First Aid - is this legal?

[garrison]

Should staff be paid for doing first aid training?

Normally we do it on an evening unpaid but this time we have done it in the day and had to lose 12 hours pay because of this

The questions I have are

Is it legal that we have to do it unpaid?

It says in our staff handbook that we are not paid for it but nowhere does it state that we have to lose paid hours because of it.

Our handbook also states that all of us have to be first aid trained. Out of 25 staff only 12 of us were made to do it - surely this isn't right either?

The EYFS states only 1 person needs to be first aid trained and as far as I am aware our council doesn't make it part of funding obligations for all staff to be trained

Advice please

[woodlands1997]

If you're contracted to 30 hours a week and this has put you under that then no that's not legal. If you've still done your contracted hours then maybe they can do that? We pay for people to do first aid but I know a lot of settings round here don't, we also pay for the actual course but again I know others make staff pay. I think you are within your rights to ask why not everyone has done it? Personally I do agree that everyone should be first aid trained x

[finleysmaid]

under health and safety law you should be paid for training that is essential for your job!

[sunnyday]

 

Normally we do it on an evening unpaid but this time we have done it in the day and had to lose 12 hours pay because of this

 

That doesn't feel 'right' to me - that's probably not a lot of help.........

I certainly would pay if it was completed in normal working hours - you can't be 'instructed' to take up training and then be out of pocket......

Have you queried this?

Ah crossed posts with Fm :1b

Edited June 9, 2014 by sunnyday

[zigzag]

We get paid for all our training in work hours or out of work hours. I would not expect my staff to train for nothing.

[Panders]

But it is becoming increasingly difficult to fund some of the training and so now I shall only be funding really necessary training. Our County offer no funding any longer.

[thumperrabbit]

We've had this problem a lot over the years and when I first took over as manager it was one of the first things I sorted out

 

Staff never got paid for any training and if the course was part of a normal working day they still wouldn't have been paid because cover had to be sort - this meant staff never wanted to attend any training which was understandable.

 

So we now have a blanket agreement that everyone will be paid a maximum of 4hours per training session - I know 1st aid, safeguarding etc are longer but we just can't afford to pay all day - at least now staff get a token payment, it's not ideal but it's the best we can do.

[diesel10]

We always pay for courses. Staff wouldn't do them otherwise.

[woodlands1997]

It's tricky - we do pay as are fortunate enough to have enough children at the moment to be able to afford it. The courses around here are around £120 for paediatric first aid, then when you think about paying someone to go even if they are on minimum wage that's still around £75 so £200 in total! I can fully see why some settings just can't afford it (not saying that it's right, just reality). I really don't think they can make you lose pay over it if you are having to do in your working hours though x

[SueJ]

This is an extract from www.gov.uk https://www.gov.uk/maximum-weekly-working-hours/calculating-your-working-hours

What counts as work

As well as doing the normal duties, a working week includes:

job-related training

time spent travelling for workers who have to travel as part of their job, eg travelling sales reps or 24-hour plumbers

working lunches, eg business lunches

time spent actually working abroad in some cases

paid and some unpaid overtime

time spent on call at the workplace

any other time that is treated as ‘working time’ under a contract

As you can see job related training counts as working hours and therefore should be paid. I pay my staff to attend training courses - the only exception being training that they wish to take that is not essential to the business but is for their own personal development. Paying staff to train, paying for the training courses and paying for staff cover if training is during normal business hours means that it is no longer financially possible for me to have everyone trained and therefore for things like first aid I have three staff (who work every day) trained up.

[Guest]

We used to get paid for training during the week as otherwise we would be short of money, but training at the weekend was never paid for, which is why we probably went to most training courses at the weekend... Personally I didn't mind about getting the first aid course paid for from work and then attending it in my own time as I am glad they are paying for it. I wouldn't be happy about losing money for training during working hours.

[Panders]

We've had this problem a lot over the years and when I first took over as manager it was one of the first things I sorted out

Staff never got paid for any training and if the course was part of a normal working day they still wouldn't have been paid because cover had to be sort - this meant staff never wanted to attend any training which was understandable.

So we now have a blanket agreement that everyone will be paid a maximum of 4hours per training session - I know 1st aid, safeguarding etc are longer but we just can't afford to pay all day - at least now staff get a token payment, it's not ideal but it's the best we can do.

I do similar, I pay whatever is the minimum wage amount,regardless of their normal rate of pay, at least it's something. Where we are supposed to magic this money up from to pay for courses,wages and cover is beyond me.

[sunnyday]

I do similar, I pay whatever is the minimum wage amount,regardless of their normal rate of pay, at least it's something. Where we are supposed to magic this money up from to pay for courses,wages and cover is beyond me.

Agreed Panders - I have designated person safeguarding coming up - £80.00 + I need to pay someone to cover + I'm travelling a fair distance for this too as you know, it's my business so I just have to suck it up