In an industry where any unexpected downtime in production can increase costs and reduce productivity, it is not unsurprising that the key reason that manufacturers need employees on standby/call-out, is to respond to machinery and equipment breakdowns. However alarm call outs are also cited by over half of companies.
Most employees are paid an allowance to be on standby or when they are called out, to compensate them for any inconvenience caused and/or the additional time spent working. However the majority of companies do not pay other costs for things such as travel.
The statistics for this new benchmark report come from EEF’s 2017 Standby & Call-Out survey and are based on responses from 147 manufacturers across England, Wales and Scotland.
Some key trends in the results
For employees on call-out only:
- Maintenance employees are the group that are most likely to be called-out
- The vast majority of companies provide payment for call-outs
- The most popular payment method is to pay for a minimum number of hours of work for the call-out
For employees on standby and call-out:
- The type of employees who are most often asked to be on standby and call-out are engineering employees
- Nearly two-thirds of manufacturers pay a fixed allowance to employees on standby
- Only 10% of companies say that the employees they have on standby are not subject to any restrictions, most impose at least two or three restrictions, the most common of which is being contactable by phone
- 79% of companies provide variable payments for call-outs and paying employees for the hours worked is the most popular approach
Find out more
Click here to find out how to access the report or email at: [email protected]