Reducing working hours once returning after maternity leave
Is anybody requesting to reduce there working hours for once they return back to work after maternity leave, I currently work in an office and currently work 35 hours a week and am wanting to reduce to 31 hours a week as I have 2 children aged 2 and under and it will help with the whole work life balance, does this seem reasonable? Advice please :)
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I hope that they accept, I’m not asking much x
I’ve just returned to work. I was doing 40 hours a week over 5 days. I’ve gone back doing 30 hours over 4 days (it’ll be re-evaluated in January). I think employers are obligated to consider flexible return to work after maternity, and reducing by just 4 hours a week seems very reasonable!
I'm looking at doing 3x 10 hour days to work 30 hours a week so I'll only technically be dropping one day. It works out better financially to do it this way with child benefits and the cost of childcare. This way I'll only have to put lo in nursery 2 days a week as my partner will have her on the other day as he runs his own company and has a Wednesday off. I've asked for a Tuesday and Friday off in work.
I've done exactly this I use to work 39 hours over five days, 4 days at 8 hours and 1 day 7 hours. I sent a request to stop working Wednesdays and work 8 hours on a working day so I've dropped to 32hours now. Be sure to put your request in writing and the employer then has a legal obligation to respond within a time frame and if your request is refused they have to provide a valid reason why it doesn't work for the business. They can't just say no.