Do you get paid for those 13 or 14 hour days?

[heartlover07, RN]

Hello

I am starting a job as a new nurse in July on a cardiac stepdown unit, my schedule is three 12's permanent days. I am aware that alot of times as a nurse you really work 13 or even 14 hours, so do you get compensated for those extra hours? In other words, do you actually punch in and out or if you show up are you just paid for those 12 hours you are scheduled for? I suppose I could ask my employer, but seems like an awkward question to ask before I even start. Thanks so much!

[RN BSN 2009]

depends, are you hourly or salary?

[Imafloat, BSN, RN]

We get paid for our time. We clock in when we get there and clock out when we go home. They take a half hour out for lunch unless we clock out no lunch.

[heartlover07, RN]

I get paid hourly. I guess another thing I was wondering is if you are consistenly getting paid for 13 hours rather than 12 do you get frowned upon by management or is it just understood that it happens?

[Imafloat, BSN, RN]

I get paid hourly. I guess another thing I was wondering is if you are consistenly getting paid for 13 hours rather than 12 do you get frowned upon by management or is it just understood that it happens?

It depends. If the census is high then it is understandable to stay later or have no lunch. I have had to stay late on days with snow/ice, when our census was high, when our census was very low (we only had 4 nurses working), or when I have had a baby come back from surgery shortly before shift change (we recover our babies from surgery in our NICU).