EBME Forums Forums Management Professional Issues Agenda For Change Review of national recruitment and retention

Just looking at the NHS Employers website to see if the new pay circular has been issued ( yes it has ) when I noticed that the website has a few problems and instead of linking to the pay and conditions (which is actually further down the page) it actually links to a review on national recruitment and retention for maintainance craft workers which states:

�The national RRP should continue to be paid for qualified maintenance craft workers because nationally agreed rates are higher in the external private sector labour market than in the NHS and without the RRP pay levels would be uncompetitive�

Later it states that RRP's should be paid to maintaince craft workers who are required to hold electrical, engineering, plumbing or mechanical qualifications.

So is anybody actually receiving RRP not just instead of pay protection but such that pay levels are competitive with the private sector? I surely doubt it!

We do not receive RRP, because our pay is equivalent to the private sector. We are by definition not craft workers and there is not a national skills shortage for our positions.

We are simply not entitled to RRP.

But can anbody answer why Reading do not get London Outer fringe allowance?

I take it your trust is one of the one's that people come in on band 6 then! Or failing that perhaps you don't know what people earn in the private sector! (recent survey suguested starting pay for someone with either a HND/BEng in Engineering was £20,000 which equates to band 5)

Just looking at the jobs on nhs jobs website and it can clearly be seen that even though under agenda for change a similar job in one trust should be on the same band in the another it just isn't happening. I've often noticed posts with similar roles advertised from anything from band 4 to 6, there was even one rare one at band 3 looking for X-ray experience! Perhaps some trusts are advertising higher bands instead of applying RRP?

It might be that technically by definition we are not craft workers but we are probably the ones who would hold the qualifications listed. Building craft workers were not included in this which counts out most estates departments, then again perhaps this statement was supposed to be intentionally woolly so no one actually qualifies!

That one's easy, Reading isn't classified as London fringe, according to the latest handbook listed above the outshirts of the fringe is Slough!

I have already stated on this website that AFC should have been dealt with at a national level.

I also believe, the bandings should be 5's for newbies and less experienced, 6 for specialist and 7's for team leaders, which is what our trust is at.

If it was agreed at a national level and all trusts got the above bandings this thread would not have been needed as you would not need RRP to make up any shortfall.

Thanks for the info. the fringe actually extends as far as Wokingham and seeing as we look after Wokingham Hospital and Broadmoor, I would say we have a good claim for fringe allowance as bothe these hospitals qualify.

The actual section on these rrp's is annex R of the AFC Terms and conditions handbook which states
"Qualified Maintenance Craftspersons and Qualified Maintenance
Technicians......who require full electrical, plumbing or mechanical crafts qualifications"
These are the only people who are eligible for a guaranteed rrp,
Qualified Medical Technical Officers and Estates Officers/Works Officers although eligible for a national rrp have no set level, so most trusts set it to £0
So, if, before AFC, you were classed as a maintenance technician, and your current JD or person spec. requires you to have a mechanical or electrical crafts qualification, then you have a good case. If you were an MTO then, in my experience, you have as much chance as the proverbial chocolate teapot no matter what qualification you hold.

Any employer will only pay rrp if they are struggling to fill posts due to the restrictions imposed on them by the posts pay structure. They currently do not struggle to fill Clin Eng posts hence no rrp.
This could however change, especially in localised areas and some employers may have to reevaluate - but hey that is an issue for HR and recruiting.

Speak for your self JohnBhoy, all I can say is that I doubt small firms lose sleep in the night worrying that the NHS is going to poach their employee's I suspect for more trusts it's more to do with financial standing, ie they won't pay rrp unless there's a drastic impact to service.

Having now worked in both the private sector and the public I can see there are different benefits to working in both, although younger employees never seem to take into account benefits like pension schemes and sickness policy so I imagine there is a big problem recruiting a younger intake.