuting.

12 hours is a kick in the nuts.

And 72 is like a Twilight Zone episode

A few years ago, we moved our techs to four tens with Team A Mon - Thur and Team B Tues - Fri. It was a huge increase in productivity. Employees only had to attend 4 morning meetings instead of 5, only had to load out their trucks 4 mornings, only had end of day BS 4 afternoons, etc.

quote:

Originally posted by Wreckless:
Our PD used to work 4-10's for years. It was a very inefficient schedule.

My FD HQ staff did 4 10s. THEY loved it. Folks in the field working the trucks, not so much.

You call with a problem, it's Monday, so and so is off. Call back on Tuesday, shits backed up from weekend and Monday so they can't get to it till maybe a few days.
Call someone else in another section on Thursday but they blow you off because it's their Friday, they want out of there.
So there was ONE day out of the week - Wednesday - that you could call and maybe get someone to actually do something about the problem you were having.
The problem wasn't the schedule per se, but obviously the drones (kinda sorta) working on that schedule. They learned quick how to milk it to where they didn't do squat and passed the buck down the line.
With some *dedication* to get shit done, I bet it would work fine. Without it, it just gets worse.

A year ago this coming April they switched us from 7 days on 7 days off, all 9 hour shifts to 4 on 4 off all 10 hour shifts.

It sucks! It interferes with off duty work - which is mandatory because of the low pay - and just as you start to recover and not feel tired, you are back on duty. Hate this schedule. And hate the job too! Regards 18DAI

The hard thing to sell to management is that a 4-10 work shift requires 50% more staff than a 5-8.

A 3-12/4-12 requires the same staffing as a 5-8, but is very hard on those working it. The 3, then 4, days off are great but you acn't do anything on your work days except work, eat, and sleep.

The last job I worked was experiencing huge growth making rubber shielding. We had 3 8 hour shifts but it was getting hard to maintain full staffing.

Eventually it turned into 2 12 hour shifts 5 days a week, with voluntary on weekends.

It was maybe 5 months of that until we all but had to shut down. People just couldn't maintain that work schedule.

They switched to 2 12 hour shifts. They staggered so that one week you worked mon-thur and the next week you worked fri-sun.

That was actually some of the best scheduling I ever had. Overtime and 3 day weekends. Or 36 hours and all week off.

I much prefer working 2 20 hour days, or 3 15’s if necessry. I likes my free time.

quote:

Originally posted by 9mmepiphany:
The hard thing to sell to management is that a 4-10 work shift requires 50% more staff than a 5-8.

Depends on what line of work you’re in. My example didn’t cost us any extra money.

I got to work 4 12s for 6 months one time.
3 days off (Fri Sat Sun) every week AND 8 hours of overtime pay every week.

IT. WAS. AWESOME!

In my company I set up 4-10's as standard and everybody loved it. Employees reduced their commute time by 20% and saved a lot of money for themselves. Since we ran a a 7 day schedule we rotated the shifts to be fair for everyone. From an employers standpoint overtime is the cheapest due to a lot of things like workers comp, health insurance, number of employees, etc. I never liked overtime unless it was a crisis.

On the flying side we worked 7 0n-7 off, 14 hours on duty with a max of 8 hours flying per day. Worked great unless we ran into a heavy flying schedule and then we had to massage the schedule to remain legal with the FAA rules on flight time.

One flaw I see in your proposal is how are the weekend guys going to get their 40 hours?

3 days at 12 hours is only 36 hours. No quicker way to get a man jump down your throat is to take money off his table. I don't know how physical the work is but 14 hour days may be a safety issue from physical fatigue or inattention if you're going to make them work 14 hours on Fridays and Saturdays to get their 40 hours.

Depending on how strenuous the job is. I'd rather do 4-10 hour days and have 3 days off than work 5

Hats off to you guys that do shift work. I couldn't do it.

Essentially we work 4 12s one week and 3 12s the next week.

I think you would piss off the weekend crew by taking their 4 hours. That is the equivalent of five weeks pay per year. Y'all could swap back and forth. We also switch to time and half on the short week after 36 hours.