Question:

I am wondering if we have an average throughout the industry with an allowance for engineers who work away from home.
Do you pay for hotels and an allowance or give your engineers a certain amount and it’s up to the engineer to book their own hotels etc etc. or any other methods and agreements?
We are trying to find a happy medium, especially with rising costs.
Thank you.

Replies:

1. We don’t often have engineers stay away but when we do they get a £30 allowance and we book and pay the accommodation on a B&B basis. If there are 2 of them will ask them to share a room, if they don’t want to share, they can pay the additional cost on having a room each. The costs are added on to the job.
2. We book the employees hotel and give them £25 per day for an evening meal.
3. I would book the hotels for our engineers. They would also receive a food allowance and additional pay at a fixed rate if they have to stay overnight.
4. We have gone through various overnight methods. The Revenue do not take kindly to an allowance. It’s okay for Civil Servants but not for industry!
   I do not believe in expecting staff to stay anywhere I would not be prepared to stay in. We pre-book & pre-pay as much as possible eg DBB if possible. When we gave a value towards dinner, they would get fish & chips & drink the rest so that was changed to a guideline for Lunch £10, Dinner £20, Coffees & a couple of pints £20 all with receipts & justification for any excess. We don’t want it to cost them anything for reasonable living & appreciate the London area may be more.
   They get a minimum 12-hour day guaranteed for an overnight ie 8 hrs standard time & 4 hours @ time & a half whether it’s worked or not. Probably a 10-hour day would be worked without travelling.
   All travelling over an 8-hr day is at a maximum of time & a half with no double time after 4 hours as is normal.
5. We provide a £25.00 allowance for food and drinks and the engineer is issued a premier card for accommodation. The rates for stay change depending on the areas of the UK. The card method is preferred by the engineers as they know the standard of hotel and they can always book a room at the hotel near to where the job is.