ask the university to make postgrad demonstrator claims easier
Anonymous submitted on
Tuesday 12th March 2019
Complete
Currently you are requrired to fill out a overwhelming spreadsheet. There are about 20 fields you need to fill in each time plus the hours you worked. Ifsave it with an exact file name or many other minor non-issues it is rejected.
The spreadsheet doesnt work well on non-Microsoft Excel programs. Meaning if someone uses LibreOffice or Linux they have to go to another computer to do it all.
How is this so complicated in 2019?
You could easily have some kind of website which does it all magically.
The current system is just complicated for everyone!
Responses
Here, you can view the complete set of official responses from the sabbatical officers regarding this submission.
Students' Union replied on
Monday 29th Apr 2019 5:39pm
Hi there,
I come back with an update! As promised, I forwarded your query to the Doctoral College and recieved the following response:
'I would like to start by saying that whilst we fully appreciate the timesheet can be quite clunky it does make us compliant with employment and UK VI legislation. We have just had a Home Office audit where we were required to supply copies of timesheets to show our Tier 4 students (many of whom are Demonstrators) were not working over their visa limitations. We also recognise there are better ways of processing timesheets and are currently investigating ways to improve the process and deliver efficiencies. There can be significant cost implications to purchasing a timesheet system and unfortunately as I’m sure you can appreciate the University is quite complicated when it comes to the various way in which people are paid, even for casual work. We are currently working with a supplier to develop an automated timesheet and we will involve key stakeholders including yourselves in the conversations to ensure we develop something that is fit for purpose.'
I hope this helps to clarify your query. If you have any further questions or want to chat through this more, please do not hesitate to drop me an email to vpcommunities@susu.org
Best wishes,
Emily Harrison,
Vice President Student Communities, 2018-19
Students' Union replied on
Friday 12th Apr 2019 4:00pm
Hi there,
Thank you for your You Make Change submission.
This does sound unnecessarily complicated! I must admit, I do not know what the exact reason for this current set up is and what the barriers to a website or interface such as you describe are. I will contact the Doctoral College and raise this issue and come back to you as soon as I have an update!
Kind regards,
Emily Harrison,
Vice President Student Communtiies, 2018-19.
Actions
Forwarded to Student Communities
Friday 15th Mar 2019 1:13pm
Comments
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