Lunch breaks and required phones

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I work in a hospital where the room are broken down into separate "zones" and each zone has it's own assigned phone that never changes. In other words the phone for each zone is always the same. Now sometimes other departments or Drs call and are transferred to the appropriate nurse's phone.

Most of the nurses take their phones with them at lunch time (and probably would on breaks if they took them). I know they get interrupted at lunch because I often transfer calls to their phones. My questions is this; would you take your phone with you at these times and would you expect to be paid for that lunch time. My thinking is that if you take the phone with you and are interrupted you should be paid for that time. I will be working as a nurse here shortly and I have no intention of taking my phone with me on breaks and lunches. To me that is my time and I get to chose whether or not to take the phone with me.

Thoughts?

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Specializes in Neuro/Med-Surg/Oncology.

I would not take my phone with me for the very reasons you state. If you want me to work through lunch all the time, I'm finding another job. Until the door is hitting me on the way out, you'll pay me for the work I do.

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I echo the sentiments above. Nurses work very hard to begin with. Your 30 minute lunch break is YOUR break. I absolutely would NOT answer my phone during my break. If this seems to be a problem for your employer, I would address it immediately and make sure that modifications are made...otherwise..there are PLENTY of other places that will hire you. Nurses are in EXTREMELY high demand.

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I don't take the phone with me. Nor do I take it into patient rooms anymore due to the caller getting angry as to why I can't tell them anything or help them with anything.

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Specializes in LTC, Med-SURG,STICU.

I would hand off the phone to the nurse that was covering my patients while I was on break. Where I work now it is not an issue because we have all of the phones at the nurse's station. I find it kind of nice because when the phone is ringing and I am down the hall I can not get to the phone on time, so I do not bother trying. Everyone knows how to take a message unless it is a doctor's office and then they know to get me if I am not waiting by the phone.

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Specializes in Critical Care, Education.

I am assuming that these folks are paid by the hour - not salaried? In that case, Federal labor law is very clear. If a worker is required to do any 'work' during his or her (unpaid) lunch, then that time must be paid - the entire break. There is an enormous amount of case law on this. Organizations have no defense if they are violating this rule because they are responsible for making sure that it is followed. Violations can incur significant "monetary penalties" - especially if there has been a pattern of 'wilful disregard' for Federal laws.

It is probably due to the manager's lack of familiarity with Labor law - it usually is. The manager of this unit should be enforcing the rules an making sure that the phones are handed off to someone else during lunch breaks. I would recommend bringing this to HR's attention if you have had no luck with talking to the manager.

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Specializes in Telemetry, CCU.

Do not take your phone with you on your lunch! Give it to the charge nurse or whoever is covering you. A good charge/break nurse will actually help you out and do stuff for your patients while you're gone; unfortunately at my old job, only 2-3 nurses actually did this when they were covering someone's break, most of them would just wait for you to come back from break (unless it was an emergency) or wouldn't even let you go to break unless you were completely caught up (not always possible).

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Every time I hear of nurses who don't stand up for their rights it makes me so angry. I know some places that is the culture but it is against labor law. Even within my own hospital there are units where the majority of staff let themselves be taken advantage of or they are intimidated by their managers regarding overtime and compensation for interrupted or not taken meal breaks. I understand with the current economy people don't want to rock the boat but these same people didn't want to rock the boat when the economy was good.

My motto is I volunteer at my kids school not at my work. On occasions for special events. like health fairs, blood pressure screenings etc I have volunteered my time It was my choice and no one got paid to help out at those things and no one had to help out at those things.

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I work in a hospital where the room are broken down into separate "zones" and each zone has it's own assigned phone that never changes. In other words the phone for each zone is always the same. Now sometimes other departments or Drs call and are transferred to the appropriate nurse's phone.

Most of the nurses take their phones with them at lunch time (and probably would on breaks if they took them). I know they get interrupted at lunch because I often transfer calls to their phones. My questions is this; would you take your phone with you at these times and would you expect to be paid for that lunch time. My thinking is that if you take the phone with you and are interrupted you should be paid for that time. I will be working as a nurse here shortly and I have no intention of taking my phone with me on breaks and lunches. To me that is my time and I get to chose whether or not to take the phone with me.

Thoughts?

Just some advice for your employer- Here in Spokane, the Respiratory Therapist won a BIG LAWSUIT against Sacred Heart Medical Center several years ago concerning this same issue. The RTs had to take and answer calls on their work cell phones, and/or answer pages for assistance while on their unpaid and paid breaks. They won MILLIONS against the hospital. You might want to call an attorney, and have him/her look up the case for some ammunition against the hospital. That goes for everyone on this listserve who has the same problem. If I have time, I can look it up too.

Lindarn, RBN, BSN, CCRN

Spokane, Washington

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I am assuming that these folks are paid by the hour - not salaried? In that case, Federal labor law is very clear. If a worker is required to do any 'work' during his or her (unpaid) lunch, then that time must be paid - the entire break. There is an enormous amount of case law on this. Organizations have no defense if they are violating this rule because they are responsible for making sure that it is followed. Violations can incur significant "monetary penalties" - especially if there has been a pattern of 'wilful disregard' for Federal laws.

It is probably due to the manager's lack of familiarity with Labor law - it usually is. The manager of this unit should be enforcing the rules an making sure that the phones are handed off to someone else during lunch breaks. I would recommend bringing this to HR's attention if you have had no luck with talking to the manager.

See my post on here, a few threads down.

Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN

Spokane, Washington

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Specializes in pcu/stepdown/telemetry.

At my job we do have the district phones to carry. All the RN's carry them at all times because we know that it is not reasonable to expect another nurse who is covering your district to have to deal with certain issues. I know that isn't right because your break is your break, but I cover 16 pt's when another nurse is on break. I would have no time to answer phones for someone else. Unfortunately we are interrupted and taken from our breaks all the time for issues for the pt's- example pain meds, MD questions. Anyway as a courtesy I bring my phone with me and no it is not paid for. Another annoying thing about being a nurse

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Specializes in ER, Medicine.

We have no choice but to keep our phones and tracers on us. During our "breaks" we're still obligated to work and to answer the phone. When my patient calls for something well...I have to suck it up and work. I'm working during my lunch break, I'm working while I'm sitting on the toilet, I'm working as soon as I put one foot off the elevator...that's just how it goes. There truly is no real break time. Breaks for me are the times when the phone isn't ringing, the call light isn't going off, and I've managed to finish charting/giving meds/drawing blood, etc, etc.

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