Family doctors across the country will be offered up to £650 to work for three hours on Easter Saturday in a bid to reduce strain on hospitals over the bank holiday weekend . Surgeries in Essex , the West Midlands and London are being offered cash incentives to open during the four-day break . Doctors could be paid up to £650 for just three hours work on Easter Saturday - which includes £150 an hour plus £200 for administrative costs . The incentive is being offered to ensure there is enough cover over the four day Easter holiday - in a similar way to when doctors were persuaded to work on New Year 's Day by being offered £80 an hour on top of their normal salary . Doctors are being offered up to £650 to work for three hours on Easter Saturday to ensure there is cover . GPs in Essex , the West Midlands and some London boroughs will be offered the incentive payments . The offer is only being made to those practices that are not already part of the directed enhanced service scheme - an agreement which sees GPs offered an annual payment for increasing cover at weekends . The bonus payments are being offered to cover patients with urgent care needs and will also be paid for doctors to carry out home visits , the Daily Express reported . Earlier this month GPs in the West Midlands criticised the £350 figure and said it needed to be quadrupled for them to consider working over the Easter break . However the offer has now been extended to include London and Essex , as well as in some parts of the north . A spokeswoman from NHS England , for London , confirmed GPs had been offered £650 for the extra hours work . She said the deal , along with the practices that had already signed up to directed enhanced services , meant that around 84 per cent of people would be able to access their GP over the weekend . She said : 'Across London , most boroughs are able to offer access to primary care services on Easter Saturday . GP practices that do not normally offer weekend cover under the directed enhanced services scheme will be offered the payments . 'For the small number not achieving this level of coverage , we are working with local Clinical Commissioning Groups and will be offering an additional payment called a Local Enhanced Service to cover the costs . 'While the price has yet to be finalised it is likely to be around £650 for a three hour session in line with other areas in England . 'Our estimates show that 84 percent of people in London will be able to access GP services on Easter Saturday . We are determining additional requirements in a small number of boroughs . ' The payment being offered is similar to that over New Year , when doctors were offered £80 an hour on top of their normal salary to work on New Year 's Day . In the North and East some incentives will be offered , but these areas are understood to have greater cover over weekends . A memo from Barbara Hawkin , NHS deputy chief executive , was sent to trusts and groups of GPs saying there was a need to come up with plans to ensure there was enough cover over Easter . Incentive payments have been offered to cover weekends and bank holidays following Labour 's 2004 renegotiation of their contracts . Under this agreement GPs were allowed to hand responsibility for out-of-hours care to private firms .
Doctors are to be offered cash incentives to work over the Easter holidays . Offer will be to pay up to £650 for three hours work on Easter Saturday . Surgeries in Essex , West Midlands and London will be offered payments . Officials in London said 84 per cent of patients will be able to access a GP . In the North and East some incentives will be given for extra opening hours .