Does your employer charge you for PTO?

[Lovethenurse2b25]

I work for an LTC facility that pretty much charges for pto. This is the first time I’ve heard of this. I actually worked for an assisted living facility for 9 years before company sold the property and we did not lose money for pto.

I'm sure your wonder what I mean by paying for pto. This companies starting wage is $35hr but if you want pto your wage will have to drop to $33.50hr. This is were it gets interesting if you want PTO and Benefits your hourly wage is $32.

With a hourly wage of $32 your annual salary would be

Gross Income$66,560.00

Take Home $53,650.46

With an hourly wage of $35 your annual salary would be

Gross Income$72,800.00

Take Home$58,040.30

The take home between the wages is a $5,000 different. I think this policy is outrages. And to top it off the benefits that they offer still come out of your check every two weeks. I feel as it they are forcing you not to want benefits and pto.

Please share your opinion on this !

[Lovethenurse2b25, ASN, BSN, CNA, LPN, RN]

53 minutes ago, llg said:

Think of it the other way around.

The pay is $32 per hour, with PTO and benefits. If you don't want the benefits (e.g. through hubby's job), you can omit them and get some of that money added to your paycheck -- making $33.50 per hour. If you also don't want the PTO, you can eliminate that too and get $35.00.

They are not really charging you for the PTO & benefits, they are not making them mandatory -- and giving little bonuses to people who choose not to get PTO or benefits.

I used to work for a hospital that did that and no one thought anything bad about it. In fact, when the hospital switched to that system, it was very popular. Each employee got to tailor their pay and benefits to what best suited them. It was called a "cafeteria plan" of benefits and was a "hot new thing" back in the 1990's. We were all paid a base rate ... and then there was an additional amount allotted for benefits. Each year, we chose which benefits we wanted to receive -- "spending" money from that additional amount to our share of the cost of that benefit. What we didn't spend on benefits was added to our paychecks. So in the end, we were all paid the same -- just some took it in benefits, others took fewer benefits and more cash. Not everyone needed/wanted health insurance, dental, retirement program, etc.

As a single woman, I chose the benefits because it was cheaper to get those things through work than to purchase them on my own. A lot of married folks got insurance through their husband's job, so they chose to forego the health insurance and keep the cash.

Thanks for the insight. But it sounds to me as if this is only ideal for someone that either has a spouse with good benefits or is receiving medicare or medicaid.

However, this option will not work for someone like me i am a single parent mom who needs the benefits and the pto. I think this option is a bit unfair. Paying for benefits biweekly alone can be pricey but with this option i also have to take a pay cut. It just does not seem right.

Something just doesn’t sit well with me about paying bonuses for not taking pto and benefits.

After all in the world we live it is almost impossible to survive without health insurance.

[kp2016]

It depends how much PTO you get. It’s fairly easy math to work out if you are better off taking their PTO and a lower wage or taking the higher wage and “funding” your own time off.

As for the benefits, honestly I think it is only fair to be paid more if you decline their health cover. Yes the employee contribution to health care is outrageous, but the bottom line is it costs the employer money too and if you don’t need it as you already have coverage you are saving them money.

[MunoRN, RN]

It sounds as though you have the option to still get a paycheck when you take time off by banking that money with the employer. This probably isn't particularly useful to most people, unless you're the type of person who spends money as soon as you have it, this would ensure that you can still pay your bills if you take a couple of weeks off.

As for the benefits, there aren't many places left where the employer pays the full cost of benefits, typically what a job with benefits means these days is that you get to pay into the employer's group insurance plan, I pay $1200 per month for instance, and that's in addition to what my employer contributes.

[llg, PhD, RN]

46 minutes ago, Lovethenurse2b25 said:

Thanks for the insight. But it sounds to me as if this is only ideal for someone that either has a spouse with good benefits or is receiving medicare or medicaid.

However, this option will not work for someone like me i am a single parent mom who needs the benefits and the pto. I think this option is a bit unfair. Paying for benefits biweekly alone can be pricey but with this option i also have to take a pay cut. It just does not seem right.

Something just doesn’t sit well with me about paying bonuses for not taking pto and benefits.

After all in the world we live it is almost impossible to survive without health insurance.

I was single, too, at the time ... and chose to take just the base pay + most of the benefits. But I understood that benefits cost an employer money. They pay the insurance company (for example) for each employee covered by the plan. So those people who chose not to take that benefit were saving the hospital money -- and the hospital chose to share that savings with the employee. I didn't mind that. Each employee was paid the same amount: it just came in different forms (cash or benefit) depending on what options we chose.

[JKL33]

47 minutes ago, Lovethenurse2b25 said:

Something just doesn’t sit well with me about paying bonuses for not taking pto and benefits.

Unless I'm just thinking completely backwards, in reality if your employer doesn't give you these options (and everyone is just automatically granted PTO, for example), you can be sure they've already calculated your hourly rate based on that. They just did it without your input. And they might have paid a little more per hour if they weren't offering PTO.

It makes total sense to not force some people to pay for double insurance coverage...that's really all it is in the end, is not forcing some people to pay for insurance coverage when they already have it. If you had decent insurance you wouldn't want the employer to make the decision that part of your pay was going to be more insurance coverage.

[caliotter3]

4 hours ago, Lovethenurse2b25 said:

No i did not receive an offer letter at all. They do provide a paper pay stub. Im so disappointed because im seeing so many red flags about this place. My sister in law told me to put in my resignation letter also because all of the unit managers are lpns. They sit at the desk during care plans and putting in Drs. Order will i pass meds all day and I'm an RN.

Haven't even finished reading through the entire thread and this jumped out at me. You should find another job. Where I come from, if anyone is going to sit at the desk and do care planning and doctor handling, it is the RN, while the LPN/LVNs do the med pass. Your facility has it backwards for a reason and you don't want to play into this.

[Oldmahubbard]

No benefit from any employer since the beginning of time has ever been free. Never has been, never will be.

Now you have to crunch your own numbers to figure it out what works for you, but I would not be without health insurance.

[Lovethenurse2b25, ASN, BSN, CNA, LPN, RN]

23 minutes ago, Oldmahubbard said:

No benefit from any employer since the beginning of time has ever been free. Never has been, never will be.

Now you have to crunch your own numbers to figure it out what works for you, but I would not be without health insurance.

Of course not thats not the point i was making as stated above the company offer various benefits packages that come out of your paycheck biweekly BUT in addition to that i would also have to take an hourly wage cut which does not make sense to me.

[Lovethenurse2b25, ASN, BSN, CNA, LPN, RN]

27 minutes ago, caliotter3 said:

Haven't even finished reading through the entire thread and this jumped out at me. You should find another job. Where I come from, if anyone is going to sit at the desk and do care planning and doctor handling, it is the RN, while the LPN/LVNs do the med pass. Your facility has it backwards for a reason and you don't want to play into this.

Several nurses that i know have stated the same thing. When i questioned it i was told the lpns have been there longer then me. Which is ultimately an excuse for not wanting to upset the senior lpns by having them pass meds.

[caliotter3]

LPN/LVNs provide input to the RN for use in creating or updating a care plan. The RN is responsible for the care plan. At least that is what I was taught in RN school, in accordance with the Nurse Practice Act in my state. Maybe it is different elsewhere. It would have to be very different in order for the LPNs to be in charge of care planning instead of an RN.

[Lovethenurse2b25, ASN, BSN, CNA, LPN, RN]

5 minutes ago, caliotter3 said:

LPN/LVNs provide input to the RN for use in creating or updating a care plan. The RN is responsible for the care plan. At least that is what I was taught in RN school, in accordance with the Nurse Practice Act in my state. Maybe it is different elsewhere. It would have to be very different in order for the LPNs to be in charge of care planning instead of an RN.

Same for the state of NJ also. This company just wants to make its own rules to better suit senior employees. We just did a ACLS course two weeks ago and not one of the lpns could attend. Which is exactly why the unit manager should be a RN especially since i work 3-11 when all of the bosses leave. There is no way a lpn can delegate and direct task of an RN.

For anyone wondering i was told many things that were not true in the initial interview that i am unfortunately learning now.

[CharleeFoxtrot, BSN, RN]

7 hours ago, Lovethenurse2b25 said:

Without PTO you wouldn’t be able to take personal time off at all. Unless you call out or have someone switch days with you. The DON explained that to me during my interview.

Get your resume in order and start applying elsewhere. As others have said too much shady stuff happening.

Oh and the whole LPN supervising RNs is endemic in LTC as a way to keep the senior people in their positions. Yeah, one of the many reasons my foray into LTC was short.