A group of room attendants worked cleaning hotel rooms. The volume of work prevented them taking their full contractual rest break and they worked significant amounts of unpaid overtime. A collective agreement said that overtime was “voluntary” but that “employees may be required to work overtime at short notice and cooperation in this matter is necessary”.

There was no evidence of the employees being asked to work overtime, and no detailed evidence of when, how often and for how long they worked extra hours to complete their tasks. The EAT dismissed the claim. The EAT said that the fact that the employees had no practical choice but to work extra hours in order to keep their jobs did not make the overtime compulsory, or “required” by the employer. There was no contractual obligation to work the overtime and so no right to be paid for it.

Blair v Hotel Solutions London Limited UKEAT/0412/11/DM

www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKEAT/2012/0412_11_1701.html