compensation for working short

I was just having a discussion about compensation for nurses with a colleague. He introduced me to an idea I had never heard of before. He told me that several years ago he worked for a nursing home that compensated employees for working short. In his example, say that the census and acuity called for 5 staff members for a certain shift. If the faciilty was not able to find 5 staff and the remaining 4 people had to "work short," the facility would divide what the pay would have been for the 5th staff member among the 4 who worked, as compensation to them for having to work short. Because they had to pay for 5 people whatever happened, there was no incentive for them to deliberately work people short in order to save themselves money.

After I picked myself up off the floor, I marvelled at what a fine idea this seemed. Has anyone else ever heard of such a thing?

[nyteshade]

Say what????!!!! Nope, never heard of such a "crazy" idea. But, I like this thing called compensation...lol!

[chellelynn25]

At my facility they do an incentive for when a shift is short. If you pick up 4 hrs of the shift you make a $25 bonus if you pick up the whole 8hrs you get a $50 bonus. Something is better than nothing lol

We get an attaboy and a hearty handshake, but nothing with "$" attached.

[Ahhphoey]

Never heard of it, but sounds like a great idea to me; pay people for the extra work they do. I'm sure it'll never happen at my job, but a girl can dream...

Never heard of it. Just got paid overtime since we usually had to stay later since we worked short.

[melsman1904]

Like Otessa, we usually get OT since we usually end up staying over.

[rn4babies63]

We get an attaboy and a hearty handshake, but nothing with "$" attached.

That's more than we get!

That sounds like a great idea... if only! We usually get the "be glad you have a job in these hard times" speech when we are asked to work short! Oh well, as long as we continue to cover for the administration, things will never change. In fact I heard last week that since we are currently taking on more pts (at first 4-5 on tele unit, then 5-6) the matrix will be changed to 7!!

[blondy2061h, MSN, RN]

I've always wondered why I don't get paid extra for working short since I'm doing the work of more than I person. I didn't think any place actually did this though.

[husker_rn, RN]

I guess I'm one of the lucky ones. Several years ago I worked in an LTC that did just that; altho I was an RN I helped with basic resident cares and also got " short pay ". Of course it was a community based not-for-profit LTC.