Hospital staff and parking costs

R

Rose65

Senior Member
Location
United Kingdom
I am reading a book written by a doctor in England, who worked through the pandemic, like so many brave staff.
In the introduction he talks in general of life and challenges for NHS staff. I had no idea that in England staff pay for their daily parking.
Is that fair? I don't think it is and I hope it is put right.
 

of course its not fair. We as patients pay extraordinarily high parking charges at English hospitals... and astonishingly we subsidise Scotland and Wales so they don't pay for parking.... but even worse is the unfair parking charges for NHS hospital staff... unbelievable that some staff are paying up to £1300 per year to park at work....

..at our local hospital the average cost to staff to park is £65 per month... that's ridiculous to go to work in any occupation, but to penalise nurses and doctors who are there to save lives.. is appalling. ..and further more, nurses, ancillary staff.. and students on £40k a year or less are having to pay the same to park as Consultants on 6 figure salaries..
 
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Rose65 said:
I am reading a book written by a doctor in England, who worked through the pandemic, like so many brave staff.
In the introduction he talks in general of life and challenges for NHS staff. I had no idea that in England staff pay for their daily parking.
Is that fair? I don't think it is and I hope it is put right.
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So do you think that people who work in a hospital should park for free, while the public has to pay to park there ? If it were me, and I worked at a hospital or a Doctor's office in the UK, I would be using the bus to get to work or pedaling a bike to work. A second question. Do hospital staff in the UK PAY for their meals in the cafeteria ? Or do they eat for free at work ? JImB. In Toronto.
 

jimintoronto said:
So do you think that people who work in a hospital should park for free, while the public has to pay to park there ? If it were me, and I worked at a hospital or a Doctor's office in the UK, I would be using the bus to get to work or pedaling a bike to work. A second question. Do hospital staff in the UK PAY for their meals in the cafeteria ? Or do they eat for free at work ? JImB. In Toronto.
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presuming that there is public transport available for the staff to get to work.... or even for the patients..

It's already been said that parking costs for patients in the Uk is very high.. but I would even be willing to pay a little bit more, if it meant nursing staff at the very least and student doctors could get subsidised or free parking...
 
Our local hospital (US) has special parking areas for staff...I think they must get a very reduced rate if they pay for it. For visitors, the parking fees are high.
 
I think parking should be free for doctors, nurses and certainly all medical staff yes. It must be very hard for the lower paid ones to afford. Also, surely staff should have prioritised parking spaces. Otherwise what happens to very sick patients if the doctor cannot get in?

The last time I went to a hospital appointment it took one hour waiting to park, then a high cost per hour. For me an inconvenience but for staff a far graver matter.

I have in the past worked in town office jobs and parking was always covered by the firm or private carparks were available. I couldn't have afforded 8 to 9 hours a day, five days a week in costs. So I think of the average nurse perhaps, who must pay, it can't be easy and must create resentment.
 
birdy said:
Our local hospital (US) has special parking areas for staff...I think they must get a very reduced rate if they pay for it. For visitors, the parking fees are high.
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all our hospitals have seprate areas for staff parking where patients will receive a fine if they park there... but the staff still have to pay!
 
CallMeKate said:
When I worked at the hospital, our doctors simply paid a monthly fee for parking in their own lot... and I never heard any of them complaining about it. If I recall, it was like $220 every six months and used for grounds and parking lot maintenance. None of them ever mentioned minding it.
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well at £440 per year from a huge salry it would be peanuts to them... here the parking for nursing staff is 3 times that amount and their salaries are only around £35 k for a qualified nurse.. and a lot less for nhs staff such as cleaners, cooks etc...
 
hollydolly said:
well at £440 per year from a huge salry it would be peanuts to them... here the parking for nursing staff is 3 times that amount and their salaries are only around £35 k for a qualified nurse.. and a lot less for nhs staff such as cleaners, cooks etc...
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Yes... I don't know what our nurses paid for parking... or if they did. My response was about the doctor's parking area.
 
CallMeKate said:
Yes... I don't know what our nurses paid for parking... or if they did. My response was about the doctor's parking area.
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Our hospitals the staff parking is separate from the patients parking.. and only the top consultants in the Staff parking area get their own spaces reserved for them... so in a parking area of 1000 spaces for Staff.. Doctors nurses etc...only about 4 of those will be for the Top visiting consultants and have their name on them . I'm sure these particular consultants will have only a vague idea if any that they pay for parking.. their huge salaries will just pay that as a small annual expense.. and probably be tax deductible..
 
My daughter worked at a large hospital in the city that had no available parking, all staff and patients had to find their own parking in private lots or parking structures. In that kind of situation I can see where staff would pay there own parking cost. You can't expect the hospital to be able to cover the expense of all that private parking and you certainly can't ask the owners of the parking areas to offer free or discounted rates to hospital staff.

In my daughters case she knew the parking situation prior to being hired so was able to negotiate a larger salary to cover the monthly cost.
 
C50 said:
My daughter worked at a large hospital in the city that had no available parking, all staff and patients had to find their own parking in private lots or parking structures. In that kind of situation I can see where staff would pay there own parking cost. You can't expect the hospital to be able to cover the expense of all that private parking and you certainly can't ask the owners of the parking areas to offer free or discounted rates to hospital staff.

In my daughters case she knew the parking situation prior to being hired so was able to negotiate a larger salary to cover the monthly cost.
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yes what Rose and I are both talking about is having to pay to park in hospital grounds... bad enough for patients, but horrendous for staff
 
When working for a company with offices downtown Los Angeles, I paid for parking at a nearby lot.

Most doctor's offices and hospitals here in the suburbs have free lots, others charge for parking. When they charge I try to score free street parking, but if not, I suck it up and pay. 🤷‍♀️ Whaddyagonnado?
 
StarSong said:
When working for a company with offices downtown Los Angeles, I paid for parking at a nearby lot.

Most doctor's offices and hospitals here in the suburbs have free lots, others charge for parking. When they charge I try to score free street parking, but if not, I suck it up and pay. 🤷‍♀️ Whaddyagonnado?
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here wereer there are hospitals the powers that be know that people will search out nearby free parking.. rather than pay hospital charges..so they ensude that there are no free parking..anywhere within a mile of the hospitals...
 
hollydolly said:
yes what Rose and I are both talking about is having to pay to park in hospital grounds... bad enough for patients, but horrendous for staff
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Presumably, staff negotiate reduced rate parking or higher salaries to compensate. RN average salary in Los Angeles is $116K per year. Wouldn't hazard a guess at what doctors make, but it's more than enough to cover their parking.
 
hollydolly said:
of course its not fair. We as patients pay extraordinarily high parking charges at English hospitals... and astonishingly we subsidise Scotland and Wales so they don't pay for parking.... but even worse is the unfair parking charges for NHS hospital staff... unbelievable that some staff are paying up to £1300 per year to park at work....

..at our local hospital the average cost to staff to park is £65 per month... that's ridiculous to go to work in any occupation, but to penalise nurses and doctors who are there to save lives.. is appalling. ..and further more, nurses, ancillary staff.. and students on £40k a year or less are having to pay the same to park as Consultants on 6 figure salaries..
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Is it cheaper to take the bus or the tube?
 
NewlySenior said:
Is it cheaper to take the bus or the tube?
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Usually not.. because there is no tube stations outside of the city.... and many towns and villages have no or very sporadic bus service, and those that do have a bus service wouldn't necessarily go out of town to the next county or next town where the hospital is... some people who rely on public transport to get to a hospital , have to take 4 buses and a train.. and the same back again... most seniors can't do that nor people with babies and small children..
 
Sliverfox said:
In our tiny town, parking is free for the patients.

There are two lots that doctors & staff use,, don't know if there is a fee for them.
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even at our GP surgery ( doctors office ) there is no parking.. not even paid for parking.. there's no parking whatsoever.. so we have to pay at a car park in a supermarket on the other side of town and walk..regardless of what physical limitations we might have
 
Rose and @hollydolly I agree with you that nurses and doctors should not have to pay for parking. But unfortunately there are places where employees, no matter their line of work have to pay to park. We have parking lots and garages in our area that charge for parking and the fees are high. People who work in the business district have no choice but to pay for parking. Parking fees for visitors in our hospitals' parking garages are also very high IMO.
 
OneEyedDiva said:
Rose and @hollydolly I agree with you that nurses and doctors should not have to pay for parking. But unfortunately there are places where employees, no matter their line of work have to pay to park. We have parking lots and garages in our area that charge for parking and the fees are high. People who work in the business district have no choice but to pay for parking. Parking fees for visitors in our hospitals' parking garages are also very high IMO.
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yes we've all have to pay to park in our workplaces... we weren't there to save people lives... we didn't ever put a patient life at risk because we couldn't afford the parking fee and not turn up for work...as has happened with nurses and junior doctors
 


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