Prison Officer Weekend Pay 2026: Is There a Premium?

In shortWeekend working for Bands 3 to 5 is covered by the flat 20% allowance inside your salary; only Band 2 overtime and Payment Plus on a rest day pay extra.

If you are a Band 3, 4 or 5 officer on Fair and Sustainable terms, your weekend working is paid for through your annual salary.

The salary includes a 20% allowance for unsocial working hours, which the HMPPS evidence to the Pay Review Body describes as paid to staff who regularly work unsocial hours as part of their rostered pattern.

HMPPS jobs adverts describe a rolling shift pattern that includes nights, evenings, weekends and bank or public holidays, and the pay page says the published salaries include the allowance. So for the standard officer, the weekend is not a separate line on a rate card.

A rostered Saturday earns the same as a rostered Tuesday, in the sense that your pay is the annual figure paid in monthly instalments. What does change pay is working beyond your roster:

• A rest day worked for a qualifying duty may attract Payment Plus.
• Band 2 OSGs have a real overtime scale with explicit weekend multipliers.

In shortBand 2 overtime is 1.33 times base on weekdays and 1.75 times at weekends and bank holidays, plus a permanent £5 an hour, non-pensionable.

• Weekday overtime1.33 x baseStandard hourly base rate
• Weekend overtime1.75 x baseMidnight Friday to midnight Sunday, or a public or bank holiday
• Permanent addition£5 an hourNon-pensionable
• Weekend rate, our estimateAbout £28.05National 37-hour base, 2026/27, with the £5

Band 2 is where the published rules are most specific. The PSPRB describes OSG overtime as 1.33 times the standard hourly base rate for weekday time and 1.75 times for weekend time, defined as midnight Friday to midnight Sunday or a public or bank holiday.

In addition there is a permanent extra £5 an hour added alongside the multiplier. It is non-pensionable, and time off in lieu is paid at single time only. The Board scheduled this overtime for review in its 2028 report.

Whether overtime is available is a local matter. The Board says OSG overtime can cover vacancies, sickness or training where the establishment has the budget. For the overall Band 2 picture, see operational support grade pay and prison officer overtime.

• The Board's own calculation of the effective multipliers on 2025 base rates is 1.72 for weekdays and 2.14 for weekends. We can reproduce that arithmetic: 1.75 times the 2025 hourly base, plus £5, divided by the base gives 2.14.
• For 2026/27 the Band 2 national 37-hour base is £25,409, which is £13.17 an hour on our convention of dividing by 52.143 weeks and 37 hours.
• Applying the same structure gives roughly £23.05 for the multiplied weekend rate and £28.05 once the £5 is added; weekdays come to about £17.52 and £22.52.

In shortPayment Plus is the nearest thing to weekend overtime for Bands 3 to 5: £23 an hour, only for qualifying duties on a non-working day or outside the scheduled shift.

• Payment Plus rate£23 an hourFrom 1 April 2026
• Six-hour Saturday bedwatch£138 grossAbout £99 net at basic rate; none pensionable

For Bands 3 to 5, the nearest thing to weekend overtime is Payment Plus. It is a flat, non-consolidated, non-pensionable payment, £23 an hour from 1 April 2026, for specific operational duties.

The PSPRB says it is paid only on a non-working day or for hours outside the scheduled shift pattern for that day, and only when the officer is undertaking a qualifying duty. Bedwatch and constant watch are paid at the same rate.

We could not find the HMPPS policy that lists every qualifying duty, so do not assume a given weekend task counts. The detailed explanation is in Payment Plus explained. The overtime and take-home calculator turns your hours into a net figure.

In short£23 is £3.94 to £4.90 above a Band 3 contracted hour but only a thin premium, or none, for Band 4 and 5 officers.

• Band 3 pay point 3, contracted hour£19.06£36,778 / 52.143 / 37; Payment Plus is £3.94 above
• Band 3 pay point 1, contracted hour£18.10Payment Plus is £4.90 above

People sometimes ask what a weekend hour 'pays' for an officer. Under the flat structure you can only say what the contracted hour is worth.

A Band 3 pay-point-3 officer's contracted hourly figure including UWH is £19.06 (annual £36,778 divided by 52.143 and 37), and a pay-point-1 officer's is £18.10. A Payment Plus hour at £23 is £3.94 and £4.90 above those respectively, and it only applies to specified duties.

• The PSPRB reports that the POA calculated the old £22 rate as roughly time and two-fifths for Band 3 at 2025 maxima, time and a third for Band 4 and time and a tenth for Band 5, so the premium above normal hourly pay is modest and can vanish at the top of Band 5.
• In 2026 the Board noted some Band 4 and 5 staff doing Payment Plus duties are paid less than their normal hourly rate, which it considered reasonable as the duties are Band 3 duties.

In shortWeekend on-call pays £25.00 per 24 hours under the Fair and Sustainable allowance; it is separate from Payment Plus and is a minor line for most officers.

• Weekends and public holidays£25.00Per 24 hours, pro rata below 24 hours
• Weekdays and privilege holidays£9.00Per period of 12 hours or more
• Outside office hours£1.04Per hour on call

Weekend duty is sometimes on-call rather than on-site. The PSPRB's Appendix G lists the Fair and Sustainable on-call (home) allowance in the table below, including £25.00 per 24 hours on weekends and public holidays (pro rata for periods under 24 hours).

The Board made no change this year, and its rolling programme puts a review of F&S on-call in the 2031 report. Specific groups have their own payments, listed below; if you are on one of those teams, your weekend pay includes those.

We did not find confirmation of how they interact with UWH, so check your terms. For the broader picture of allowances see specialist prison roles pay.

• The ORRU on-call allowance is £8,000 a year.
• Operation Tornado is £40 an hour for officers and £30 for OSGs.

In shortHow weekend rosters and leave fit together is not confirmed in the sources we read; ask HR for a roster review if weekends are affecting you.

• HMPPS annual leave25 daysRising to 30 with long service
• Statutory minimum, five-day worker28 days5.6 weeks (GOV.UK); bank holidays can count at the employer's discretion

Pay is only half of the weekend question. Your leave entitlement and rest rules matter too. HMPPS states 25 days annual leave rising to 30 with long service; the GOV.UK statutory minimum for a five-day worker is 5.6 weeks, or 28 days, and bank holidays can be counted within it at the employer's discretion.

Since 25 is lower than 28, the balance must come from public or privilege holidays or an hours-based leave entitlement, but how HMPPS structures that is not confirmed in the sources we read, so see prison officer leave and time off for what we can verify.

The guide to prison officer shift patterns covers what exists on rostering.

In shortEverything above is England and Wales; we make no claim about how Scotland, Northern Ireland or private prisons pay weekend work.

Everything above is England and Wales. Pay and allowances elsewhere are set separately.

Scotland

The Scottish Prison Service sets pay outside the PSPRB: a Residential Officer starts at £37,682 from 1 April 2026, progressing to £44,248 within three years, and SPS lists annual leave rising to 42 days after five years' service. We did not find how SPS pays weekend working in the pages we read, so we make no claim. See prison officer pay in Scotland.

Northern Ireland

A recent Custody Prison Officer advert showed £32,510 to £42,725 (marked under review) with a Supplementary Risk Allowance of £4,284 a year. Whether any weekend working is paid through that allowance or separately is not stated in the advert, and the 2026/27 NI award outcome was not found. See Northern Ireland.

Private prisons

Private-sector prison custody officers are not covered by the PSPRB. We could not verify custody-officer pay from a fetched primary advert, so we have not quoted any. See private custody officer pay.

In shortCheck contract hours, the UWH percentage, any Payment Plus, Band 2 overtime, on-call and time off in lieu against your payslip, and raise differences in writing.

A short checklist reduces the risk of underpayment or misunderstanding. If your payslip does not match what you expected, raise it with payroll promptly and in writing, copying in your POA representative where appropriate.