Days of work reduced to 4 days a week

[diggerman]

Hi,
I work fulltime as a construction worker but with the credit crunch hitting the construction industry hard my employer has cut my days of work from 6 days to 5 days a week about 6 months ago and now with 7 days notice they are cutting the working days to 4 days a week. Are they allowed to do this ?

[cassa333]

If when they wrote to tell you of the first cut they went on to add that further reductions may have to be made then yes I think they can.

Which would you rather... cut your hours/days or be made redundant? If theformer then put up with it. If the latter then ask for redundancy.

[diggerman]

when my employer dropped the working days from 6 to 5 this was done verbally and the latest cut of 5 to 4 days was by letter.
My employer has made a lot of redundancies and they say they have to cut the days of work to stop any more redundancies.
But a lot of my fellow workers agree the company is trying to force you out so that they don't have to pay any high redundancies packages to the workers who are all long time servers that are left.

[buildersmate]

Digger, have a look at this.
http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Employment/Redunda ncyAndLeavingYourJob/DG_10026693
The long and the short of it is that your employer can't do this and not pay you unless there is something to cover it in your contract, or your industry has a general agreement - in spite of my name I don't know this - phone CAB and see what they know.
As you suspect, I reckon your employer is trying to avoid forking out redundancy payments - get folks to clear off.
(unless clauses in your contract to agree it), your contract cannot be changed without giving you your notice period of the change - so changing it at 7 days notice is a no,no - should be giving you the number of weeks that you have been employed there in full years - up to a maximum of 12 weeks notice.

[diggerman]

Hi Buildersmate,

Thanks for your help, I had a look at the webpage and its very informative and shoulod be of help.

I have not got a contract with my employer (of 22 years) and 99% of the workforce have not either so I am not sure where I stand there.

Thanks again.

[buildersmate]

Oh you have a contract alright - made up of statutory terms and conditions (which apply in the absence of anything else written down), custom and practice applied by your employer and industry-specific arrangements (of which there are some in the construction industry, though I'm not up to speed on them).
Specifically with 22 years service, you are entitled to the maximum statutory notice of a change in your T&Cs of employment - which is 12 weeks notice, so go back and point that out to your employer. Putting you on short-time working at one weeks notice is just not on.