British people work an average of 504 unpaid hours a year

• On average, Brits spend an extra 504 hours or 21 days a year working outside their contracted hours
• Nearly half of Brits arrive at work early (49%) and leave late (48%) by more than 10 minutes each day
• Media/Marketing/PR named the industry most likely to work overtime

Millions of Brits are spending years of their life working unpaid outside of their standard working hours, new research reveals¹.

The poll, conducted by Hitachi Personal Finance, reveals exactly how much time Brits are spending working past their contracted hours and what else the nation could be doing with this time. 

Looking into the number of people who work over their contracted hours, 43% of British people are working an extra 147 days in their lifetime, by working between 10 and 30 minutes before and after their contracted hours each day. 

More than a third (39%) are going even further and working an extra 330 days in their lifetime, by staying in the office between 30 and 60 minutes before and after their contracted hours each day. Even more shockingly, more than a quarter (26%) of Brits are really going the extra mile by tallying up one year and two months worth of overtime in their lifetime, by operating an hour or more before and after their contracted hours each day. 

In total, this means that as a nation, we are putting in an extra 917 days - or two and a half years - unpaid office hours. That’s 21 days, or three weeks, extra every year!

With three in five Brits (61%)² admitting they would rather have a good work-life balance than a high salary, the prospect of a bigger wage packet is potentially not what is keeping UK workers in the office for longer, but perhaps the pressures and workload they are facing in their jobs. 

Delving into the industries that are most likely to work overtime, the top five are: 

• Media/PR/Marketing (68%)
• Emergency Services (65%)
• Finance and HR (63%)
• Sales (61%)
• Accounts and Artist/Designer/Creative (60%)

So, what else could Brits be doing with this time? Experts at Hitachi Personal Finance offer five alternative activities UK workers could be doing instead of sticking around the office: 

1. Learn a new language 

If learning a new language is of interest, research shows that it takes 480 hours to reach basic fluency³. So, in the two and a half years spent on overtime over a lifetime, you could learn 45 new languages - that’s one new language each year of your working life. 

2. Gain a new habit 

It has also been widely reported that it takes just 21 days to form a habit⁴, so in the same time you spend working overtime each year, you could be making a new habit part of a daily routine that could have a positive impact on your life, such as exercising, quitting smoking or meditation.

3. Take a trip 

For Brits who would rather have a more relaxing break from the office, why not use the time to take a family trip somewhere you’ve always wanted to go. On average, it takes 21 hours and 40 minutes to fly to Australia from London⁵, so in the 21 days Brits spend working overtime each year, they could fly down under and back nearly 12 times.

4. Run a marathon 

If you’ve ever been tempted to run a marathon, it could be very doable if you skip the extra hours in the office. The average person takes four hours and 22 minutes to run a marathon⁶, meaning you could do it 5,050 times in the two and a half years spent working overtime in our lifetime. Now that would be an achievement! 

5. Binge watch a box set 

If getting your teeth into a good boxset is more your thing and you’re a Game of Thrones fan, you could binge-watch all eight series instead of putting in the extra graft in office, it would only take three days and 16 minutes to watch from start to finish⁷. But in 21 days, you could finish the box set six and a half times. Marvel films more your thing? It would take just over two days to watch all 23 movies⁸, so in the three weeks you’d otherwise be spending working overtime in a year, you could sit down and watch the entire superhero franchise 10 times.

Commenting on the findings, Vincent Reboul, Managing Director from Hitachi Personal Finance, says: “It’s very interesting to see the sheer amount of people in Britain who are working way past their contracted hours. It’s shocking to see that the hours spent simply by arriving to work early or leaving late adds up to three weeks per year, or over two and a half years in a lifetime. 

“It’s clear that there are plenty of other things that we can do in the time we spend on overtime, such as watching the entire Game of Thrones box set six and a half times, running a marathon five thousand times or even learning one new language per year. This goes to show that although sometimes putting in the extra hours at work is necessary, our time is precious and we should aim to spend it wisely, whether that's with our loved ones, focusing on our wellbeing or maybe even learning a new skill or two.”