Weekenders Working Weekday Holiday?

Nurses General Nursing

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I am a weekender at my current facility. I work 7p-7a every Sat/Sun only. My facility is trying to enforce new holiday scheduling that would require weekenders to work holidays that fall M-F weekdays. Does anyone have any suggestions??

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Specializes in Community, OB, Nursery.

Sadly, I don't. Weekenders at my place have to work the major holidays on top of their weekends. I have tried to fight it but nothing doing so far.

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Specializes in Family Nurse Practitioner.

Personally if they are rotating them I think its only fair that everyone take their turn. At my facility there are usually plenty of us that want the holiday rate so its never hard for people to give up shifts.

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Specializes in NICU, Mother-baby, home health care.

I have to agree with Jules. At my previous employer, I only worked weekends, and we still had to rotate holidays that fell during the week. Again, if everyone is rotating correctly, it should be done in a fair manner. Also, there were plenty of people wanting the holiday pay rate :)

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Specializes in Pediatric/Adolescent, Med-Surg.

So if you have to rotate weekday holidays, is everyone else going to rotate when Christmas falls on a weekend, or is the weekend crew going to be stuck working it?

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Specializes in NICU.

I just started working a weekend program a few months ago. Our policy is the first year the weekender has to work either Christmas or New Years, regardless of where it falls in the week. I had to work Christmas this year, but have off today and will be back for Sat and Sun. I am a little worried about next year, when both holidays fall directly on the weekend. My understanding is that you still only have to work one of the two, but I am not sure. Generally if it falls on a weekend you work it.

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Specializes in Neuro/Med-Surg/Oncology.

At my hospital, if it doesn't fall on the weekend, we don't have to work it. Since Memorial Day and Labor Day are on Mondays, we wind-up working on most if not all of them. Most activities for those days start at noon the next day, so I wind-up missing out or going late. Also, next year, Christmas and New Years are both on the weekend and you can bet we'll be working both. (The eve and the day too.)

At our sister facility, they also have a weekend program. Their weekenders are required to work one "winter" holiday: Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years and one "summer" holiday: Memorial Day, 4th of July, Labor Day. This doesn't seem too unreasonable to me. At least it won't be feast or famine.

Now, from some of the other posts, I'm getting the impression that some facilities require the holiday time in addition to your weekend hours worked that week. I don't think this is right at all.

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Specializes in Adult Critical Care/Neonatal ICU.

I've been on weekends for 6 years and we always just worked the holidays if they fell on the weekends. Now they are trying to have us go on a holiday rotation. There are several problems with this that they haven't clarified with us yet.

1. If I work a holiday that falls during the week will I still get my weekend rate PLUS holiday pay? If not, then working the holiday only makes me 6 hours more pay instead of 12 hours extra pay like "weekday" people get. (When I work a regular weekend day I get time and a half so I get 18 hours worth of pay. If I work a holiday during the week at straight time plus holiday pay it equals 24 hours worth of pay).

2. We have non-paid holidays on our rotation so if I work one of those during the week I am actually LOSING 6 hours of pay.

3. When Christmas Eve and Christmas Day both fall on the weekend am I expected to work 2 days during the week for straight time (losing 12 hours worth of pay) or will I have to "volunteer" to work one of those days so I can break even on pay?

Weekenders are considered part-time for holiday pay benefits so we only get holiday pay if we work it. Full-time people get 8 hours of holiday pay when they don't work the holiday.

This new holiday rotation for weekenders was presented to some units as a way to try and be flexible to keep weekend jobs from being eliminated. The wording was something like, "Times are hard right now and weekend people are expensive." But the managers from other units presented it in a casual way that came across that if people wanted to go on the holiday rotation they could and if they didn't want to then it was no big deal.

I am torn on this. On one hand I would hate to have the weekend positions eliminated but I also feel like we are being used to fill in holes on the holidays. Our unit has had a lot of turnover on the night shift for full-time positions but none of the weekend people have left. Also, NO ONE volunteered to work any of the holidays when Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year's Eve, New Year's Day all fell on the weekend one year. I worked them without complaint because I knew that once I got thru that rough year or two of them falling on the weekend then I would be good for several years while they were during the week. I have also volunteered to work MANY holidays that didn't fall on the weekend. I have worked 5 out of 6 Thanksgivings (would've been 6 but I got called off this year), I work Sunday night into Monday holidays like Labor Day, Memorial Day when I could schedule myself to work Friday night and Saturday night those weekends and have the holiday off. I have volunteered to work New Year's Eves and Days many times. The only holiday I've never volunteered to work extra was Christmas.

I'd be curious to hear about the details of holiday rotations for weekenders at other facilities.

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Specializes in Community, OB, Nursery.

We have to work at least 3-4 minor holidays (Halloween, Mothers Day, Fathers Day, Easter, July 4, Labor Day) and we switch between major winter holidays.

By default, I am already working Easter, Mothers Day, and Father's day. This year I also worked 4hrs on Halloween since it fell on a Friday. I worked the night before T-giving, and will be working 12/31 and 1/1 on top of my regular weekend. I don't like it. If it's going to be required that we work weekday holidays, then I think we should be allowed however many weekday hours we worked off on the weekends. There is not a weekend requirement for regular staff, and I don't think it's right that it doesn't work both ways. Sigh.

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If you are hired for only weekends that's what you should work. I'd hold firm on this if I were a weekend only employee. They are changing the terms of your contract and if you did that they'd have a stroke and not allow it. Hold them to the same standard.

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Specializes in Peds Heme/Onc.

I work only Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. I have to work 2 minors (more fall on F,S,S so I end up working more by choice, my employer only makes me work two), and I have to work 2 major regardless of where they fall. It can be anoying to have to work during the week but it is not fair to make everyone else work the major Holidays because it does not fall on the weekend. They have familys like us all and would like to be off as well.

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That's how it is around here, too. I don't work just weekends, but I would NOT be happy if I did and was made to work weekday holidays, too.

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