One of my research champions in the field, Rahul, introduced me to Ajay, a senior finance professional who lives in the home county with his wife Sonali, an accountant, and their son Kapil. Both Ajay and Sonali grew up in Hindu Punjabi families in the southeast of England where their respective parents had settled upon arrival from India some five decades ago. When I first contacted him, Ajay was quite keen to participate in my study. As we spoke over the phone late one evening, after he had returned home from work, he informed me that he had consulted his wife and son and that I could come round to do the interviews one weekend. But finding a suitable time, he confessed, was the biggest obstacle. Ajay described how every hour outside paid work and school time was meticulously planned, with weekends set aside for ‘family time’, which generally included going to the cinema, taking their son to activities, eating out and having ‘fun’: each unit of leisure scheduled into the calendar. Where to find the time for face-to-face in-person interviews while making sure that much coveted ‘family time’ is not sacrificed? As he put it “Our weekdays are very busy, but weekends are busier” and continued “but we will try and find a time for you to come over”. When I requested that he keeps me informed, he responded with “Hanji”. Despite the fact that we had spoken in English throughout the call, his last word was a North Indian expression meaning ‘sure’ or ‘okay’, which he used under the assumption that as an Indian I will understand it. After trying for a few weeks, Ajay and Sonali could not take out a block of time from their weekend to meet me as that would encroach into their ‘family time’, which is extremely precious to them. Although Ajay, Sonali and Kapil did not end up participating in the interviews, my interactions with Ajay over the phone on multiple occasions illuminated key concerns around the symbolic constructions of time, leisure and family practices that resonated in profound ways across the ten middle-class British Indian families I researched. Time in these families is a quantified commodity that is finite, in high demand and therefore precious.