News

Tuesday, 28 February 2017

Land and Property Information Flexible working training at Queen’s Square


Land and Property Information Flexible working training at Queen’s Square – February 2017 (PDF version)

Recently the PSA became aware of a workplace issue at LPI pertaining to your apparent direction for certain staff to work only standard hours with a one-hour lunch break

The PSA wrote to management to arrange a meeting to discuss what we saw as a denial of the ability to accrue flex time under the DFSI Flexible Working Hours Agreement 2016 (FWHA) for these staff.

The PSA’s view is that customer-facing staff have always had access to flex time, and there is no justification for that arrangement changing.

Historically, staff in customer-facing roles at LPI have always been required to carry out numerous other non-customer-related tasks either before or after counter hours.

Your PSA delegates communicated this to management, and requested it withdraws its direction to staff concerning the working of standard hours.

As a result of the meeting it was agreed staff could use their good judgment as to whether they have enough work to accumulate flexi time, up to what is reasonable on each occasion. This means staff would not need to ask their manager on each occasion for approval to work more than seven hours.

In order for members to fully understand their rights and entitlements, the PSA will be running two half-day courses on Achieving Workplace Flexibility at Queen’s Square (Rolleston Room) on Wednesday 22 March 2017.

This course will look at the benefits of workplace flexibility and what flexible work practices exist in the NSW public sector. It will examine what you can do to access and implement these flexible work practices, by providing negotiation and organising strategies.

To register for this course, please visit the following link HERE.

Registrations close at COB on Tuesday 7 March.

Special Leave for Trade Union Training is available for members to attend this course. Here is a brief list of some of your flexible working entitlements:

  • Actual working hours and patterns of work will be determined based on business and customer needs and by mutual agreement in advance between an employee and their manager.
  • The bandwidth is 7am-7pm. It can, however, be varied to 6am-10pm taking WHS implications into consideration.
  • Core time is 10am-3pm. Again, this may be varied by mutual agreement.
  • The employee/union will determine starting and finishing times by mutual agreement.
  • Management is not able to arbitrarily place an employee on standard hours unless it is fully able to demonstrate operational demands require it. This should be done in consultation with your union.
  • Whilst the standard lunch break entitlement is one hour, this may be varied by mutual agreement to a minimum of 30 minutes, and a maximum of 2.5 hours.

If your manager proposes to place you and your colleagues on standard hours without sensible reason;

  1. speak to your workplace delegate
  2. contact your union and we will meet with you on how best to resolve the matters
  3. attend the above training course to equip yourself with the skills and knowledge required to assist in achieving flexible work practices.

Your PSA delegates:

PSA Industrial Officer