Motivating Pharmacy staff

[admin]

Originally Posted by Jeff

Lloyds had no objections (seemed quite keen on the idea actually)

Jeff

Jeff

I was working at one of their stores a few weeks ago, and there was me and a young woman who had worked in a chemist for a few weeks only, on a Friday afternoon. The Saturday lad passed, and saw we were in real trouble, so he worked for two hours to help us. When I rang up head office to see if I could pay him out of the till I was told no. I ended up giving him £10 out of my own pocket for his time. Are we talking about the same company???

[admin]

Originally Posted by Zoggite

Yup, our area manager even suggested we close the shop for one morning each month, for staff training/meetings!

You are kidding right??????

[Jeff]

Originally Posted by admin

Jeff

I was working at one of their stores a few weeks ago, and there was me and a young woman who had worked in a chemist for a few weeks only, on a Friday afternoon. The Saturday lad passed, and saw we were in real trouble, so he worked for two hours to help us. When I rang up head office to see if I could pay him out of the till I was told no. I ended up giving him £10 out of my own pocket for his time. Are we talking about the same company???

It's the "pay him out of the till" bit that's the problem - you're asking head office if you can avoid tax and NI contributions - they are obliged to say no.
He should be paid overtime for the extra time worked, lots of "thank you, you were a great help" - and buy him a bottle of plonk, chocs from the till.

Jeff

[Hot topic]

I have followed your advice about finding out what motivates them which has been challenging. But I have introduced a regular team meeting before every new health promotion to try and share ideas. Tomorrow my fellow pharmacist and I are paying for them to go out to for a nice meal to "Celebrate our Sucesses" since the new Pharmacy Contract was introduced. Sometimes I wish one could just concentrate on the business of being a pharmacist though. I guess its just all part of the package.

[nadie]

what i found is that support staff often lack confidence to go out and be proactive... more training can be helpful in giving staff confidence to talk to patients and allocating staff PAID training time within store hours can be a great start... try to get them to see it as a part of their job rather than force it upon them.

[admin]

Originally Posted by Jeff

It's the "pay him out of the till" bit that's the problem - you're asking head office if you can avoid tax and NI contributions - they are obliged to say no.
He should be paid overtime for the extra time worked, lots of "thank you, you were a great help" - and buy him a bottle of plonk, chocs from the till.

Jeff

Jeff,

I started off by asking if they would pay him - he doesn't earn enough to pay tax etc. When they said no, I asked if I could take two hours out of the till as petty cash. I know some stores where the manager regularly takes more out for sticky buns as a treat for the staff!

My point is that I was in a busy pharmacy on a Friday afternoon, with one young person, and a lot of angry customers. He helped us out because he's a great young man, and could see we were in deep trouble. He didn't expect to be paid.

In my opinion there is no excuse for not paying him a couple of hours salary. It's less then £10 to them. They acted awfully in my mind, and so I paid him £10 myself.