Unsolicited Offer

Nurses General Nursing

Published

Specializes in Gerontological, cardiac, med-surg, peds.

The other night at work on our unit, an unsolicited offer came up over our fax machine. It was from a nursing agency that I had never heard of, offering $4,200 dollars/week to work at unidentified hospitals in California. Had an 800 number to call if interested. Just wondering, anybody out there also receiving this offer and is this a strike-breaking outfit? Seems like an inordinate amount of money. Must be something fishy going on.

Why not call it. That is how we got into travel nurses. They had an ad in the Sunday paper for 15k for two weeks. We called and made that. You never know. As always use common sense and be cautious!

David

Quite often those ads are for scab nursing during a strike. See the other threads on that topic. It also usually requires working many 12-16 hour days in a row. If you look close to home, you can usually find agencies that will find work for you like that if you want that drudgery lifestyle. Just consider how safe it is! (And if you are a scab, are you undermining the nurses who are working the change the job conditions you embrace, ie overtime, no days off, etc.)

Yep. I've seen a very similar thing come over the fax where I used to work. It seems like it even said at the bottom in really fine print "labor disputes may exist."

Love

Dennie

Specializes in Hospice, Critical Care.

We've been having recruiters calling directly into our units. The ICU has received several phone calls from a man asking to speak to "any available nurse" and claiming to represent a "700-bed hospital in the Pittsburgh area." PACU received a call like this too.

I don't know about you but that really strikes me as, well, underhanded. To call right into another hospital's ICU! But then again, it's probably the nice guys that finish last. I'm the nurse recruiter for my hospital; I just can't imagine doing something like that.

boy would i be ticked having to stop what i was doing and pick up the phone for a call like that.

Yep, we get those, too. Of course, they always come over the fax at 2 or 3 in the morning. If they were so legit, why aren't any of these offers in any of the nursing mags? I know some of them have good career sections, but no scab offers :D

And calling for "any available nurse"? Isn't that scraping the bottom of the barrel? I can't imagine trying to entice a nurse while he/she is working. I sure wouldn"t want to work for someone with those ethics :rolleyes:

I have worked for the company that sends out those flyers.

They are a spin off of Fastaff, they do rapid response(4wk contracts) and strikes.

I also know that gettings them to live up to their word is near impossible. They have been known to mess up payroll on a regular basis, refuse to pay at all, and various other screw-ups.

You have been forewarned, If you decide to work for them you will pay the price, and they might not pay yours.

MSO4 takes the pain away.

yes, our hospital has been hit with those flyers as well. they usually will show up around 2 or 3 am. i have seen two in the last 2 months.

Specializes in Gerontological, cardiac, med-surg, peds.

No, I would NEVER work for a strike-breaking outfit, even if they were paying $1 million/week. It really galls me, that they're spending these big bucks to strangers to break a strike, but won't offer their own dedicated nurses a decent wage and decent work conditions:( :( :( We nurses need to stick together and refuse to help these underhanded outfits.

HealingTouch, I totally agree with you, if they can fork out that much money for just "any nurse available", why can't they invest a fraction of that in the wonderful nurses who work their butts off despite the working conditions and bull that they have to put up with!

Unfortunately it is all about money. They could give a hoot about the nurses or the patients. I beleive that hospitals use strikes as a tool to force out nurses they don't want and bring new ones in. They have strike insurance to pay for it all. Why do you think the strike nurses stay in 5 star hotels and get high pay? The strike insurance covers it all. The hospitals actually make money during a strike. While I agree with your cause it won't make a difference whether you stick together as nurses or not. It is not just hospitals. Look what Enron did to its employees while the executives walked away with millions. Market forces will cause these hospitals to make adjustments that will favor the nurse.

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