I don’t know. Maybe it’s all that time I spent in management consulting. But my general attitude is if you are going to nickel and dime me about my flight, my hotel, renting a car, and my expenses, maybe it’s not really worth it for me to travel to that client.
That “higher up” stuff is bullshit anyway. The OPs boss is just worried about his own P&L. I’m sure his bosses are too busy to give a fuck about approving individual travel expenses.
Unless they are cutting back by increasing the approval level. In this case the expenses will be higher because of the extra hotel day.
Back when staying over a Saturday night saved you money, my company made doing that optional. agreeing to pay for hotel and meals if it would save money and understanding that Saturday was on ones own. But he’s not even staying over a Saturday, not that it saves money any more.
Good luck finding decent bourbon on Bourbon Street. Big Ass Beers, “Hand Grenades,” and slushees made with 190-proof grain alcohol on the other hand…
I’m surprised at how many people haven’t travelled on their own time. I travel for work maybe once a year, but almost always at least some of the travel outside work hours. Leaving Sunday for a Monday meeting. Leaving Monday evening for a Tuesday meeting. Leaving the meeting Thursday afternoon and arriving home Thursday at 10PM.
My SO used to travel every other weekish, and probably 75% of his travel time was outside of business hours.
Honestly, I usually prefer it that way. I’d rather leave a meeting at the end of Thursday and get home late that night, rather than staying over another night and travelling on Friday.
Yeah, that’s bullshit. If it takes you a day to get to your destination, and a day to get back, those two days of missed work are part of the cost to the company of sending you on the trip. It’s not like you’re choosing to fly to the UK for the hell of it.
Where I work we actually factor travel time into deciding which developers we work with. A developer in San Francisco is more likely to get signed than one in Montreal, just because we know that flying back and forth to Montreal on a regular basis is going to cost us a lot more time and money.
I do this pretty often, but never really thought about it as my ‘personal’ time. If a conference begins at 8am Monday and my company is paying for the conference, hotel, meals and conference fees I don’t think it’s unreasonable for me to fly out the night before on ‘my time’. Of course, I’m Canadian and mid-career, so I get almost 6 weeks vacation. It’s hard to begrudge a few evenings here or there.
That’s crazy. I always traveled on company time and company time during the week, and then when I started scheduling other people’s travel time, it was the same. Is there anything in a company manual, Winston?
Are you on wages or salary?
Bloody Marys. Don’t forget Bloody Marys.
If the trip dictates it, that’s reasonable. For example, I’m traveling to San Francisco on business this Friday and since things will probably run late, I’m flying home Saturday morning. I have to be there on Friday because a lot of people all all converging and that’s the only time that worked.
But that’s very different than ordering an employee to use a day off as a travel day.
It’s like the difference between coming in on a Saturday because there’s an emergency and coming in on a Saturday just because they want an extra day’s work out of you.
I went to Shanghai a couple weeks ago and travelled Saturday & Sunday to get there supposedly I will get 1 “comp day” but I’m starting to wonder
So, I guess it’s not unprecedented but that was on my terms and I wanted to be a me to start Monday morning and get everything done that I’d gone there for. I did, and came home on Friday.
I might go in there tomorrow and tell my boss I won’t do it. And see what happens. I think there is at least a remote possibility it will cost me my job. I have always worked nights and weekends as necessary to get the job done, but when they start saying I have to, it makes me not want to
Also, operationally, there is no need for me to be there specifically any day. I can do my work any night
Are you salaried or hourly? If you’re hourly and not getting paid for travel time, this could cost your company a lot.
My employer offers comp days if you travel on a weekend or overnight.
Same here. Most of my business travel took place on my own time, as did my ex-wife’s. Neither days in lieu nor extra pay were given. Nor were they expected–travel on one’s own time was simply a part of the job; if you didn’t like having to travel on your own time, you were free to find another job that didn’t involve travel.
Different strokes for different folks, I guess.
I’m currently on a trip where I caught a 6am flight so that I could be in a 9am meeting, this morning. And will catch a 9:45pm on the return leg so I can be in the office for the entire workday. It’s part of the deal when you are at my level (middle management at a Global 100 company.
When i travel to Europe, I usually take the Sunday red eye from the east coast, returning on Thursday, and take Friday off to recover. Usually end up doing email and conf calls anyway.
Was the same way at the last two companies I was at. Travel during the workday was definitely discouraged.
Salaried. If I was an hourly employee I don’t even think this would be an issue, as it would be totally illegal. Unfortunately, as a salaried employee this is totally legal.
I fly nights and weekends all the time. I even had to fly out on MLK Day this year. Comp days? Forget it.
Travel is always booked thought HR for our room and flight, we do not have to pay out of pocket for that. If we need a rental car that is paid for through the office as well. If we have to drive anywhere in our personal car we are reimbursed after the trip for gas and food purchased during travel time, to , from, and during our business meetings. To ask an employee to pay to travel for WORK is insane, and I suspect against labor laws.
this may be a good place to startto see if they are violating and Federal Labor Laws