Supermarket Asda is to trial a four-day working week, it has been reported.

It was revealed that a new working arrangement at the stores would conclude at the end of this month. 

This included shorter shifts, flexible working arrangements as well as a four-day week, says the Sunday Telegraph.

The experiment follows similar trials at a range of companies across the UK who reduced their working hours by 20 per cent for six months, and saw a 'significant reduction in stress and illness'.

An Asda spokesman told the Telegraph: “Since September 2023, we have been trialling a variety of flexible working patterns for managers in 20 stores, including a four-day working week for the same pay and benefits.

“There has been no reduction in the number of hours that hourly-paid colleagues are contracted to work as a result of this trial.

“While we are still evaluating the results, the feedback from participating colleagues has been very positive.”

It follows a week when the co-owners of Asda also insisted the grocery chain did not intend to make a bigger profit on fuel prices, after an investigation last year found it had bumped up fuel margins during the cost-of-living crisis.

Bosses also doubled down on assertions that there are no gaps in the company’s finances, although admitted there could be confusion over how the business is structured.

TDR Capital, the private equity group which co-owns Asda with billionaire brothers Mohsin and Zuber Issa, was probed by MPs during a Business and Trade Committee session in Parliament.

Conservative MP Jonathan Gullis said Asda was found by the UK competition watchdog to be “one of the leaders in bumping up the price” of fuel, leading competitors to do the same and meaning people were being “ripped off at the pump”.

Gary Lindsay, the managing director of TDR, said: “There wasn’t a particular strategy to bump the price of fuel or to make a larger profit on fuel.”

He also shrugged off the “notion that we were moving profit around between fuel and food”, insisting: “We are incredibly competitive when it comes to price across the business.”

The remarks were in relation to a probe by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) which last year found that Asda’s fuel margin target was more than three times their 2019 level by 2023, after it looked into concerns over profiteering on fuel.

Asda also deliberately passed on reductions to retail prices more slowly in areas where they had no competition, it found.

Asda last year said it had started displaying live fuel prices online, following pressure from the watchdog and the Government.