Formalising the right to request flexible working has only made a marginal difference to such requests being granted, according to recent research by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).

The second flexible working employee survey of 3,222 workers found that 81% of requests were either fully or partly accepted, up slightly from 77% before the right to request was introduced in 2003. It was 86% in the first survey last year.


However, the survey did find that employee awareness of the right to request flexible hours is rising, with nearly 65% of the UK’s workforce now aware of the right, compared to 41% when it was introduced.


It showed that nearly a quarter of working parents with young children have asked to work flexibly over the past two years. Overall, 14% of employees put in such a request, made up of 19% of female and 10% of male workers.


The two most requested flexible working patterns were part-time work (25%) and flexi-time (23%), with women more likely than men to seek the former, and vice versa for the latter.


One in seven (16%) had requested to work reduced hours for a limited period and 7% had requested a compressed working week. A further 16% of respondents sought a more complex working pattern that combined different working arrangements. Other types of arrangements had also been requested, including working from home on a regular basis, and job sharing.


Full acceptance of a request was more likely if it was made orally, employees had dependent children, were women (73% as against 63% for men), worked less than 40 hours a week, or their line manager was a woman.