Opinions Please

It depends on your contract. If you’re a casual you don’t have paid leave at all. What contract are you on? (Full time/part time ect) Have you used up any sick leave or person leave this year? I’m Aussie but worked as a manager in UK for 2 years x

Your employer is legally obliged to give you the time off and this would be paid if you are on a full time contract I believe

https://www.acas.org.uk/your-maternity-leave-pay-and-other-rights/time-off-for-pregnancy-appointments#:~:text=By%20law%2C%20you%20have%20the,full%20time%20or%20part%20time

I’ve just posted a link to acas. Legally you’re entitled to paid time off. Your employer should have a maternity policy too

@Emily I work full time but even with my last pregnancy I was not paid for antenatal appointments and with this pregnancy, I noticed my pay goes lower on months I go for antenatal appointments so I just stoped attending most of my appointments. Do you feel I should send a mail to my manager and ask directly especially seeing that from the comments , it seems to be the law to be paid on those days .

@Harriet how do you feel I best go about this without any issues and in the most polite way

@Claire checking this out now. thank you x

@Claire as per the length of appointment, I do work night shifts but with appointments going for hours sometimes , I get to spend most of the day time after work travelling down to the hospital ( I use train ) and most hours of the day just goes by . So for night staffs , are they supposed to get paid or it does not apply

Absolutely you should email your manager. If you don’t get what you need you’ll need to go to HR. Ensure your emails are question based and not accusing so you can understand the policies of your company.

@Emily or is it possible it is only applicable to day staffs and not night staffs since appointments are done during the day ? Maybe that would explain why my employer does not pay the night staffs ( I am not the only night staff who has been pregnant and had to avoid appointments so their pay do not reduce )

Sorry I'm a bit confused You work nights but the appointment is during the day. So if the appointment is not during your work hours then it shouldn't affect you ?

If the hours you are taking off aren’t during your work shift then I don’t think you’re entitled to pay if you’re then taking time off after the appointment at night. Perhaps you need to meet with your employer to discuss options. You should get a risk assessment at about 20 weeks.

What @Emma said is exactly what your company would say as well. Unless there’s some extra circumstances where you have to travel far away for the appointment and won’t be back in time for your shift it won’t apply. The appointment needs to fall in the hours of your shift. What’s the reason you’re taking a whole night shift off for a day appointment?

If you have to miss work because of antenatal appointments it should be paid

I don’t understand. If you don’t work days then this isn’t an issue? You can’t just miss your appointments, especially when you’re not even working when they’re scheduled xx

I assume the point is that you're going to the appointments when you should be sleeping? So you need to take a few hours so you can actually sleep between shifts? Perfectly reasonable, I would have thought

As other commenters have said you are only entitled to time off for appointments that fall within working hours, but you are also entitled to reasonable adjustments for your pregnancy. You don't have to wait to have a pregnancy risks assessment you can request to have one whenever it's needed. If a staff member came to me and said that their appointments were impacting their work/life balance and ability to sleep I would be looking to give them a temporary change of working pattern without a reduction of hours. I would consider this to be a reasonable adjustment.