I’m wholetime and retained (10 and 15 years respectively)
I can only speak for my brigade/station however most if not all are heading in the same direction.
A retained FF is indeed quite a commitment but as bruneep alluded to ;) it is relatively well paid (now.)
As a rule it’s personnel that are available during the day that most retained stations are after as many smaller towns have less and less industry now or employers willing to let employees away in normal office hours. It’s quite frightening how many pumps will be ‘off the run’ during the day in some areas.
There’s a bit of a transitional phase going on at the mo. The ‘old’ way is that you’ll either be 100% or 75% retained. This relates to the percentage of the retaining fee you get paid. With that you’ll have to make either 61% or 51% the total turn outs for the station and 80% of training nights. This is more often than not reviewed on a quarterly basis so have a think and decide whether you’ll be able to commit to this.
The ‘new’ system is where you’ll be salaried and have to give 120 hours availability. This is calculated by booking on/off via computer of phone and it’s likely to evolve further (as many brigades have already) to a roster system where you’ll be ‘told’ when you will give cover.
Looking at it from a business perspective it makes sense as some of our snr officers see it as poor value or as a part time job where the employees are picking and choosing when they work.
I am at a small, 1 pump retained station which gets about 200 calls per year. Between retainer, call outs and community safety work (school visits, home safety visits etc) it was worth £7.5k to me last year. So not to be sniffed at but bear in mind that there are a lot of people leaving due to the changes and the expectations that are now placed on them and it’ll only get worse if/when the roster system comes in. (some of the welsh brigades saw 40% of station personnel leave!)
As for fitness, 9.6 on the Bleep Test is the toughest part so nothing too taxing then there’s an HR/PC type interview (gone are the days where you need to know loads about the job…just as long as you don’t upset or offend anyone :roll: )
Staff turnover in the retained is higher than that of the wholetime so there are always vacancies. Give it a go if you think you can give the cover. It’s a great job and I left my well paid retail management job to go wholetime…best move I ever made. Sure, I’d be earning more but there’s more to life than that!
