mandatory overtime

efy2178 · Jan 29, 2004

You need to get a union started for theother workers in the hospital. I'm sure you are not alone. Try http://www.SEIU.org

You have a right to 1 1/2 times your pay after 40 hours a week. The eight hour work day for overtime was changed some years ago. I believe this law exploits part-time workers and certain atypical shift jobs. Where I have worked, full time OR employees were sent home early if there were not enough cases but then forced to work over 8 hours the next day but if they were not over 40 hours there was no overtime pay.

Good luck. You might also write a letter to your congressman/ senator and let them know how this effects nursing care. Right now Prs. Bush is pushing to get rid of overtime after 40 hours!!!

The longer I live, the more rights are eroding away. But having a union helps. Get your going!

PHM · Jan 31, 2004

You better take a look at the new Overtime Bill that GW Bush just screwed us with. Specifically says employers NO LONGER have to pay anyone over making something like $24k/yr time and a half. While most can refuse, media specifically pointed out who will bear the brunt of this: nurses, police and fire folks.

Phil

efy2178 · Feb 1, 2004

That bill has not yet passed. But if you would like to send a fax to Bush telling him to leave our overtime alone ogg onto:

http://www.unionvoice.org/campaign/faxbush4ot/e75e4zb8en8

He is really trying to get this passed. I personally believe that right-to-work laws and lack of a union condemn patient care. However, the ANA is trying to pass whistleblower protection laws.

Ufuoma Okome · Feb 6, 2004

I think that it is a terrible mistake to force any one and particularly any one working in the medical field to do mandatory overtime and then not receiving time and a half pay. Who suffers? The patients that needs care do.

mattsmom81 · Feb 25, 2004

President Bush has not signed this yet!!!He is still considering!!! WRITE LETTERS EVERYBODY!!!

What the OP describes may come to pass for many of us, sadly. One way we can get out of this is to say we are physically or psychologically exhausted, and to stay over would be against your Nurse Practice Act as you are essentially impaired and could harm a patient in your current state of exhaustion. While they can probably fire you for not staying over, your BNE will support your action: you will NOT lose your license.

Brownms46 · Feb 29, 2004

I think it's time more nurses went into business for themselves, and stop taking the demands of hospitals, who couldn't have their doors open without them! My goal is to become the one who dictates what I work for, and how I am paid!

Let Ole Bushy boy make this lunacy law, and He and the rest of America will soon find out ...hopefully...that the "shortage" just got a WHOOOLE lot worse!

tmoorelpn · Mar 12, 2004

The state VA nursing facility in my town has to be one of the worst with mandatory overtime and they are unionized. The state railroads the union and since the union is scared to stand up to the state the mandatory overtime continues. The nurses are paid time and a half for the overtime but how safe is it to have a exhausted nurse working 16 hour shifts? I wouldn't want my loved ones under the care of any nurse, no matter how competent, who's been working for 16 hours. Mistakes are certain to happen, it's downright dangerous. I think 12 hours should be the maximum number of hours ANY nurse can work. Just like truck drivers who have to take so much time off the road, why should nursing be any different?

I am a partime L.P.N. working in a small hospital in Ohio. My facility has mandatory overtime for all nursing staff. Only the R.N.s are in a union. Now our employer has taken overtime pay away from all non-union members who work under 40 hours a week. I work second shift (3-11) and I average about 24 hours per week. Last Friday the third shift L.P.N. called off and I was mandated to work all night long for straight time. I benefited nothing by forcing myself to stay awake all night long. This really does not seem like it should be allowed to happen. I have tried to look up laws regarding overtime pay, but it is very overwhelming. Is there anybody who can help me?

mattsmom81 · Mar 19, 2004

I hope that nurses will 'vote with their feet' and refuse to work for employers who abuse staff in this way, mandating OT then refusing to pay time and a half for the same. Seems akin to slavery conditions....

I won't work for anybody who 'mandates' OT, and those who DO really need to consider nursing law in regards to duty and impairment.

If this new labor ruling does pass, and IF my hospital ever refused to pay for nurses' OT, they would quickly lose volunteers. Since the hospital depends on some OT to staff safely, it is unlikely it will do away with OT pay.

As of now my CEO has promised to keep OT pay in spite of any new ruling permitting him to discard it.

mattsmom81 · Mar 19, 2004

I hope that nurses will 'vote with their feet' and refuse to work for employers who abuse staff in this way, mandating OT then refusing to pay time and a half for the same. Seems akin to slavery conditions....

I won't work for anybody who 'mandates' OT, and those who DO really need to consider nursing law in regards to duty and impairment.

If this new labor ruling does pass, and IF my hospital ever refused to pay for nurses' OT, they would quickly lose volunteers. Since the hospital depends on some OT to staff safely, it is unlikely it will do away with OT pay.

As of now my CEO has promised to keep OT pay in spite of any new ruling permitting him to discard it.

louisianalvn · Jun 13, 2009

Federal Law, the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), trumps state law.

Some of the ways that health care facilities (especially skilled nursing ones) cheat workers

out of their overtime is:

1) Tell you to arrive early for report and THEN clock in.

2) Interrupt your lunch hour - even for a minute - then you are entitled to be paid for the hour

3) Make you attend meetings off the clock

4) Tell you to clock out and finish your charting or other work

5) Tell you to clock out and do the narcotics count

6) Tell you to clock out and wait for your relief.

They always threaten you with the loss of your license if you don't stay.

A group of Texas nurses has filed under the Fair Labor Standards Act to collect their overtime.

Although it talks about LVN's, documentation suggests that Med Aides, CNA's, housekeeping,

and food service will join in to collect their back money

It looks like the suit is expanding nation wide to many skilled nursing facilities.

Read about it here:

http://www.lvnclaim.com

lindarn · Jun 14, 2009

Its about time that nurses stand up to the abuse that we are subject to. You should come here to Washington State, where there is a nursing school, it seems, on every corner. To make matters even worse, there is not alot of industry here in Eastern Washington. The biggest employers are hospitals, and the health care industry.

There has always been high unemployment here in Eastern Washington, and wives are working to support the family when the husband has been laid off.

This puts nurses in a catch-22 situation. If they make waves, and get fired, they have no income. What would you do?

When I moved here, I went to work at Deaconess. The nurses told me that they only got raises every three years. That was it. Benefits were terrible. There was no job security. Nurses worked there for years. The did not know that it was not like that in other areas.

When I went to work there, I could not believe how bad the equipment was, the most user unfriendly stuff I had ever used. They finally voted in SEIU, after YEARS of refusing union membership. They were not happy with them, and they voted them out. The hospital was bought out by a for profit company from the South, and things are already going downhill.

What can I say? I think that someone put it best on here, when they said that nurses should wear signs on their backs that say, "Kick Me". JMHO and my NY $0.02.

Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN

Spokane, Washington