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24/48 vs 48/96
Identical hours, identical platoons, completely different rhythm. The only question is whether you want your time off in two-day pieces or four-day blocks.
| 24/48 | vs | 48/96 |
|---|---|---|
| The cycle | ||
| 24 hours | Tour length | 48 hoursTwo tours back to back |
| 3 days | Cycle length | 6 days |
| 56 hours | Average week | 56 hours |
| 3 | Platoons | 3 |
| 2 days | Longest break | 4 days |
| What it costs | ||
| No | Two consecutive tours on duty | Yes |
| 2 days | Recovery before the next tour | 4 days |
| No | A busy second tour with no sleep behind it | Yes |
| Living with it | ||
| No | Four-day blocks for travel or a second job | Yes |
| Yes | Never more than a day at a time away from home | No |
| YesEvery third day | Predictable for childcare | NoTwo days gone at once |
Same hours, different arithmetic on your body
Both average about fifty-six hours a week and both use three platoons. The 24/48 works one tour then takes two days off. The 48/96 stacks two tours together and takes four.
The forty-eight hour block
This is the argument. Two consecutive twenty-four hour tours means that if the first one is busy, you start the second already short of sleep, and there is no way out until it ends.
Crews that vote for it accept that trade because of what comes after: four full days, every cycle. That is long enough to travel, take a course, or work a block of paid duty work without eating into recovery.
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Which one families prefer
It splits. Two days away at a stretch is hard on a household with young children, and 24/48 never asks for more than one. But four days off in a row is time you can actually spend at home, rather than a day spent catching up on sleep before going back.
Full detail on each pattern: 24/48 and 48/96 explained
In Canada this is a bargaining question
Everything above holds either side of the border — the cycles are the cycles. What changes here is who decides, and what the two cost.
A Canadian service does not simply adopt a rotation. The schedule sits in the collective agreement as a compressed work week article, and the Toronto Police Association and OPP agreements both carry one. In the OPP's case the terms of a compressed work week agreement are themselves subject to the grievance procedure. So moving from 24/48 to 48/96 is not a decision a new inspector makes — it is bargained, and it stays until it is bargained again.
It also does not follow that a whole service runs one of them. The Toronto Police Association agreement carries a Shift Schedules schedule in the plural, so which one you work can depend on where you are posted. The answer is in the agreement.
What the province still decides
Both of these run the same shift length, so provincial overtime rules treat them alike — but the rules themselves differ. Ontario triggers overtime after 44 hours in a week and has no daily trigger. British Columbia triggers after 8 hours in a day or 40 in a week, with double time past 12. Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador calculate it at 1.5 times the minimum wage rather than your own rate. Where the cycle does not fit a calendar week, hours can be averaged over two to four weeks by written agreement — and in a unionised service, your union makes that agreement.
Checked 7 August 2026. Provincial rules are quoted from the Employment Standards Act of the province named and, for Quebec, from the CNESST; federal provisions from the Treasury Board agreements. Employment standards are amended and collective agreements are renegotiated — check the current text before relying on a threshold or a figure.
The shift schedule you actually work
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