Running the centre
Night shift
The night shift is the stretch of time when a residence is covered by fewer people, usually from ten at night until the next morning. In a student residence it covers the door, emergencies and whatever cannot wait, and in Spain work in that period has its own rules under the Workers' Statute.
Also known asnight duty · nights · overnight shift · night cover
What the law says
Spain's Workers' Statute defines night work as work done between ten at night and six in the morning, and a night worker as someone who normally spends at least three hours of their daily working time in that period. Their working day cannot exceed eight hours a day on average over a fifteen-day reference period, they cannot work overtime, and night work has a specific rate of pay set by the collective agreement, unless the salary was already agreed on the basis that the job is night work or it is compensated with time off (Article 36(1) and (2)).
In practice, a residence's night shift is one person on reception or at the porters' lodge, a security guard, or nobody in the building and an on-call phone. Which of the three works depends on what comes in at night: a flood needs someone within ten minutes; a blown light bulb needs nobody until morning. Writing that split down is what stops people being woken for what can wait and stops what cannot wait from going unanswered. The split by time slot comes from the org chart and the shift.
Worth knowing
What people take for granted: that nothing happens at night. Less happens, but what does happen is the serious stuff, and it arrives with fewer people to deal with it. The morning handover has to pick up what came in during the small hours; otherwise the three o'clock fault starts its clock at nine. How Bedel routes it: escalation to people.
Sources
Related terms
- 24-hour receptionA 24-hour reception is a residence service that has someone looking after the entrance and the phone at any hour, including nights and public holidays. In a student residence it is where forgotten keys, parcels, night-time faults and emergencies all end up.
- On-call dutyOn-call duty is the period when a member of staff, not necessarily in the building, must be able to deal with anything urgent: answer the phone, make a decision or come in. In a student residence it usually rotates between management, maintenance or tutors, especially at night and at weekends.