Working in the Bay Area

Daly City RN · Apr 6, 2008

Hi Daly City RN,
I came to know from this tread that you are residing in san francisco. could you please give me some info about the agency nursing at san francisco. i have no idea about CA area.If you could give some details about the best hospitals & agency to work at san francisco will be appreciated.
could you tell me where are some safe as well as offordable places at san francisco?
i'm working in nicu.How much a nurse with 6-7 yrs experience can expect to ask(pay rate) their employer(tell me atleast approximately please......) & also some good agencies & their pay rates? please PM me
please give me as much info as possible by you.
thanks in advance.

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Hi Mrs. Bambi,

First of all I apologize for the delay in my response to your question. It is only tonight (local time in California) that I went back to this particular site and read your question. Are you planning to come to the U.S.A. or are you already residing in this country? Are you already a licensed RN in any of the state in the U.S.A.? You must be licensed RN here in the U.S. in order to even get an employment offer from any hospital. If you are a licensed RN from another state it is quite easy to obtain reciprocity and get your RN license in California.

San Francisco has many large hospitals. Just Google "San Francisco California Hospitals" and you should be able to obtain your needed information. Kaiser Permanente Hospitals has many branches up and down the state of California. Univ. of California-San Francisco (UCSF) is world famous for its organ transplantation. Calif. Pacific Med. Cntr. provides top-notch medical care. San Francisco Gen. Hospital is a Level 1 trauma center and is famous for its culture sensitive nursing care.

As for salary, many RN's who are just starting out expect to get paid about $70,000 to $85,000 per year in acute care hospitals in the city of San Francisco, but wages go down somewhat the farther you go away from San Francisco.

If you have several years of acute care experience in the U.S.A., many RN's expect to earn between $90,000 to $100,000 per year, and with overtime and holiday pays, it is not surprising to hear RN's working in San Francisco earning as much as $140,000 per year. Google "SFGate.com" and search for "city pays big bucks" or something like that. Actually that story about city employees earning more than $100,000 per year was recently published, many of whom are registered nurses.

San Francisco is one of the most expensive cities in the U.S.A. Although the mortgage crisis that hit the whole country beginning in 2006 or early 2007 has somewhat mitigated the high cost of housing in San Francisco, but it is still relatively expensive to rent or buy a house here compared to other states in the U.S.A.

There are many safe places to live in San Francisco. Generally speaking, if the houses in the neighborhood are very expensive, then I can say that it is a safe neighborhood. Avoid run-down neighborhoods with lots of liquor stores and drunks in almost every corner, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize then that that is not a safe place to live.

Several years ago, I worked with a nurse recruited from Germany who was recruited by an agency. She was not too happy because she was paid way below the prevailing local wage scale. Even though she acquired a California RN license, her pay rate was lower than the pay rate of our Certified Nursing Assistants! I think the agency received half of her salary for the duration of her contract.

It is very different if you are a "Traveller Nurse" or sometimes they are called "Flying Nurses". These are U.S. licensed nurses willing to work in hospitals away from their home city. They get paid good salaries plus housing allowance of around $3,000 per month. One Traveller nurse from New York state who worked in our hospital a few years ago brought her van to San Francisco and lived in her van for three months and pocketed her $3,000 per month housing allowance. She told us that she showered in her friend's house living here in SF. Now that's smart and adventurous! (I don't think it is possible to do that in wintertime.)

As you may already know, San Francisco is one of the most beautiful cities in the world. The Golden Gate Bridge and the city's cable cars are just two of the many famous landmarks that make San Francisco a world famous destination for tourists.

I hope I was able to answer most of your questions.

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suzanne4, RN · Apr 6, 2008

A few changes that you need to be aware of:

In the US, we do not have reciprocity with licenses, only the NCLEX exam has reciprocity and you will need to endorse your other license if you have one and meet the educational requirements of the new state to get a license.

In the Bay Area, we have not seen any hospitals starting the petitioning process for anyone for more than a year and definitely not now because of the length of the retrogression. Noted that you are from India as well, and if that is your country of birth, it is going to five years plus for a chance at a green card, even if you have the Master's degree, there is still a long line in front of you waiting. The US goes by country of birth in determining when you will get a green card, or have a chance at one.

And none of the hospitals in the Bay Area will consider anyone under the H1-B visa as the unions do not permit it.

You cannot get a job as a travel nurse without already having at least a green card and a few years of experience in your specialty in the US. Most facilities that have the NICU, want to see three to five years of US experience before they will contract them.

With the current state of the retrogression right now, things are very different than they were just a year ago.

( And I am in the Bay Area as well.)

Daly City RN · Apr 6, 2008

A few changes that you need to be aware of:
In the US, we do not have reciprocity with licenses, only the NCLEX exam has reciprocity and you will need to endorse your other license if you have one and meet the educational requirements of the new state to get a license.
In the Bay Area, we have not seen any hospitals starting the petitioning process for anyone for more than a year and definitely not now because of the length of the retrogression. Noted that you are from India as well, and if that is your country of birth, it is going to five years plus for a chance at a green card, even if you have the Master's degree, there is still a long line in front of you waiting. The US goes by country of birth in determining when you will get a green card, or have a chance at one.
And none of the hospitals in the Bay Area will consider anyone under the H1-B visa as the unions do not permit it.
You cannot get a job as a travel nurse without already having at least a green card and a few years of experience in your specialty in the US. Most facilities that have the NICU, want to see three to five years of US experience before they will contract them.
With the current state of the retrogression right now, things are very different than they were just a year ago.
( And I am in the Bay Area as well.)

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Thanks, Suzanne. By the way the reciprocity I wrote about is the (U.S.) state to state reciprocity and not from another country.

If Mrs. Bambi is still living in India then it would take her many years to get a U.S. nursing job.

I did not give any information about nursing agencies that Mrs. Bambi inquired about. I don't get paid to do that! Anyway she can easily Google the information.

Zusanne, glad to know that you live here in the SF Bay Bay Area as well.

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suzanne4, RN · Apr 7, 2008

State to state does not have reciprocity. One must endorse and meet all of the educational requirements for the new state. If the training is not accepted, even if the person has a license from another state, they will not get one issued. This is the point that I am trying to make, and usually need to do so quite frequently. The NCLEX exam has reciprocity meaning that its results are accepted all over the exam does not need to be repeated in most cases. But licenses do not have reciprocity, they are not automatically accepted for licensure in the new state. And CA does their own review, one must even submit transcripts even if they have graduated years and years ago.

CA does not accept training done thru Excelsior, it also does not accept all training that is done in the Philippines. Reciprocity existed when each state still had their own exam, as well as when Canadians could use their Canadian exam for licensure in some states in the US, but they can no longer do that either since all require the VSC now to get a green card or any type of visa. And that requires either passing of the CGFNS exam or the NCLEX exam.

There is no application for reciprocity as there used to be, only for endorsement and initial licensure.

Daly City RN · Apr 7, 2008

State to state does not have reciprocity. One must endorse and meet all of the educational requirements for the new state. If the training is not accepted, even if the person has a license from another state, they will not get one issued. This is the point that I am trying to make, and usually need to do so quite frequently. The NCLEX exam has reciprocity meaning that its results are accepted all over the exam does not need to be repeated in most cases. But licenses do not have reciprocity, they are not automatically accepted for licensure in the new state. And CA does their own review, one must even submit transcripts even if they have graduated years and years ago.
CA does not accept training done thru Excelsior, it also does not accept all training that is done in the Philippines. Reciprocity existed when each state still had their own exam, as well as when Canadians could use their Canadian exam for licensure in some states in the US, but they can no longer do that either since all require the VSC now to get a green card or any type of visa. And that requires either passing of the CGFNS exam or the NCLEX exam.
There is no application for reciprocity as there used to be, only for endorsement and initial licensure.

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Sorry, I guess this "old" nurse who got his LVN license in 1981 and his RN license in 1982 only remembers the olden days.

I'm a little embarrassed to admit that when I took my RN State Board Exam, as they were popularly called back then, we used test papers and pencils...and computerized testing was still many many years away! To tell you the truth I am not sure whether the exam I took was the NCLEX or just the RN State Board exam that is good only in California or they are the same thing. It was so long ago!

I'm glad you cleared some things up for me and for many other readers as well.

Also, I have only practiced nursing in the State of California and have not have to apply for an RN license in another state yet. At this point in my career I don't foresee myself moving to another state to work as a nurse. Actually, at age 51 y.o., I am planning to retire from my acute care hospital nursing job in about 1-2 years, collect my lifetime pension (I'm a government employee of 27 years and already eligible to retire) and then work part-time to supplement my retirement pension.

In order not to stray too far from the topic, for those nurses who wish to work in the SF Bay Area may want to consider working in a government owned hospital if they are interested in early retirement. If you are a young nurse and stay in your job for at least 20 years (if you are going to work anyway consider staying put in one hospital if you like the place) by the time this young nurse reaches the age of 50, this nurse will be eligible for retirement pension and benefits. Then this nurse can work for the private sector and boost his/her income significantly by getting TWO paychecks, one retirement check and one paycheck from the new job. Cool, huh?

Thanks.

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suzanne4, RN · Apr 7, 2008

I actually took the old pencil and paper exam as well and that exam had reciprocity with most other states providing that your numerical result met the requirements of the new state; if it did not, then you had to actually write the exam for that state. That is why there is no such thing as reciprocity with exams any more and since the advent of the non-traditional programs as well, the nurse must meet the educational requirements of the new state to be able to get a license there.

The NCLEX exam is actually computerized and was not around when you wrote your exam. That is a national exam and can be completed in just a few hours, minimum of 75 questions and you can pass.

You may wish to check out the NCLEX Forum to get some idea of what is being done now in the US. Far different from what we did.