On call pay for OB nurses

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Specializes in OB, Peds, Med Surg and Geriatric Nsg.

I am an LTC nurse transitioning to OB for 4 months now. Since it is required as patient safety goal for 2 RNs to be present during a delivery, my facility has started putting out on-call shifts on 8-hour increments and with that, you get paid $50 being on call on home. If you're called in, then your hourly rate starts running. We don't have that much deliveries per month so if OB is closed, some of us are cross-trained to different departments to help out. Some prefer to be in house on call because they don't like being pulled. In house on call means you are required to stay in the OB department and sit around getting paid not your hourly but only $50. It doesn't sound right at all. You're being paid $50 to wake up as early as 7am to sit around and do nothing because they needed an RN in house. You are being counted as a number of RN's working in the hospital. The hospital is using you to fully staff the hospital with RNs now why not get paid you're hourly? They strongly discourage everybody to punch in while being in house on call. Nurse supervisors will not pull you to help out on different departments especially if the census is low because the department will be overstaffed and that there ass is on the line when corporate asks about it.

Now my question is, is this legal? Are there any labor laws affecting these? I have no problem being on call at home but I certainly don't agree with the in house on call pay. Is this happening in different hospital?

Please advise.. Thanks in advance!!

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It's choice, right? Reads like some nurses like it. You also have the choice of being cross-trained for another unit. It should be fine then:). No?

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Specializes in Family NP, OB Nursing.

When I was doing OB, at first call was $1.50/hour and you were on call 12 hours. IF you got called in, you received time and a half for the time you worked, which was nice. Then the budget cuts kicked in and they stopped the time and a half if you were called in and increased call time to a whole whopping $3/hour.

You didn't have to be in house as long as you were within 30min of the hospital.

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Specializes in OB, Peds, Med Surg and Geriatric Nsg.

Some nurses is okay with it because they don't like working other departments. It's a choice but for a full timer like me, if there's nothing to do at all in different departments, then they're forced to put you in house for 8 hrs and get paid $50 instead. The nurse supervisor's excuse is that they can't overstaff a department. Whether you don't care being pulled, if the census is low, they can't put you anywhere but be in house. So you're losing your hours since you're not being paid hourly rate. People sign up for it to make extra money but at the same time, they can screw you over with it.

The thing I'm infuriated with is that, on call persons are the back up people. They are the ones who already worked their hours for the week but the only downfall of it is that if the main person calls in sick then the person on call who signed up is required to come in and be paid $50 for it which is a bummer.

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Specializes in OB, Peds, Med Surg and Geriatric Nsg.

@rninwch: I live literally half a mile from the hospital I worked and it doesn't matter for them. They need an RN to staff a department even if it's closed. So I am being used as a number of the staffing enough needed to be in the hospital per department. My understanding is, if the hospital is being benefitted by staffing an RN in a department that they should be paid hourly and if the department itself doesn't have patients that they should be pulled to other departments whether they're gonna be overstaffed or not. If they are very anal about the patient satisfaction survey then they should allow overstaffing other departments too. It doesn't happen quite often. I guess that only exist in the ideal world. Such a shame...

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Specializes in Ante-Intra-Postpartum, Post Gyne.

We get $4 an hour. That is even less than you. And our on-cal time does not count towards our hours accrued for vacation. When we get called in we get our regular pay, and if it dies down again we could get called back off. I get a lot of on calls for the last four hours of my shift because we have a mixed unit and a new shift comes in at 1500 while the 12hrs stay until 1930. I live 45 mins from the hospital so I have to find something to do for four hours. I spend literally three hours wandering around Costco the other day.

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Specializes in Family NP, OB Nursing.

Well if our unit was empty we still had to have at least one RN on the unit. If you were on the unit because you HAD to be, then you were paid for it.

Now, other units did sometimes borrow us if we were empty. We weren't allowed to take an assignment in an other unit, but we did help out with things like admissions, busy ER, maybe start IVs, dressing changes, or help the techs with rounds and VS.

The only couple times I had to be in house for call was for weather related issues and they paid me. Most hospitals I know pay any RN who is "staffing" the unit her regular wage no matter if the unit is empty or full.

Personally, I would expect to be paid if I was required to be there just because the unit is empty shouldn't be an excuse. You're right they're benefiting from you being in house so they should pay, other wise let you stay home and have them call you in if someone shows up.

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Specializes in Community, OB, Nursery.

We get paid $2/hour but we aren't required to be in-house. Callback pay is time and a half. Something about your situation doesn't sound right. You might want to check your labor laws.

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Specializes in Nurse Leader specializing in Labor & Delivery.

If they require me to be in-house for call, they darn well better pay me my full salary. Our on-call pay is $3/hour, and the only requirement is that we be reachable by phone.

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Specializes in OB, lactation.

You said "They need an RN to staff a department even if it's closed." --> if you are working on staff, then I would think you should be getting paid at least your regular wage.

Our on call (at home) pay is $2/hour and if called in, time+1/2.

As far as I'm concerned, if I am ON THE UNIT, I am NOT on call, I'm AT WORK. KWIM? How can you label it "on call" if you're at work?? LOL ... yeah, something fishy...

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Specializes in L&D.

I get $2/hr on call pay and time & a half if I'm called in. Since I live more than 30 min from the hospital, I take call in house (as you well know, you can spend only so much time shopping near-by). There are a few of us who can't take call from home, so we assigned ourselves a post partum room for the on call nurse. I can sleep, watch TV, work on my laptop, or whatever.

Even if there are no labor patients, we keep 2 RNs in the department. You never know when that abruption is going to walk in. We clean stuff, make sure everything is well stocked, audit charts, catch up on our on line mandatories, quiz each other (What's the name of the hyperthermia medication, and how do you mix it?), stuff like that. If you are required to be there, seems they'd better be paying you for it.

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This actually was just cleared up at the hospital I work at. It is illegal to make an employee stay in house and not pay them their regular wage. If they choose to then that is not illegal. For example where I work we must always have 3 nurses on. If not all three are needed then we can be floated to another department and help out because we are employees of the entire hospital. If they are just keeping you on call low census than they do not have to pay you your actual wage. We make $2 an hour when low censused.

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