Good God, I hate my employer

The BBQ Pit
81

Oh, hai. Here I am at work.

I wasn’t forced to work today, but would have had to use an Earned Time day if I hadn’t come in. I work in a heavily unionized environment, although I am not in the union. Most of the union positions are ones that are required 24/7 so there will always be people scheduled on Thanksgiving itself, let alone the following day. The collective bargaining dictates that non-union positions cannot have different holiday/earned time schedules than the union ones, so even though I’m not essential to patient care areas (Quick! Everyone to 6West! There’s an Organizational Development and Training Emergency!!), I can’t have a freebie day.

Seems silly to me, but I suppose were I in the union, it would seem unfair if non-union folks got better perks. (Although, the union has negotiated better perks for union members, such as lower contributions to health insurance…but that’s a different thread entirely.)

82

We had blizzard in February. 14 inches of snow. Office was closed but we still had to use a vacation day or take it unpaid. Not even an act of god will stop their insanity and cheapness/evilness. I honestly don’t care about working the 23rd. It was just another example of their lack of feelings towards their employees. If they offered it unpaid. I probably wouldn’t take it but other people in the office would. Just when I think they can’t go lower they find another sub basement.

83

I can’t understand this hostility. With the office closed because of a blizzard, how much business was your employer conducting? He wasn’t getting paid so why should you?

I’ve worked for companies that have handled that either way. Pay or no pay. But why would you think that is evil for a company not to pay their employees for not working? Snowstorm so you stay at home with full pay?

84

One reason is that we are all on salary except for the admin assistants

85

“Salary” means different things at different jobs. Since you use vacation and sick days, then the company you work for uses a modified form of salary and doesn’t just pay you a straight rate for your overall services.

I’m not unsympathetic. I just believe that your grievances against your employer regarding days off are against a policy that is not at all uncommon in the U.S. private sector. If you got another job, you might have a better paid time off system. But then something else about the job is worse. Grass is always greener, etc.

Or you could get a government job where you get plenty of time off. Then the pay scale is smaller. Sure, posters here can chime in about how their sister works for the government, gets 45 days off per year, and makes twice what she would in the private sector. Those people are called “lucky.” Very few of those jobs exist.

If you look at the totality of situations in the workforce, you are not doing that poorly.

86

I know the grass is always greener but my original Op and my subsequent ones just wonder out loud if this is really the best way to run a company or the best way to treat your employees. I just don’t get of all the possible ways to run the railroad why these folks always fall on the dickishness side of the line. I keep on making the statement that happy employees are better than unhappy ones. I’ve told a couple stories here but there are a dozen more. Why can’t the employer just once fall on the side of decency?

87

Hey - here’s an idea! Why don’t put the time, effort and money into opening a business, and then you can get a different perspective on what exactly that side entails.

I have no idea why you would think you should get the 23rd off, paid. Except that it would be “nice”

You know what would make employees happy? A unicorn. Should we mandate that as well as 75 days off, paid, a year?

88

I figured we’d get the 23rd off because the past few years we got day off for Xmas eve and day. this year because both are on the weekend we only get one day off. As far as I’m concerned they took away a holiday we historically had off. And for what reason and benefit? Because they can and they run the zoo. It’s just another not nice thing in a long history of not nice things

89

So if salaried employees work overtime, should they get paid extra? Or does this knife only cut one way?

90

As I said, it depends on how the word “salary” is used in the company context. In some cases an employer will pay you $X per year to do your job and leave it to your discretion how you do it. If you want to work 16 hour days for a couple of months and then take a month off, then fine with them so long as the job gets done.

Other companies use a salary to mean that they expect you to work 40 hours per week with any excess made up as time off (plus vacation and sick days).

Still others use salary as an excuse to work you like a dog with no overtime pay.

I would think that it is the understanding that each employee has with his or her employer as to the boundaries of these rules.

91

The way I’ve always understood salary was that you are paying x dollars to do my job. Therefore you really shouldn’t have unpaid days. Take the salary divide by 26 and there ya go. Maybe I haven’t had enough salaried jobs in the past but I thought that was universal. If the office is closed by an act of god I would expect salaried folks to not to have to take it unpaid.

92

Didn’t I understand you to say that you have a certain number of vacation and sick days and only certain other days designated as paid holidays? If you are absent from work other than in those circumstances, you are not paid, correct?

If so, then you are not on a straight salary model. It’s modified from that because you do have unpaid days, and most companies that pay salaried employees give them a certain amount of holidays, vacation, and sick pay.

93

My husband is a stock broker. Since Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve, and New Year’s Day all fall on weekends this year, he won’t get a day off this entire Christmas season. Just business as usual. Sucks.

94

I had Thanksgiving off, but I had to pay for it out of vacation time. Same with Dec. 26 and Jan. 2, which are mandatory vacation days. That’s 24 hours of vacation time I had to earn and that I am losing.

95

Hard to tell if that is unfair or not. How many total vacation days do you get? How many total mandatory vacation days are you required to take?

96

That’s still a lot better than what people are talking about in this thread - like 12 days vacation, no sick days, 0 days off at x-mas.

Besides, does that mean you have to work Good Friday for regular pay? Or do you get time an a half? If you work Rememberence Day is it straight time or you get OT? I ask, because with the exception of the construction industry, I belive that is standard in Canada. (i.e. either a paid day off or time and a half).

97

My wife works in Manufacturing. The plant closes week between Xmas and New Years. It wouldn’t be fair if she had to take vacation days off because the plant closed. Same with my blizzard story, our cubicle farm closed, I don’t see why I’d have to take it off unpaid. Earlier this year, we had big thunderstorm 1st thing in the morning. Got to work at 7:30 & our power was out. We sat around in the dark, did a little filing to window light and our flashlight apps until 11:15. At that time they finally gave up and finally said go home, unpaid or vacation time, at 1130. Another act of God, another unpaid/unanticipated vacation day. Needless to say, power came back on as we are walking out the door, tragedy averted.

Yes I do get two weeks vacation plus two days sick (that is frowned upon if we actually call in). If historically we get 2 days over Xmas, then years when the holidays are on the weekend, we should still get 2 days sometime around the holidays, or if nothing else give us 2floater holidays.

Again bigger point is why. Why not be a little nicer to your employees, the company will be substantially better off.

98

Only the Monday off? Do you have to work on the weekend or something?

When I worked in the great world of academia we had two weeks at xmas, but other than that, about the best I remember is having a half-day xmas eve and then xmas itself. Of course this would depend. If xmas fell on a Sat. then it would be xmas eve off, and back to work on Mon.

Then there was the year that I started work for the co. in July, and around the middle of Dec. they said “Oh you have earned 4 vacation days, you have to use them by the end of the year or lose them.” WTF? I want my goddamn vacation in the summertime, not in the fucking middle of winter when I will just sleep. (Only worked for that co. for a year and a half. That wasn’t the only reason, but it did count.)

Here is my suggestion for happy employees. If you had a profitable year, give out bonuses. Give them out by putting them in the first December paycheck (or at the same time as the December paycheck, I guess they have to be separate.)

What happens at my company is, the bonus checks are handed out at the holiday party, on xmas eve, and then everybody gets to go home a bit early. Wahoo. Usually we know if we’re getting a bonus or not–we always have–but we don’t always know how much (or how little).

Not only that, the checks are handed out by company bigwigs as if they are Santa Fucking Claus, ho ho ho, so generous. This is usually after they have told us what great profits we made (if we did). So it’s like they are being super generous, and here’s your check!

If you don’t go to the holiday party, the check is just mailed out with your next regular paycheck.

Now here is what I would do. I would send that sucker out with the first paycheck in December so employees could use it to buy some gifts for their kids, maybe, instead of going into debt. That would make me a lot happier instead of just resentful that (a) they waited so late, (b) just the way they hand it out, grrr, for this reason I usually miss the holiday party, and © you never know how much it’s going to be, and it would be nice to know that.

One year they gave us gift cards instead. We had a limited number of places where we could pick gift cards. I didn’t like it at the time, but it really worked out better, because I got $100 gift cards from Target, Toys R Us, Whole Foods, and a local mall. That took care of most of my gift-giving, xmas dinner, plus a pedicure. But a lot of people bitched about not enough choices, so they never did that again, even though that year, they sent the cards out early. By early I mean before the holiday party, so yes, I did a lot of shopping on xmas eve that year.

99

My boyfriend is expected to put in eight hours, in the office, on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

Y’all can suck it.

100

I’m not sure what your gripe is. Your company gave employees 2 weeks of paid vacation per year. You started in July. By mid-December, you’d earned 41% (5/12) of your 2 week allotment, or 4 days. Your company very nicely reminded you that you had just a few weeks to use up those 4 days, or you’d lose them. On January 1st, you were entitled to another 2 weeks of vacation, so you could have taken those 2 weeks off anytime, including the summertime.

Or were you griping that they didn’t allow you to take your 4 days off in the summertime of year 1, within a few weeks of starting? Because that’s a whole new level of chutzpah.