Zooker, it's a NO vote, around 70%.
I see someone has been on the sauce again......

Zooker is hiding

Dee Mac,
"Thanks For The Information"
Worcestershire, Heinz or HP?
PS. Don't forget Hammond's 'Chop Sauce', - MONSTER!!

Also simplistcally we have a 5 watch system that has to cover a 24 hour period divided by 3 shifts, therefore on average we must work 8 hours per shift x 181 attendances per year-or am I really missing something?

Well you might allow half an hour per shift for overlaps?
Why 181? I make it 219 less leave.

Fenella
Someone must clean the office blocks (those responsible probably don't live in the city), Bart's Hospital is within the square mile, as is Sir John Cass's Foundation Primary School.

I can't believe we still include wimmin in the statistics... this is the 21st century you know, not the dark ages

Next someone will tell me that female NATS staff are included in this Pensions Ballot

It'll never catch on, I tell you.

Dan Dare

That mean wage you talked about - is it a poll of people who actually work in the square mile, or live there?

If it is merely those who live there, then that puts a whole different perspective on the figure.

That figure is for place of work for full time employees. The equivalent figure for Fareham is £31245.

FRANK COOPER!

NATS don't work out how many 'days' you work but how many hours in a year. For ATCO/ATSA its around 1400, for office type staff (including CTC filth) its around 1500.

BD

36.5 cycles a year at 6 days per cycle = 219. plus 3 days clawback = 222

less 28 days leave, less 8 public holidays = 186 days

186 x 8 hours per day = 1488 hours per year.

so you are correct BD, ATCOs work around 1400 hours per year.

So not much difference then, as I stated. Shiftworkers get lots of days off, but work almost the same amount of hours.

Thank you BD for confirming (even if you didn't meant to!) statement.

You obviously haven't worked in a professional job in private industry for a long time. The last time I did that few i was on holiday

Maybe NATS office workers do. I think anyone who worked as little in most offices would have been sacked long before the current round of redundancies

Good luck with the vote, but please do not suggest that your hours are comparable with most professional jobs on the basis of these numbers- and surely you would rather be compared with professional jobs than shelf stackers?

I have no axe to grind, I was simply stating how it works. I personally think that the 100 hours differerence is in order to account for 'sleep' days as you'd do around 10 hours work over that 2 'day' period (irrespective that you've actually probably done at least 6 hours work (midnight to 0600) on a 'sleep' day).

Hope that makes sense.

BD

Scuse me .... I get pi$$ed off with people saying that our shift pattern is 6 on and 4 off. it is not, it is 7 and 3.

I work 30 cycles per year, and out of that I do about 50 nightshifts/10 day shifts. I start a nightshift at 2200 and I rarely get out the door before 0600 the next morning. I then go home to sleep for 6-8hrs til about 1400.

How would all the blunties like it if they were in work for 6 hrs in a day and told on this forum that was viewed as a day off ? Aye right.

So I make it that I am working 181 shifts, plus 3 clawback days, plus 50 'sleep' days where i have spent 6hrs at work at NATS behest.

That makes 234 calendar attendances by my reckoning.

Not forgetting having my bodyclock ####ed around, working weekends and Christmas etc ... AND having to book my leave 11 months (Yes, 11 months in advance).

Now. back to an original question - why does NATS not take REAL life expectancies into account ? That shouldn't be too hard to work out.

The quoted expectancy is 86, and that applies for all staff. But NO ACCOUNT is made for the 1500 shift ATCOs, 1100 shift ATSAs and 400 shift engineers whose life expectancy is 5 years shorter because of the long term health implications of shiftwork.

In the last 5 years I know of 6 ATCOs and one engineer that have sadly died before retirement. 4 in mid 50s and two in their early 30s.

The way I see it, effectively you are subsidising non-shift workers, by statistically dying earlier.

Depends on your contract. I think most NATS 'day' staff are contracted for 37.5 hours a week. Which is 9-5 Mon to Fri with a half hour for lunch.

BD

ZOOKER where are you?

Please restore some sanity on this PENSION thread

They are talking about nurses, cleaners wages, and something about a square mile (nautical or statute?)
Also the office types are trying to say they work more hours than us ATC types . How dare they

Because there is a big difference between age of death data and life expectancy. The regulator will allow Actuaries to use industry life expectancy figures if they can justify them but it's hard enough coming up with a life expectancy figure for the population as a whole let alone a very small subset of the population. For actuaries there is safety in numbers, by using the same figure as every one else they are following good practice and less liable than if they branched out and used something different.

I will soon reach (in three weeks) the "Broad sunlit uplands" of retirement having spent thirty years in the "Dark abyss" of ATC shiftworking at LHR, West Drayton, and Swanwick. A few days ago I received from the CAA Pension Scheme my pension benefits that are due to me and I would say that anyone contemplating changing their pension rights VOLUNTARILY must be crazy irrespective of what is said by the Unions, Barron, or New Lairbour.
NUFF SAID!!!