Accounting for Overtime

Survey reveals the high level of unpaid overtime within the accountancy industry and explains why this may be an indication of a strong sector.

Over two thirds of qualified accountants work on average more than 6 unpaid hours per week overtime; in effect almost 50 unpaid days per year. This is the shocking result from an online survey conducted by finance recruitment specialist Andrew Farr Associates.

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According to the survey, only 7.5% of accountants actually work their contracted hours. A further 10% of accountants work 2-4 hours extra per week and 15% work an extra 4-6 hours per week. For the vast majority of qualified finance workers they are reaching and often exceeding the maximum weekly working limit under the European Working Time Directive.

It is somewhat inevitable that there will be an element of unpaid overtime. A large proportion of those surveyed were in senior management positions which paid well, and thus overtime is to be expected. However the headline figure may not necessarily indicate bad news for accountants. Andy Farr is the managing director of Andrew Farr Associates and notes that this could well be an indication of some positive examples of good working practices ìwhilst a majority of accountants appear to be working many more hours than they are contracted to do, we are seeing that this is often in tandem with the employer providing the employee with flexible working arrangements and freedom in how they work.î The employee often doesnít realise the hours worked or predominately is much happier with their work life balance so that they give back to their employer via overtime. In effect ìboth employee and employer are gaining from this arrangement and provided the employer is not encouraging the employee to consistently work more than their contracted hours, the majority of the accountants who work this way do not complain and it is benefiting diversity within the sectorî explains Farr.

However there does appear to be a trend fuelling these figures ñ out of office time saving connection devices. The Blackberry, mobiles and laptops with wi-fi connections all mean that the propensity for accountants to excessively ëdip into workí is constant and increasing.

Farr concedes that there will be some employers who demand overtime however this is less common as the standards within the industry have been driven up. Farr also comments that ìworking conditions and hours are one of the primary reasons as to why people choose to start looking for alternative careers, it is therefore an important retention strategy to ensure that those employees in strategic and important positions, such as accountants, are not undervalued and taken advantage of by making them feel obliged to work longer hours. This is also important where diversity strategies are paramountî

Far from painting a negative picture of the accountancy industry, scratching the surface reveals a profession who are loyal to their employers and extremely dedicated to the sector, along with working practices and procedures that are at the forefront of any human capital management programme.