The Pitman schedule is the best-known version of the 2-2-3: four crews on 12-hour shifts, each working two on, two off, three on, two off, two on, three off across a fortnight, with the day crews and the night crews swapping every two weeks so that nobody is permanently on nights. It is common in plants and hospitals and it is the rotation many police departments, sheriff's offices and dispatch centers adopted when they moved from eight-hour to 12-hour shifts, because it gives every officer a three-day weekend every other week. This page sets out the Pitman schedule day by day, what it does to hours and overtime, and the differences in the pitman schedule police agencies run.
The Pitman, day by day
Two crews are on days and two on nights. In the first week, Crew A works Monday and Tuesday days, Crew B the same nights; Crews C and D take Wednesday and Thursday; A and B are back Friday to Sunday. In the second week the two pairs swap positions: C and D work Monday and Tuesday, A and B Wednesday and Thursday, C and D the weekend. After the fortnight, the day crews go to nights and the night crews to days, which is the Pitman's defining feature. Each crew works seven 12-hour shifts a fortnight, 84 hours, an average of 42 a week, and has every other weekend entirely free.
Hours, overtime, and where the workweek starts
Under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act overtime is owed on hours over forty in each workweek, and the Pitman alternates a 36-hour week and a 48-hour week, so eight hours of overtime accrue every other week however the pay period is arranged. Some employers set a workweek that splits the three-day working weekend across two weeks to change that shape; others pay the eight hours and build it into the wage. The rotating schedule generator on this site returns the average and the hours over forty from the pattern's seven days on in fourteen, which is the arithmetic every version of the Pitman shares.
The police version
Police and fire agencies have a federal exemption most workplaces do not: under section 207(k) of the Fair Labor Standards Act a public agency may set a work period of up to 28 days for law enforcement and fire protection employees and pay overtime on hours over a threshold for that period rather than over forty a week. That is why a police Pitman is usually run on a 28-day period, where the four fortnights of 84 hours land inside the threshold and the overtime bill is smaller than a plant's on the same shifts. Agencies also commonly fix the crews to days or nights for longer blocks, because a rotating shift and a court schedule do not mix, and add a training day into the days off. The layout is the same Pitman; the pay rules and the rotation block are what differ.
Questions people ask about pitman schedule
How is the Pitman different from a plain 2-2-3?
It is a 2-2-3 in which the day and night crews swap every two weeks. A 2-2-3 with fixed day and night crews has the same shape without the swap; the names are often used interchangeably.
How many hours a week is the Pitman schedule?
An average of 42, alternating 36-hour and 48-hour weeks on 12-hour shifts. Over a year it is a little under 2,200 hours.
Why do police departments use the Pitman?
Twelve-hour shifts cut the number of shift changes, the pattern gives every officer a three-day weekend every other week, and the federal law enforcement exemption lets an agency count overtime over a 28-day period rather than week by week.