News

Relief work pros and cons

This week and last has been hugely busy on relief specifically. We are right in the middle of the season now and there are lots of chefs out working through us. We do very often get establishments phone up and say they are looking for a relief chef who can start as relief and the possibly take on the permanent role. Although this does occasionally happen we usually advise that the relief chefs just like to do relief work.

What isn’t to like? Good hourly rates of pay, accommodation at no charge, paid for every hour that you work, travel at 30 pence a mile. But what most new relief chefs don’t realise that there are some down sides. If relief chefs are happy to keep their head down and work away, we can almost guarantee work until the end of October time. However, the relief work available over the winter time is very limited and this can result in a very long winter season. The places that the relief chefs go in to are usually in desperate need of a chef and they need a chef to go in and get the job done. The staff accommodation can be sometimes a little less than desired however we ask that is clean and single so not sharing a room with anyone else.

When I first started out as a chef the idea of being a relief chef never really appealed to me as it doesn’t now. I think this is due to the inconsistency and the changeability on what you do on a day-to-day basis. But I know that for some of our relief chefs doing relief work on a regular basis is the best way to ensure they can set their own work schedule and get that elusive life -work balance that we talk about.

What is the one thing you love about being a relief chef?

Availability of Chefs 7th June 2018

Head chefs

If paying good money and in a central location such as Glasgow, Edinburgh, Stirling, Dundee, Aberdeen and Perth the availability of head chefs is good, basically, the more central and the larger local population the better availability.

What is good money for a head chef? This can vary from a small pub to a large five star or 3AA Rosette Hotel and can be anything from £14 per hour for a one-man job cooking simple food to £45,000 and upwards.

For a standard hotel job in we would suggest £28,000 to £35,000 with overtime paid pro rata over 45 to 48 hours sanctioned by management.

Bonus schemes always help and can be based on getting a gross profit margin of over say 65 to 70% and it is always advisable stressing in advance how often the bonus is paid and what the exact criteria are. Other bonuses may be based on increase in sales. Keeping wages ratio down and helping to achieve certain net profits subject to maintaining quality of food, kitchen cleanliness and staff retention.

In more rural Scotland it is harder to get and retain chefs and often accommodation should be offered to attract suitable candidates.

Sous chefs

The availability of sous chefs in rural Scotland is getting poorer as we move into the middle of the season. Sometimes, a mature former head chef will be happy to take a step back to work alongside head chef.

In more central Scotland, there are quite a few candidates about and if paying decent money and offering good working conditions there is no reason why you cannot land and keep a good sous chef with a stable track record.

In rural Scotland, there can be a need to think outside of the box to retain and attract good sous chef candidates and many establishments find it easier to take on relief chefs for the season.

Chef de parties

Availability is ok in Glasgow, Edinburgh and the central belt.

In rural Scotland with accommodation there are fewer candidates, but you will get applicants if wages are decent, suggesting £10 to £12 per hour. The more money you can pay the better the availability of chefs is.

For chef de partie jobs it is a chef market.

Commis chefs

There are usually a few candidates available centrally or further afield if offering accommodation.

Pastry Chefs: this is quite a specialist position and there are often a couple of specialised pastry chefs looking, not always though.

Enclosed link to minimum wages.

www.minimum-wage.co.uk/

Availability of Relief Chefs changes daily and we can advise daily, it is currently quite tight as you would expect for the time of year. The rates of pay are the same as last year which is £13 to £17 per hour according to the position.

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Back at it after two weeks of Scottish sun.

It has been a busy couple of days back at the office this week after my two week holiday.

I spent my time off entertaining some of my Canadian friends who had come over to visit me. I decided that it would be good to show them as much of Scotland as possible as it was their first trip here.

We started off on the island of Gigha off the Mull of Kintyre: it is a beautiful 6 mile long island and has one of our clients- The Boathouse- a few hundred yards from the ferry. The food was excellent!

The next stop was Arran, and after a very brief night we left thanks to an ignorant campsite owner!

On to Aberfeldy we went passing a few more of our clients; The Bridge of Lochay hotel, The Waterfront at Kenmore and the Three Lemons in Aberfeldy. After a couple of nights there we went onto Dundee and then to Perth for a volleyball tournament.

We ate at a Mexican restaurant in Perth with a large group of my volleyball friends from back in my uni days, it took 2 hours to get our food! But thankfully we had good enough company to not notice the wait too much!

After Perth we had another brief stop in Aberfeldy before going onto the Isle of Skye. We stayed at the campsite at the Sligachan hotel and had a great couple of days on Skye.

On the journey back to Moffat we passed a few more hotels that use us for chefs, the Drovers Inn and the Ardlui hotel on Loch Lomond side.

The weather was beautiful for the two weeks we were exploring and it definitely gave my Canadian friends a false impression of Scotland but it was great fun!

Now I’m back we are pushing on with the brewery and the chef recruitment office seems even busier than before.

Out and About Friday 1st June

We have over 70 relief chefs out working just now with 30 being booked this week so far.

All in all it has been a very but week in the Chefs In Scotland office.

As of today, any new relief bookings rates of pay for chefs will be ……… Head chef £17 per hour, Sous Chef £15 per hour and Chef de Partie £13 per hour – premium rate applies for 3 days or less also.

Tom will be back after 2 weeks annual leave and will get back to placing junior chef and Jessica will go back to senior chef recruitment.

We are still looking for available as we have so many relief jobs needing filled, if you are flexible of position and location you can be kept in work right through to the end of October and possibly longer.

Working just now

Sarah Jeffrey is at The Old Mill Inn in Pitlochry

Kevin MacAngus is at The Cairndale hotel in Dumfries

Bruce Robertson is at The Glen Nevis Restaurant

Donnie Lamont is at The Castle Moil Restaurant in skye

Thomas McLean is at The Popinjay Hotel in Carluke

New recruit David Maxwell was over in Mull at The Mishnish

Chris Robertson is at The Moorings Hotel in Fort William

New recruit Pedro Campos is at The Ballachulish hotel

Dom Kelecius is at Ardlui hotel

Ryan Willamson is at The Onich hotel

Sebastian Luszczynski is at La Garrigue in Edinburgh

Roo Edwards is going to The Oswald House in Fife

Alan Anderson is at Y not in Thurso with John Taylor

David Ironside is in Iona at Bishop’s House

Taylor McFarlane is at The Fife Arms in Turriff

Ally Brown is at Balmacara Hotel.

We have been getting lots of excellent feed back from establishments

Thanks all for your hard work and support 😊