Part-time working the most common flexible working practice
Date: Monday 28 November 2005
That’s according to 2005 annual employment trends survey published by The Confederation of British Industry. Reporting the responses of 420 private sector employers to a questionnaire that covered a range of labour market issues, the survey found that part-time working was the most common flexible working practice used by employers (85%). This was followed by flexitime (39%) job sharing (34%) and career breaks/sabbaticals (19%).
However, the CBI commented that the findings suggest it is ‘becoming harder for employers to accommodate requests to work flexibly’, after the survey found an increase in the proportion of companies reporting a ‘negative impact’ of the flexible working legislation, up 15% from 11% in 2004 to 26% in 2005. Although 90% of employee requests for flexible working were reportedly accepted by employers (55% were accepted formally, 20% informally and 15% resulted in a compromise) and 10% declined, there are significant sectoral variations, with the highest proportion of requests declined being in retailing (21%) and distribution, hotels and restaurants (19%). This year, 52% of companies reported that the legislation had had 'no impact' on their organisation, compared with 62% in 2004.
Working time
According to the survey, over one-third (36%) of employees had signed an individual opt-out from the 48-hour limit on average weekly working hours, compared with 30% in 2004. Employers with 500-4,999 employees had the largest proportion of employees who had opted out (40%). However, the proportion of employees who in practice worked an average of more than 48 hours per week was lower at 16% - compared with 20% in 2004. A substantial minority of companies (43%) believe that the potential withdrawal of the individual opt-out would have a have a significant or severe detrimental impact on their organisation, while 53% felt that this would have no impact or only a minor impact. Of those firms indicating that removal of the opt-out would have a significant or severe impact, 34% said that the primary impact would be to undermine their ability to meet customer needs.
Very few firms reported making much use of the Working Time Regulations’ exemption from the 48-hour week of workers with autonomous decision-making powers. The main reason given (59%) for this was that companies 'don’t need to make use of it’, but one-third of the respondents (32%) said they had 'never heard of this flexibility’.
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