New traveler to Florida, contract advice

Work2Live · Mar 19, 2015

NedRN will inevitably weight in, but I ALWAYS ask for my weekly net take-home pay before I accept an assignment. The one piece of advice that I have is, if you ultimately enjoy traveling and plan on continuing to do it, explore the various hospitals in that vicinity and consider a seasonal assignment. You can earn a flat rate closer to $50 per hour (no housing or health insurance). I would think that there would be seasonal needs for physical rehabilitation nurses in Florida. Good luck and enjoy your first assignment!

NedRN · Mar 19, 2015

If you will run your compensation on PanTravelers calculator, I'd be happy to give you an idea. Without housing and insurance figured in too, the numbers you provided are meaningless. I will say however that your overtime rate absolutely will represent a huge cut over your base hourly rate. Really stupid. If you like extra hours and they are available, you need to negotiate this up to at least $50 an hour.

Staff pay is worth more than $4 extra though. Sick pay, holidays, vacations, education, good health insurance. Think about what in hospital per diem pays in lieu of these benefits.

That said, there are of course intangible benefit here. Sun, family, getting away from politics. Ultimately it is about the total value to you of course.

Atl-Murse · Mar 20, 2015

OT should be aleast 42

Trjl · Mar 21, 2015

I have worked a few med-surg (oncology) positions in Florida and I would say $28/hr for all is about right for med-surg. A larger hospital may do better, but I would not expect to go much over $30 in Florida. And I am meaning day shift hours. If you are nights, you may be getting less than you should be getting paid. I also would not obsess too much over your overtime pay. I suppose there may be some jobs where they are begging you to work an extra shift every week. But I have yet to have one job ask me to work an extra day because I am way too expensive to be having me work over either the 36 or 40 hours I was hired to do weekly. They will not even let me work a holiday due to I would be paid much higher than their regular staff to work. But again, you may come across some situations where the hospital is desperate for workers and will pay what they can to get an extra body on the floor.

I personally think salaries for Travel nurse have dropped in the past many years. I can remember years ago seeing advertisements about pay starting at $36/hr. I assume mainly only the ICU and night shifts see that kind of pay. I am not sure if I have ever made over $32, even in the expensive areas. So if you are in travel for the money, I think people will be disappointed. I know people comment to me all the time about how much money travel nurses make. If they only knew. But I have had so much fun and adventure on each assignment, that has been worth more than a few extra bucks could ever mean.

Winter Haven is a nice 'small town' in Florida. Right in the middle of the state you will be less than an hour from all the parks in Orlando and probably about an hour and a half to the beaches of Clearwater/St Pete area. If you only have time to visit one beach, pick the Gulf side. So much more pretty. If you like outdoors, there will be quite a few parks and trails to enjoy, and LOTS of alligator to see in their natural environment. (I lived east of Tampa for over 12 years) So enjoy your time in Florida.

aamy · Mar 31, 2015

$18.59/hr is low. Even in Florida. Especially considering you are taking their housing. If you take the housing stipend and find your own housing, you can usually pocket several hundred $ or more per month (If you have a tax-home because that makes your stipend tax free). I have done several contracts in Florida and have never made less than $20/hr (taxed base pay). It's been my experience that the housing stipends in Florida are typically at least $1200/month (oftentimes more, depending on where you are of course)