'I work 80% of my hours for 100% pay' - what it's really like to work a four-day week

Culling meetings and being told to close down email when working on a task - these are just some of the initiatives one company has taken to be able to fit five days’ worth of work into four.

As of last week, staff at AKA Case Management are being paid 100 per cent of their salary but for 80 per cent of the hours they would usually work, going from 40 to 32 hours per week. The brain injury case management firm is one of the 70 companies that has signed up for the world's biggest pilot scheme into the working pattern over the next six months.

The trial is being organised by 4 Day Week Global in partnership with think tank Autonomy, the 4 Day Week UK Campaign, and researchers at Cambridge University, Oxford University and Boston College. AKA has employees working from home across the country, with 14-full time employees taking part in the trial, including a few living in and around Manchester.

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Staff have been divided into those who have either Friday or Monday off, allowing for a three-day weekend, but also so there is still cover for their clients across the typical five-day business week. Andrew Rose, a director at the firm, who usually works from his home office in New Mills, near Stockport, in the Peak District, instead spent his Monday in Lyme Park with his children.

“I have a little boy who is four so I spent a day with him, which I don’t usually get to do,” Andrew says. “My daughter, who is five, had an inset day at school too so we went to Lyme Park, had a walk and went to the play area.

“My partner and I were also getting the house ready for guests staying later that week, so it meant we didn’t have that