Working for us

Pay and conditions

For most employees, pay levels and many other conditions of service are decided nationally by the National Joint Council for Local Government Services.

Pay and conditions for craft employees are decided by local agreement.

Hours of work

The majority of posts are covered by the council's flexible working scheme, which means that employees can agree with their manager the hours of work within predetermined and agreed limits. The flexible scheme is always subject to service delivery requirements.

For further information on hours of work and whether the flexible working scheme applies, please contact the relevant directorate.

Annual leave entitlement

Depending upon length of service and grade, annual leave entitlement ranges from 24 to 32 days per annum. This is in addition to 8 public holidays. The entitlement is pro rata for part-time staff.

Other leave policies

The council operates a number of other leave policies that may allow an employee to take paid or unpaid leave. These policies include:

• Maternity Leave
• Parental Leave
• Paternity and Maternity Support Leave
• Adoption Leave
• Compassionate Leave
• Leave of Absence for Extraneous Duties

Probationary period

All new employees are required to serve a probationary period of no less than six months.

Equal opportunities in employment

Preston City Council is committed to equality of opportunity and values diversity.

We believe that everyone has the right to be treated with dignity and respect. We are committed to the elimination of unfair and unlawful discrimination in all our policies, procedures and practices.

We are committed to ensuring that the principles contained in discrimination legislation including European directives and equality standards.

We aim to have a workforce that reflects the local community allowing us to respond to the diverse needs of the community effectively and sensitively.

We seek to challenge any unlawful or unfair discrimination and aim to prevent exclusion on grounds such as age, gender including transgender, sexuality, ethnicity, disability, religion or for any other unjustifiable reason. We will take appropriate action to resolve alleged discrimination.

For more information please download our Equal opportunities policy (PDF, 69 KB).

Disability Confident employer

We are committed to improving employment opportunities and career development for disabled people, and in recognition of this, have been certified as a Level 2 Disability Confident employer.

What is a Disability Confident employer

Armed Forces Silver award

We are proud to hold the Armed Forces Silver award for those who proudly protect our nation, who do so with honour, courage, and commitment.

This means we have:

• Signed the Armed Forces Covenant
• Stated our intent to be supportive by using GOV.UK - Defence Employer Recognition Scheme (ERS) to register at the Bronze level
• Proactively demonstrated that service personnel/armed forces community are not unfairly disadvantaged as part of our recruiting and selection processes
• Actively ensured that their workforce is aware of our positive policies towards defence people issues
• Employees who attend Volunteer Reserve Forces Training Camps are granted leave of absence with pay up to a maximum of 10 working days to assist them in the commission of these duties (i.e. training courses)

Agency work

In October 2008, cabinet approval was given to enter into a corporate contract with a neutral vendor to manage the supply of agency workers to the council.

The neutral vendor selected to supply this service is Matrix SCM.

Matrix will not supply agency workers itself but will act as an interface between the council and agency suppliers so that managers will have a single point of contact for the procurement of agency workers and will no longer have to deal with agencies direct.