Am I the only HH nurse paid hourly?

[Eleven011]

I have been reading this section of the boards for awhile and see most people are paid per visit and do charting at home, etc. In the agency I work for, I go into the office in the morning, divide up the visits with the other nurses, then do them and the charting throughout the day. If I can't get to all the charting, I do it the next day. But I get paid for the hours I am there - usually 8 a day. Even if there happens to be only 1 visit for me to do that day - I still stay and get paid my time. Is this really odd for home health?? Until reading here, I thought this was the way it was!

[ernrs2b]

with the agency that I work for :they offer, full time salaried/fulltime hourly/parttime hourly/ and pay per visit....I chose Pay per visit, because I can't obligate myself to a full 8hrs

[annaedRN, RN]

At my agency the RNs are paid salary and the LPNs are paid hourly. The RNs get a per visit rate for any visits done on holidays or when on call. Works for me...most weeks I am right at the 40 hr mark, occasionally more but more often less than 40. Don't think I would like the per visit pay...I like the reliable paycheck based on 8 hrs a day whether or not I put in all that time :)

[LadyT618, MSN, APRN, NP]

That is interesting. I've never heard of hourly home health. I get paid a salary, up to a quota of visits weekly. Anything over the quota, you get paid per visit. I guess the hourly thing wouldn't work many places due to the fact that most home health nurses like to go home when they're done with their visits for the day and barely like to go the office as it is. This is what I've found so far anyway in my travels.

[caliotter3]

I've always been paid hourly because I do shift work. With one of my current employers I have an agreed upon per visit rate, should I ever do visits, but so far have not. Although three of my previous employers had different hourly rates depending upon the reimbursement source (private, insurance, medicaid or combination) one of them always paid me the same hourly rate and didn't differentiate the type of case, although that was supposed to be their policy. Only one prospective employer told me that they would maintain a minimum number of hours for the employee by having one come to the office to do paperwork even if there wasn't enough business. I thought that was a good policy. I have only encountered salaried employees to be internal employees rather than external employees.

[RN1263]

I am paid hourly....If you have 3 clients you don't get 8 hours obviously, you go home afterward.

They've been real slow for about 6 weeks now and I can't pay my bills!

I'm interviewing wed. for a salaried HH job (at least I hear they pay salary?). Some weeks I'll probably put in more than 40 hours, but it will be worth it for a steady pay check!

I don't like the idea of "per visit" either, because if their slow then your check will flucuate as well.

[jnette, ASN, EMT-I]

Interesting... I've never heard of hourly OR salaried. Unless you're an office staff nurse, as I now am. But wjhen I was on the orad, all the road nurses are paid by the visits. We never had anough "slow periods" to affect our paychecks much.. we stay slammed!

[RN1263]

No, I'm not an office nurse I do home visits. Most HH agencies in my area are "per visit", but like I said where I work is hourly and the one I'm interviewing with is salary (so I hear), but yeh all the others are "per visit" I think.

[Eleven011]

Its very interesting how different some places are. Even if we come in on a weekend, we punch in and get paid our actual time worked. Never been paid per visit! If we have 3 visits and they are done by lunch, we just do paperwork, put new charts together, do audits, file, ect. We usually end up with additional visits - a patient had a dr. visit and needs meds changed, ect. We also supply DME, so we deliver that stuff.

[iluvivt, BSN, RN]

I get paid by the hour,but it is because we have very long visits. Our IVIG can take up to 7 hours per infusion but usually is 2-4 hours. I would be working for free almost if I got paid by the visit.

[buterfly]

I get paid per visit, however I choose to get paid this way. When visits are available it's good. Right now it's slow and I cant depend on a pay check. Now I am thinking of applying to Bayada. I don't know anything about them but I hear they do 8 and 12 hours shift. Something new for me but I am thinking about it.

[HisTreasure, BSN, RN]

We are paid hourly. This is a new agency I just got on with (2nd day of orientation just completed!) but we get an hourly pay no matter full-, part- time, or per diem. We do computerized charting that can be done in the home, in the office, or at home. We get 5-6 patients a day to make visits on. That is supposed to allow for a full 8 hour day. Sometimes it doesn't work out that way from what we were told but normally it seems to work in the nurses' favor.