12 hour nights 3 on , 3 off since last September. Before that , 10.45 hour night shifts for 12 years, 4 o 4 off but they reckoned we were being paid too much for that shift pattern across 12 months including holiday entitlement, so changed it to 5 on 3 off, with the odd 4 on 4 off thrown in to the shift pattern.

Some interesting input here, thanks

The new job is a decent pay increase even at the bottom of the scale. On top of that we get evening (after 7pm) and weekend shift allowance, time and half for bank holidays and overtime potential. My pay increases further after completion of the competency checklist with our mentors and further still if and when I can pass the exam. Thereafter it’s an increment per year.

Interesting times ahead. LL.B (Hons) - University of Derby
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I spent 12 years doing 12hr, 4 days on 4 days off, 7am/pm till 7pm/am shifts

I loved them - you could do Mon morning to Thurs on days and not be back at work till the following Tues night. Loads of time off and if i took a block of 4 days off it works out as 12 days away from work. There was a 40% uplift on pay as well.

Having said that i didn't have kids at the time so had quiet time to sleep during the day which makes a big difference - you need an understanding family who leave you alone to rest.

The downside is that we had a lot of guys having marriage/stress issues due to not being around for family stuff at the weekends and general tiredness because they tried to go through the days with no sleep at weekends. It worked out that for 5 weeks in a row your weekend was messed up in some way - if that fell in the summer it could be difficult.

I used to work 3 days, 3 nights, 6 off, twelve hour shifts. Absolutely brilliant, I worked a bit of a weekend and got a bit back on my off period or worked all, got all. i didn't on so well with 4 on and 4 off. And hated 4 on 2 off when we did it for short periods. Benefit of weekend nights was no management in and less work, but we still had to provide cover, so lots of car washing, fixing and general shenanigans which would see most people fired from a job in seconds.

I have never worked shifts but in the 70's I went through an intense period for about 6 months working on a project to get some large mainframes at 5 UK Universities through some performance trials which was worth £millions to the company. A team of about 6 of us worked day and night, whenever and wherever we could get computer time, just stopping for sleep in hotels. Extremely generous overtime rates and bonuses meant that I paid off my first mortgage. Not the sort of thing you can keep up for long. 3 x FL1 2 manual + 1 auto
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Since leaving the army in Jan 2000, I worked shifts for the next 14 years. Different patterns, 8 hour shifts, 12 hour shifts, earlys/lates/nights and days/nights.
I finished the last few years doing 4 on/4 off, 24/7, 365 days (less annual holidays)
Never really had a problem with it, until I switched to a Mon-fri in 2014 (something I always thought wasn't for me and I would hate)

It was then I realised how screwed up my body was.. my metabolism was screwed, my sleep cycle was screwed, my stress levels had been high even though the jobs weren't themselves stressful, my health was basically being destroyed by long term shift working. And I wasn't alone in that as plenty of guys I have contact with have said exactly the same

Of course not everyone was badly affected, but the vast majority were.

Shifts are fine but I would suggest only doing them for maybe 5 years maximum.

Quite agree with RogB comments - there are certainly plenty of downsides to mixed shift patterns. Although I'm not getting any younger, I personally feel that over the years I've been on such shifts I've never felt as tired, stressed out as I was on the basic hours

RogB wrote:

Since leaving the army in Jan 2000, I worked shifts for the next 14 years. Different patterns, 8 hour shifts, 12 hour shifts, earlys/lates/nights and days/nights.
I finished the last few years doing 4 on/4 off, 24/7, 365 days (less annual holidays)
Never really had a problem with it, until I switched to a Mon-fri in 2014 (something I always thought wasn't for me and I would hate)

It was then I realised how screwed up my body was.. my metabolism was screwed, my sleep cycle was screwed, my stress levels had been high even though the jobs weren't themselves stressful, my health was basically being destroyed by long term shift working. And I wasn't alone in that as plenty of guys I have contact with have said exactly the same

Of course not everyone was badly affected, but the vast majority were.

Shifts are fine but I would suggest only doing them for maybe 5 years maximum.

totally agree with rog b,
I worked shifts for the last 30 yrs , 8hour shifts various patterns ,2 of each days , afternoons , nights 48 hrs off, then management change 2days ,2afternoons 2 cover shifts , 2nights , then 12hour shifts 2 days ,2 nights 4days off, all management changes business needs no employees input , cutting employment numbers every time , glad I retired 2 years ago and still not got my body clock right , I still say the person that thinks up these shift patterns does not work them .

Can’t say it bothers me it’s the nature of the job. It’s the only way I’ve ever worked, never been privileged enough to have Mon-Fri 9-5. To be honest I prefer my days off during the week. 21MY Defender 90 S 3.0 D200

I have worked shifts for pretty much my whole working life.
Last 10 years on 12hr shifts, I loved them, so much more time off.
Now retired i still get up at 05.00 every morning (which I love)
The hardest thing I found was coming off shif for the break, was adjusting to sleeping and eating at different times of the day.
I cured the rough hangover feeling by only eating Fruit and porridge on the night shifts (easy on the Tum)

Once a few months have gone by you will be settled and love them.

Ugg Don't wait for your Ship to come in.. Swim out and meet the Bl**dy thing (Barry Sheene)

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