Catering Assistant in Wigan

Main area Catering Grade NHS AfC: Band 2 Contract Permanent Hours

• Part time
• Job share
• Flexible working

30 hours per week (Working 30 hours a week, 6 hours a day, between the hours of 7.00 am and 8.00 pm. The rota pattern will involve working 5 weekends out of 7.) Job ref 302-26-7939243E

Site Royal Albert Edward Infirmary Town Wigan Salary £25,272 per annum, pro rata Salary period Yearly Closing 09/06/2026 08:00

Job overview

The Catering Department are looking to recruit a Catering Assistant to join our Retail Team.

1 x 30 hour post, working 6 hours a day between the hours of 7.00 am and 8.00 pm. Working 5 weekend out of 7.

The successful candidate will need to provide colleague cover when required.

The rota pattern will be explained on interview.

Main duties of the job

• You will work as part of a busy team working to tight timescales.
• You will be required to undertake a wide range of duties including food preparation, cleaning and meal service duties within the kitchens, and retail outlets.
• Ensuring retail stock is well presented, with daily monitoring of product expiry dates & appropriate stock rotation, identifying products for replenishment & reporting any price/product changes.
• Assisting with simple food preparation duties as instructed & allocated by the Catering Manager, other department managers or supervisors.
• Completion of audit forms associated with food safety; financial policy & procedures will be required.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

• Work to standard operational procedures.
• Preparation of food, this could be within high-risk chilled areas, to specified recipes.
• Ensuring labelling of products is correct e.g. product name dates.
• After training could be required to produce cooked foods e.g. soups, gravy, fried, bacon etc.
• Performance of duties in accordance with approved methods, frequencies and standards, adhering to strict food safety standards.
• Meeting deadlines for production of meals as part of a team.
• May be required to take patient menu choices at ward level, offer alternatives where required.
• Required to serve meals at ward level to patients, or in retail outlets to staff & visitors, occasional delivery of buffets & functions outside the Department.
• Use of equipment, machinery and cleaning materials once trained, ability to spot defects with fabric or machinery and report to Supervisor.
• Significant cleaning duties are associated with this post including cleaning of pans, cutlery, crockery, machinery, cooking equipment and floors walls and work surfaces.
• Recording temperatures and other key audit requirements onto the appropriate monitoring forms, reporting to Supervisors where particularly temperatures may be outside required limits.
• Have high standards of personal Hygiene and follow the Departmental uniform code of practice.

Person specification

Qualifications

• No formal qualifications are required: an induction period, on the job instruction & additional training will be given on Food handling and cleaning. This will include COSHH training/ minor cooking skills and attendance at a CIEHO Food Safety level II course as a requirement.
• CIEHO Level II Food Safety Qualification.

Experience

• Previous experience not required.
• Previous Catering Experience.
• Previous Cooking Experience.

Skills

• Basic literacy and numeracy required.
• Ability to record information onto forms, ability to work as a team.
• An understanding of working to deadlines.
• Willingness to learn new skills during training.
• Previous use of cleaning machinery, Dishwashing or machinery or other Catering equipment.

Knowledge

• Understanding of how important food safety is.
• An awareness of the hospital and what activities occur.
• Knowledge of the Hospital site, or Catering Department.

Additional

• Working unsociable hours, mobility to meet requirements of the service. Provide cover for colleagues, Could be expected to work in cold rooms, hot and noisy environments.
• Flexibility to provide cover for colleagues.
• Could be expected to work in cold rooms, hot & noisy environments.
• Speak English to an appropriate standard relevant to their role.

Working for our organisation

Choose Well – Choose WWL

Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust are the proud providers of acute hospital and community services to the people of the Wigan Borough and surrounding areas. At WWL, we value our staff believing that ‘happy staff, makes for happy patients’. We have a recognised track record in staff engagement and living our values.

WWL are committed to placing the patient at the heart of everything we do, and in the provision of safe, effective care that acknowledges and ensures dignity. With this in mind we are seeking to recruit people who share our values and beliefs.

Good basic salary plus an attractive package of benefits which include:

• Excellent Pension & Life Assurance Package (over 20% employer contribution)
• Excellent annual leave entitlements 27 to 33 days per annum dependent upon service
• Paid occupational maternity, paternity, and adoption leave dependent upon service.
• Training opportunities and eLearning resources.
• Health and wellbeing support.
• Career Progression opportunities within Estates & Facilities and the NHS.
• Access to salary sacrifice schemes for items such as lease vehicles and buy a bike schemes.
• NHS Discount schemes to access hundreds of discounts and savings from everything to High Street Stores to restaurants, family holidays and more.
• Long Service Awards.

Employer certification / accreditation badges

The postholder will have access to vulnerable people in the course of their normal duties and as such this post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service to check for any previous criminal convictions.