Computerized Time Clocks Susceptible to 'Manager Attack' 885
crem_d_genes writes "It appears to be business as usual for some chain stores to delete minutes from employees' time cards to save on the bottom line. The practice, while illegal and officially 'prohibited' by company policies is widely admitted as flourishing. Middle management is especially pressured to engage in the practice known as shaving time - 'a simple matter of computer keystrokes' - or another practice, that of shuffling hours between weeks, which is also prohibited by federal law. A number of lawsuits are being initiated because of admitted and alleged violations."
Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:3, Insightful)
If a "you've got to get this done" order comes in conflict with the "you've got to stop on time" order, then the employee is already screwed.
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Insightful)
Daniel
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Informative)
Overtime isn't always something you plan out and have happen. Sometimes things go wrong, or emergencies occur and people stay late. Are you suggesting all stores should hire 6-12+ people and simply keep them on retainer on the off chance that they're needed for those 2-4 hours a week most overtimes accrue to?
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Insightful)
Daniel
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Informative)
Redundancy makes sense in engineering when it doesn't cost anything (or very little) to have something available that sits around and does nothing except in the event of failure of the main something or other.
Doesn't make sense in scheduling because it only results in skyrocketing costs and either reducing or eliminating your profit margin or causing your prices to skyrocket to compensate, effectively removing you from the market.
Even emergencies that happen "all the time" are unpredictable in nature. You say you can just hire one more person and the problem goes away. Now schedule that guy. Put him on the schedule. Where does he go? The nature of the emergency dictates the solution, and the more hours you are open the harder it is to have another guy. If you're only open 10 hours a week, then hiring one more person to work 10 hours a week will keep you covered. But if you're open 160 hours a week, it's a different story.
Here's how you handle scheduling. It's very simple, and the system works well. First you determine how much work is needed to open the store. Then you schedule enough people to do all the work needed and have it open by a specific time. Next you determine, to the best of your ability, how much business you will do before 5pm. 5pm is the standard turnover hour in retail, although I've seen places do their evening shift change at 4pm or 6pm, and I've even seen places not have a shift change. (They were a mess) Now you multiply the amount of business you anticipate by the ideal labor ratio for your business, divide the result by the average hourly wage in your store, and that tells you how many people to schedule. That's not usually good enough, though, since for many businesses afternoon business drops off after lunch, so instead you break the day into smaller chunks and do the same math. Then you look at who can work that day, what you've already scheduled them for, and what you need to schedule them for later on. (After awhile you get a knack for it and don't have to do the fancy math) Great, so far.
Now you build in some redundancy (the best managers already build in some redundancy in their schedule, believe it or not). The best place to build your redundancy is to schedule someone who says "I want all the hours you can give me" to get off work immediately before the time period in which you are concerned about having enough employees. That way, if you need more, you can just ask that guy to stay, knowing he'll probably say yes. There's other ways.
Alright, now you say we should have one more person on the schedule to deal with "emergencies". We have to pay him. Having one more person each hour on the schedule (assuming he's not the one with the emergency) will drive your labor ratio through the roof, and in many retail businesses will actually cause the business to be unprofitable.
Now, as a businessman, pick one:
Having just enough people to do the work that is needed lets you have the lowest prices possible with an acceptable profit margin (assuming other costs are also in line) and still provide the level of service you need to in order to stay in business. Scheduling another person for each hour of business requires your prices go up. Sending people home early because of stupid overtime policies reduces the level of service you can offer.
It's a complex equation. It's also very shortsighted to set your company policies on the word "overtime" rather than the other numbers available. I've made killer overtime in places I've worked while overall we had great service and low labor ratio. The bosses didn't c
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Informative)
For many of these people, BTW, the penalties they will have to pay their babysitters for picking up late (which can be as high as $1/minute, DOUBLING every minute) will vastly outweigh any additional amount they earn from unscheduled, forced overtime.
sPh
Prosecute the babysitters! (Score:4, Funny)
Let's lay off Walmart and prosecute the babysitters. They make Dennis Kozlowski, Ken Lay, and Jack Welch look like Mother Teresa by comparison.
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:4, Insightful)
See "All Quiet on the Western Front" for a discussion of the difference between rich families and poor families when it comes to paying for vital services (doctor's care in that case, but the point applies). Nothing new there since 1918 I guess. Or 0018 for that matter.
sPh
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean, sure, no one is going to pay those fees. They will just pick up their kid, head home, and..... then what? Do you have any idea how hard it is to find child care for 5 PM to midnight? I won't even mention trying to find overnight care. The care provider has all the power in that situation, not the working parent.
No, they won't really pay $1,000,000,000. They will just pay $100 or $500 or whatever they can't afford, with a warning not to do it again. Hell, my professional employees, who can afford lawyers, have the same problem.
And the next time the employer demands unscheduled overtime, then what? When the care provider drops them, then what?
Sheesh guys, move out of Silicon Valley for a while to a neighborhood where people are fighting to earn a living and spend some time talking to the people who live there. And talk to some of your low-income, low-status employees before you jump on my ass. Just keep in mind that if you are a man, they are most likely hiding all this from you out of fear and shame.
sPh
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Insightful)
Spoken like lower management who doesn't know how business works :) The problem is not that workers refuse to work overtime, its they won't do it for free. Overtime pay is supposed to be an incentive NOT to overwork your employees. Every place I've ever worked for (from, subway, to walmart, to universities after I got my degree) have had the same policy, "We do not pay overtime."
Here's why. Say you own a trucking company, and theres a long stretch of road called "interstate 1" where the speed limit is 55MPH. For arguments sake, lets say the road is 55 miles long. Said trucking company wants to lower costs -- they want drivers to traverse the road quicker. Now, how to write the company policy for that?
Statement 1: "Drivers will maintain an average speed of 75 MPH on interstate 1."
Statement 2: "Drivers will take no longer then 40 minutes to traverse interstate 1."
Whats the difference? Statement 1 is ordering employees to commit crimes -- civil and criminal penalties may ensue. Statement 2? The implication is that employees should break the law to meet the companies demands -- much harder argument for a prosecuter to make.
Its the *EXACT* same thing with the overtime rule, the rule is designed to force managers to shave time. They can't say "Shave time" so they give a strict limit on how many hours the store pay which is far below the number actually needed. If a manager refuses to shave time, then fire him and find someone who will.
As far as tricks, this one is old school. What i've been seeing alot of lately, is companies compensating employees with comp time, but then refusing to ever allow employees to use the comp time. It's a much better scam because its very hard to prove you had no intention of allowing them to use their comp time. If an employee insists, just fire them, oops their comp time is gone to :)
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Insightful)
which is why I'm glad there was a $1.5 million settlement against Taco Bell last year [nytimes.com]. What if the jury only awarded what was taken? Then companies would just keep doing it and consider the lawsuits just part of doing business.
Instead they should make every lawsuit worth at least 10,000 times more than the money taken. That should make other companies think twice about stealing from employees.
This story is a great example of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.
The Down Side (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Insightful)
However, with 20 people half-time, you have 20 shitty jobs that can't support anyone, forcing most of those employees to get second jobs. And if they ever have to take a trip to the doctor/hospital, it's probably going to come out of *your* pocket (indirectly, obviously), because they won't be able to pay for it and won't have insurance to cover it. Those 20 people will also probably have the attitude that "it's just a shitty job, they can get rid of me at any time," wich leads to low morale and poor performance.
It'd be great if everyone could live off of 20 hours a week. But the $6 something that most places like that pay leads to a monthly take home of well under $500, which isn't enough for anyone in the real world. Add a second similar job, and you're almost half-way to the poverty level!
Apparently you are unfamiliar with the term "working poor"?
--Jeremy
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Insightful)
2) The "whoops I'm 15 minutes late in clocking out" situation, where an employee may not have really worked any overtime, but maybe got a hair sidetracked on his way to the timeclock, or just didn't realize what time it was, his watch was out of sync with the time-clock, etc...
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Normal Practice at Wal-Mart (Score:5, Insightful)
What is this 8 hour workday I keep hearing people talk about? - Salaried, exempt. :-(
How come this is not considered theft? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:How come this is not considered theft? (Score:5, Informative)
Willful violations may be prosecuted criminally and the violator fined up to $10,000. A second conviction may result in imprisonment.
Re:How come this is not considered theft? (Score:5, Insightful)
Does anyone really believe that time shaving, going after MP3 traders, etc. is somehow directly linked to the current administration? If you think that time shaving wasn't just as much a problem before Bush, for those companies that had fully-electronic time clocks, you're kidding yourself.
Similarly, I doubt that these practices will change just from the installation of a new administration. As long as employees take time shaving lying down, and people continue to shop there, it will be a problem.
Re:How come this is not considered theft? (Score:4, Insightful)
They are commiting fraud. They are defrauding the employees out of wages. They are also defrauding the government out of payroll taxes, but we'll leave that for someone else.
Suppose you're selling me a serivce (let's say computer consulting), and you bill me at a rate of $100 per hour. I'm in charge of keeping track of the hours you work. You tell me each day what you worked & I then give you a statement at the end of each week with the total hours and a check for what I owe you. If you submit 10 hours for five days (50 hours = $5000) & I give you the statement with 45 hours listed and a check for $4500, explain how I did not just cheat you out of $500.
Re:Here's a more direct analogy that might help (Score:5, Funny)
1. If there is no physical component it cannot be stolen, thieved, pirated, etc.
2. If it is technologically possible it is morally right and should be legal.
So I agree there is no difference. But this is slashdot wackyland so they both should be legal. Get the with program or be threatened with moderation.
Oh wait. Did I mess this one up? Since it involves a poor(er) person instead of a rich(er) person its not ok to mess with their rights relating to the intangible? Dang it, I'll get it right someday.
Re:Here's a more direct analogy that might help (Score:4, Insightful)
Nice troll.
I don't care if you pirate money, that is, make unlicensed copies of coins and bills. The government might, but it doesn't really concern me.
I do care if you steal the specific coins that are en route to my account. Which is what the article talks about.
Of course, if you meant "pirated" in it's original meaning...
Now this is interesting. Perhaps you might be so kind as to give some examples of Slashdot advocating abolishing all laws (which is what this really means, if you think about it) ?You're on the right track. It is indeed more morally wrong to steal from the poor than from the rich, because the poor will suffer more from losing a given amount of money than the rich will.
So yes, you did mess this up, but keep trying and I'm sure you get it straight. Soones or later...
& at call centers., the experience is ... (Score:5, Interesting)
At a different call center, we had time cards, but no one ever used them. So the manager would simply see who was present each day, and fill in a form saying we worked our five hour shift, regardless of the hours we actually worked --- which was usually somewhere between four and four and a half hours. If he paid us for 5 hours, and we were only there for an hour, his attitude was "Don't worry about it." [And no, that time did not have to be made up.]
At a third call center I worked at, we would be penalized if we worked overtime. Management was supposed to hand us a sheet every morning, showing our worked hours this week, and the time to leave that day. Three violations, and you were terminated. [The major problem is that managers seldom showed us the sheets in the morning, so more often than not, we would come back from break, and be told to sign out for the day. The next week we would get a verbal warning, because we took a break that we were not entitled to.] [That company is now also out of business.]
This would be a better article... (Score:4, Insightful)
Keep handwritten records (Score:5, Insightful)
Keep handwritten records in ink of your time in a journal along with your daily activities.
To what end? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:To what end? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:To what end? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:To what end? (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless there is an audit trail every time the manager edits the time, I'd say most folks would believe the handwritten records. Only if there was no easy way to "adjust" hours would computer record be more credible.
Problem is, many folks will forget to punch in or out, punch in before they change, or otherwise try to game the system in their favor. Therefore a manager needs a easy method to account for this, wether it is done for simple forgetfulness or in an outright attempt to defraud the employer.
What we have here is folks seeking a technology solution to an HR problem. Even if you find a perfect technology solution, a manager can still intimidate employees into punching out early, working off the clock, etc. so long as there folks desparate for work, employers of last resort will try this; note that this ensures they get the cruft of the labor pool, will offer poor service, have employee theft problem. Turns into a vicious cycle, since this will reinforce their view that employyees are a shifty lot that deserve this abuse....
Re:To what end? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This would be a better article... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:This would be a better article... (Score:5, Insightful)
How about: stop giving sanction to slavemasters by volunteering yourself as a slave. Stop participating in the aspects of society you find abbhorent or wrong.
Most people will patently reject this solution. Either the ideal is too precious to give up in the face of harsh reality, the person has mired themselves in debt and this is not an option, or they fear peer pressure from family and friends. But those are personal problems.
This problem is centuries old and its root has reached critical mass. If you don't want to comply, and you don't want to drop out, the only option remaining is revolt. And did you really expect to find a blueprint for revolution in a magazine article?
Re:This would be a better article... (Score:4, Insightful)
Having employees is more complicated than playing a video game. Often times employees will feel loyal to the company. They'll want to put in the extra time because they perceive it as helping the company that puts food on their table.
And you just want to fire these people? They're usually not folks that are trying to chissle their employer out of a few extra bucks. They're people who want to do a good job and will keep working until it's done.
Sheesh.
Re:This would be a better article... (Score:5, Interesting)
Sam Walton speaks from the grave. Thank you Mister Walton, you may return to hell now.
It's against federal labor laws to work unpaid hours whether it's the employee's idea or otherwise, and for reasons which are OBVIOUS unless you're retarded.
Can't help but wonder... (Score:3, Insightful)
What exactly was a former member of the Air Force military police doing working for Toys 'R' Us in anything less than a managerial capacity?
Re:Can't help but wonder... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Can't help but wonder... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Can't help but wonder... (Score:5, Informative)
It has been a while, but I recall that the Air Force treated Security Policeman (SP) as a default slot -- good for folks that hadn't requested anything in particular, with aptitudes well-suited to holding a gun while watching for Bad Guys. It's a role closer to security guard than policeman. There are some positions that have more responsibility, but I don't doubt that someone who had served one enlistment as an SP would be qualified for jobs not more complicated than, well, security guard.
(Again, nothing against the SPs: It just wasn't one of those positions that gave experience that was highly sought in the outside world.)
TSG
Remember when we had unions? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Remember when we had unions? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Remember when we had unions? (Score:5, Informative)
Unions have some bad points, and many people like to point them out for being greedy and self serving bastards who are gouging the companies.
Well Unions are the result of the management abusing workers in the extreme, 100 years ago, they were still using children in dangerous factory jobs. Anyone want to have worked in a coal mine 100 years ago? It is was just dangerous, it was out and out deadly. Unions brought alot of workers rights that did not exist before, like minimum wage. You do not think that management brought that about, do you?
To give a more recent example, management of American Airlines was complaining that they might have go to bankrupty if the Unions did not make concessions, which they did. Not long after it was revealed that management was giving itself retention bonuses. [cnn.com] It is just easier to blame Unions because everyone knows what they earn, but not everyone knows what a manager does...
Re:Remember when we had unions? (Score:5, Insightful)
I have to order my sneaks from a company that specializes in wide sizes, Hitchcock Shoe, and their house brand is the only model that fits right.
My sneakers are of high quality, and interesting style, and cost $35. They're made in the US... all of Hitchcock's house brands are made in either the US or England. First world countries, with unionized shops and first world wages, benefits, and protections. It's not like the product has a huge market to drive down the prices or subsidise their marketing, either.
Thirty five bucks.
How much did your made-in-China, sweatshop produced Nikes cost you?
Offshoring is a dodge management uses to hide their incompetence. American labor is a phenomenal value: literate, educated, adaptable and to-the-grindstone efficient. It's why Nissan, Mercedes, Toyota, Honda and Hyundai all have factories here. American managers are a bunch of fad-addled buffoons who can't see past the next quarter and insist on ludicrous compensation, so get their asses kicked by more reasonable and intelligent European and Asian companies.
SoupIsGood Food
Re:Remember when we had unions? (Score:4, Funny)
Great choices capitalism has left us huh? Either get paid like a chinese or lose your job to a chinese. Whoo Hoo!.
Lets get rid of the unions and take a five hundred percent pay cut. Let's also get rid of all environmental regulations, labor laws, laws against prison labor, and of course those stupid worker safety regulations. That will show those chinese!
work the clock (Score:5, Funny)
Of course if you're working at the Burger King the Man has pretty much had his way with you already, but that's a different story.
Re:work the clock (Score:3, Insightful)
Of course, somebody who stands by the timeclock from 12:37:43 to 12:38:00 is not actually working... so in this case it'd be legal for the manager to correct the stop time to 12:37:43 and therefore take advantage of the downward rounding to shave a quarter hour.
Re:work the clock (Score:3, Insightful)
When I am ready to go home for the day, it takes me roughly 30 seconds to log out, collect personal items from my desk and stand up. Another 75 seconds are spent walking from my desk to the time clock. In winter an extra 30 seconds can be added to account for retrieving and putting on my coat.
Thus if I'm sure to start this process no earlier then 5:05:15 on my computer clock then I a
Re:work the clock (Score:3, Interesting)
This really only benefited the PT'ers, as the FT's were limited to 40 hours unless management approved overtime for the employe
Re:work the clock (Score:5, Interesting)
Once upon a time..... (Score:5, Interesting)
I used to work in retail, a middle sized national UK chain, and I can safely say that these happenings are not just US centric. They happen in this country too, and probably whereever there are large chains.
I was there a year before they brought in the electronic swipe card time keeping system, and I never think they saved much money with it anyway, as right up until I left, they were still employing a woman 2 days a week to chase up missed swipes, double checking stuff etc.
The company only paid you in increments of 15 minutes, and one of their favourite passtimes was to shave off enough minutes from your swipe in and swipe out so that it looked like those periods only consisted of 14 minutes and voila, half an hour saved on that day for that employee. Of course, us employees caught on and brought the issue up with the store manager who of course denied it all.
I did some research into the time management system, and discovered that one of its features was a debug trail, covering all activities within the system. So, one day when I had access to the system, I changed the windows shortcut to turn on this debug trail, and noone was any the wiser about it.
6 months later, we had a store visit by a group of people on the board of directors. I waited until they had done the rounds, and the store manager was glowing with pride etc, when I interrupted them to ask them a question. The question I asked was "So, is it national company policy to rip off your workers?", and when asked to explain, I did so.
Of course, they denied all knowledge, and the store manager was ready to throw me out there and then, until I said "Well, I can prove it.", and prove it I did. The VIPs, who later it turned out, knew nothing of this, took a copy of this file, and had it verified by the people who sold the time management system (luckily, they had checksums on all activities within the file, so they could conclusivly say that it was not faked, and every action produced the correct checksum in the correct order).
The store manager got sacked, as did a number of others in the chain who were doing a similiar thing, and all workers in these stores got paid an extra 2 weeks of pay. I took the money and left the company, to join my current employers who Im very happy at, outside of retail :)
Re:Once upon a time..... (Score:4, Insightful)
this used to happen to me... (Score:5, Interesting)
tough shit... if the company's not going to pay me to do my job properly, the customer's going to suffer. not me...
Employer justification (Score:3, Insightful)
Common practice (Score:5, Funny)
Scott Adams (Score:4, Funny)
True (Score:5, Informative)
Re:True (Score:3, Interesting)
I would be very surprised if the US didn't have something similar. Think about all the people that work on oil rigs. 2 weeks, 2 weeks off. Thats how they usually do it, they have
Re:True (Score:5, Informative)
Contracts that violate federal law, even when agreed to by both parties, are unenforceable.
Re:True- basically radioshack policy (Score:5, Interesting)
Which is, of course, total bullshit- even if Texas law allows that, Texas employment law doesn't cover a kid working in St. Louis. RadioShack specializes in screwing employees. Don't get me started on the commission-stealing managers I had as an assistant. Fuck RS.
Re:True- basically radioshack policy (Score:5, Funny)
Re:True (Score:4, Informative)
This is why we have unions (Score:5, Insightful)
Engaging in what is essentially part-time slavery is bad management; those who engage in it, or look the other way, are criminals.
Few Workplace Rights (Score:3, Insightful)
What's the punishment when an employee steals from his employer? What's good for the goose is good for the gander. I say it's time we start holding companies responsible for their actions. In particular, it should be easier to pierce the corporate veil than it is today. It would be nice if they paid taxes, too.too.
Re:Few Workplace Rights (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Few Workplace Rights (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Few Workplace Rights (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd call it simple theft. Try to pretty it up with names like "shaving" or whatever, but it still boils down to good 'ol garden variety stealing. I'm not sure why this is being handled in civil court instead of criminal court. They had motif, intent and opportunity and should be facing the same sanctions as employees caught boosting goods out of the warehouse.
You're totally right about responsibility. As long as some groups can have their criminal behavior regulated to civ
Re:Few Workplace Rights (Score:5, Informative)
Eh? Ever hear of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) [dol.gov]? I'd say those are some pretty good rights, including the ability to get back pay (with penalties and interest) long after a bad deed is done. Please don't take a story about some bad companies (who are no doubt headed for trouble on this) and make broad, sweeping US-bashing statements that aren't really true. There are plenty of valid points on which to bash the US, but I don't think this is one of them. The rights are there. The companies in this story violated them, and are subject to penalties because of it. Read the site -- the punishment can be tough, including prison time:
violations may be prosecuted criminally and the violator fined up to $10,000. A second conviction may result in imprisonment.
And what's that about companies not paying taxes? What color is the sky on your planet?
Working though lunch is not allowed. (Score:5, Interesting)
This would mean that having a timecard that says 8am to 4pm with no breaks is just as illegal as inserting the 30 minute break that didn't actually get taken. It's just as much the employee's responsiblity to know they have to take a lunch break as it is the manager's responsiblity to tap the worker on the sholder and shut them down and force them to take the break.
We've got offsetting fouls on the play...
Re:Working though lunch is not allowed. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Working though lunch is not allowed. (Score:5, Funny)
My very first job involved some contracting for the local electric company. I was working on the computer when the gals in the office I was in came to me and said "It's break time." I said thanks, but I was salaried. No, they insisted, they *had* to go on break, and exactly when they were scheduled to (union rules), and they couldn't leave a contractor unattended at the computers (company policy).
So I went and took a fifteen-minute break with them, for which they got billed at $100/hour.
Ugh (Score:4, Insightful)
Seriously though, I wonder at the effectiveness and pragmatism of such tactics. While it can be profitable to attempt stunts like these in large factories with hundreds of employees where a couple added minutes every day can add up, having so many people constantly look at their watches in perplexement is bound to rebound on you eventually when they sue and some overzealous jury takes the moral high ground. Not that it matters to the manager who actually perpetrated the crime since the verdict won't come out of his skin, but the company itself should probably be more vigilant in such matters. History is rife corporations being fined exhorbitant amount due to the actions of employees harassed by the bottom line.
Hard to detect? (Score:5, Insightful)
But c'mon, most people can tell if they're frickin' worked overtime and suddenly not see that extra pay1/2 in their paycheck.
Trust me, I work 42-44 hours a week, and if even the slightest calculation on my pre-tax pay does NOT equal +40*8/hr. I'd notice pretty frickin' quick.
Always remember, even with direct deposit, CHECK YOUR PAY STUBS. Do the simple math, if it's too tricky (let's say you don't get a flat number per hour 'n you worked a frag-ton of hours) get a bloody calculator. Hell, there's probably one on your cell phone, and there sure as heck is one on your computer. =)
I figured they were talking like shaving 15 minutes out of the day to save a few bucks here and there, but entire rounds of overtime pay?! This isn't hour-SHAVING, this is hour-REAPING.
Unauthorized overtime (Score:3, Insightful)
This can be a sticky situation for employers. Frequently, they instruct employees that overtime is not available, people go over anyway, and the company has to pay up, whether or not they need/can afford the extra hours. That's the law.
As long as employers are clear about how many hours people are allowed to work, they shouldn't be required to shell out for people who go over.
Re:Unauthorized overtime (Score:5, Insightful)
The proper solution for this is diligent managerial supervision. The problem is, these "time shaver" middle managers aren't catching this unauthorized overtime until it's too late. If it's that important, they should be out on the floor at 7 hours, 59 minutes telling the employee "you're done-- clock out". If they can't "manage" the job, perhaps they should be stock clerks.
District Managers and Corporate Execs Responsible? (Score:3, Interesting)
You have to wonder if there's any way to go after the district managers and/or corporate for knowingly demanding certain performance levels that could not be reasonably achieved with the number of "billable hours" allowed.
Reluctantly, we need a new regulation (Score:5, Insightful)
WORM drives or secure bitemporal databases (Score:4, Insightful)
During my temp career (Score:3, Informative)
Publix (Score:5, Interesting)
Scumbag employers. (Score:4, Interesting)
Amazing (Score:3, Insightful)
They did that at the Office Depot I worked at. (Score:3, Interesting)
Electronic Time Tracking (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Electronic Time Tracking (Score:4, Informative)
I had this happen to me and I reported it... (Score:5, Interesting)
Besides charging the employees for their uniforms, and then demanding them back at the end of their employment or they'd withhold the last paycheck (and no, you got no refund), they'd shave hours flagrantly.
With me, since I often worked long shifts, sometimes open to close, they'd clock me out for breaks on my timecard whether or not I took any. I even went back and changed my timecard after the management did, and they'd just change it back. Some weeks, they'd even track it back more to make sure I never went into overtime.
I got tired of this, so I waited until a friend who was training to be a manager was on duty late at night. I took my timecard with me on a delivery route to copy it before the end of the pay period, when they'd change it. My paycheck, of course, reflected a lower amount of hours, but I had proof now that they had cheated me.
I sent the proof to my state employment board and filled out a complaint form. I had left the company before any investigation happened, but about a year after I filed, the main corporation bought out the franchise and fired nearly everyone in the management fields.
I feel great knowing they can't cheat anyone else. I'm upset that I lost perhaps $500 in the few months I worked there. But you *can* sue, and possibly win, to get those hours back, with interest, and your state will probably investigate and fine the company higher amounts than they saved, only if you take the initiative.
Re:I had this happen to me and I reported it... (Score:4, Funny)
I worked for an independent franchise chain of the Marco's Pizza restaurant a number of years ago as a delivery driver.
Pizza delivery jobs suck. I once had a job as a delivery driver for CosaNostra pizza, and they had a really strict policy that the pizza had to be delivered in 30 minutes or less. One day, the manager gave me a pizza that only had 8 minutes left for delivery, and I accidentally put the company car in a burbclave pool en route. Luckily, a Kourier was able to deliver the pizza within the remaining amount of time, so I wasn't totally screwed...
Now I'm doing anti-virus work. Much better fit for me.
Time and Attendance (Score:5, Interesting)
Now what i do see a problem with is rounding. A lot of places like to round punches in a very unfair manner. If you're 15 minutes early it rounds forward, and if you stay 15 minutes late it rounds back. This is VERY common, however illegal.
The law states that whatever rounding rules you apply at the start of the day must be the same rule you apply at the end of the day, so if your employer uses these techniques to cheat you, do something about it.
Best Buy (Score:5, Interesting)
In my situation, I was the 'in home pc-tech'. I had to use my own car. When I was in a car accident, I obviously could no longer continue in that job. My computer access was immediatly restricted so I couldn't finish the invoices I had outstanding. The white bankers box I had put all my invoices into while I was BEGGING to have my computer access restored 'vanished'. Shortly after that I was 'fired' for theft. Was I jailed? Nope. Fined? Nope. Had my pay check shortened to cover the 'loss'? Nope. They simply wanted to hire another in home computer tech and didn't have the money to do so without getting rid of the highest paid computer store tech that they had -- me. I saw all the 'tao' messages that had been sent back and forth to the support manager of the tech area.
This kind of crap goes on all the time, and it needs to stop.
What happened to the general manager of the store? Well, after being caught in MORE time-stealing, he was promoted to REGIONAL MANAGER!
That's business in the US for 'ya!
How to Fight This (Score:5, Interesting)
Daughter #1 came home from her job at a regional restaurant chain, one night during high school, and complained bitterly that she was getting cheated. It seems the restaurant's assistant managers had decided that they were going to make some policy changes to save costs--and the costs they had in mind were the payroll costs of the "cleaners", two or three people who did cleaning chores in the kitchen and the restaurant area. Their brilliant plan: the cleaning chores would be assigned to the wait staff--who would have to perform them after going off the clock at the end of their shifts.
For those of you keeping score at home, this is a federal crime.
An Internet solution...
So I registered for a Hotmail account, under the pseudonym of a noted villain [wikipedia.org] in American labor history, and found an email address for the chain's corporate parent from their web site. The email went something like this:
The company jumped
I sent the email late Friday night. By Saturday afternoon the company had descended, announced that the restaurant would be closed on Monday and Tuesday for "training," and Tuesday night had a staff meeting announcing that this would not happen again, yadda yadda yadda. The assistant managers got spanked.
In an age of anonymous email, there's no excuse for putting up with this
Especially because, for just a couple of bucks, you can register a domain that will scare the stuffing out of your typical PHB (oh, like "People United for Fair Wage Reporting", "Pennsylvania Labor Standards Action", "Mid-Atlantic Coalition for Labor Justice", and so forth), and be sure to "copy" your anonymous emails to a name at that domain. Or, for that matter, copy a local newspaper columnist.
The cockroach principle
Shine a bright light, and cockroaches will scatter like, well, cockroaches. An anonymous email to corporate headquarters, or the local newspaper, will focus a lot of attention on the cockroaches who are trying to pull this stuff.
Re:Not quite so anonymous any more (Score:5, Insightful)
Nope--and it no longer needs to be. This happened two-and-a-half years ago, and Daughter #1 no longer works there. And isn't likely to want to go back.
Anonymity matters
When I threatened the restaurant chain they took it seriously. And when they landed on the local restaurant staff, some of the assistant managers spent some time trying to figure out who had sent it. They guessed that the letter came from the parent of one of the waitresses who were under 18 (since I'd mentioned keeping minors past midnight), and quietly pulled those workers aside and asked them if they knew who sent the email. Daughter #1, having been coached on the ethics of the situation, lied through her teeth.
(Digression: you are only responsible to tell the truth to people who have a legitimate claim to the truth. When the Nazis ask if there are Jews in your basement [assuming there are] you are perfectly correct to lie. The 'Nazis at the door' question is standard stuff for a seminary ethics class, and we had this conversation with Daughter #1 when I sent the email.)
But if the assistant managers had found out who it was, her life would have been miserable. That's the beauty of anonymous email: you can threaten the company--or complain to the authorities--without retribution. If the authorities won't move without a complaint (from a soon-to-be-unemployed-employee) you can make your pitch to the local newspaper. Practically every TV station in America has a "Channel 8 HelpLine" type of crew: they investigate complaints, putting the most photogenic ones on TV. They'd love to do a "concealed identity" interview about how your boss is stealing money from your paycheck, followed by the obligatory denials from the home office, etc.
As I wrote earlier, the trick is to shine light on the cockroaches. With the Internet, it's easier to do.
They don't do this in the Euro social democracies (Score:4, Insightful)
When are Americans going to wake up and realize that capitalism is a TOOL to be used, and NOT a end-all, be-all, or a way of life, or a fuckin' religion?
But like all tools, it must have comprehensive controls and safeguards built in. You wouldn't design a chainsaw without adequate controls and safeguards, would you?
I guess you did not read my OTHER post (Score:4, Insightful)
But the workers do not report it very often. Why not? Because when they try to get another job, they may not be able to. For one, the old employer may badmouth them, effectively blackballing them from the job market.
So, what makes the social democracies from America in this regard? In the social democracies, if the workers cannot get another job (especially because of being blackballed/given a bad reference), then the state will give them MONEY for YEARS. Yes, it is not uncommon for workers who cannot find work to draw welfare/unemployment for years in the social democracies. So, therefore the workers there are NOT at the mercy of the job market.
This situation is mainly true in the true social democracies, such as Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Netherlands, etc., but also to a somewhat lesser degree in other Euro countries such as France, Germany, Belgium, Switz, Italy, Luxembourg, and also Australia and even Canada (where the average able bodied young male draws an average 21 months of unemployment at a time (that is IMPOSSIBLE in the USA)).
So, this is America--a social darwinistic state, where we live shorter lives than the Europeans, where we are stunted physically compared to the citizens of the social democracies, and where we come up with way back in the pack in many areas of living standards.
Best country in the world...MY ASS!
Easy way to kill overtime... (Score:4, Interesting)
No kidding, you can get away with anything by using salary as a defense. I used to work for a company that was based on "Good Ol' Boy" rules from Texas (Cargo Furniture, division of Tandycrafts, who put tiny crate-style furniture showrooms in malls). That was work 48hours, six days a week. Of course, we had a staff of three to run a whole store, so this was broken up by two full timers (a manager and assistant manager) and one part timer. Luckily (or unluckily) the stores were usually empty (and thus, no longer around), so crowds were not a problem. The part timer was only there so no one, in theory, had to work a full 12-hour day.
The salary went like this: they said it was hourly, but they paid you overtime. I can't recall why they paid you hourly, but there was some odd tax thing of salary vs. hourly. So, as a manager I got paid:
(40hrs x 1.0 x $7.00 = $280 for "normal time") + (8hrs x 1.5 x $7.00 = $ 84 for "overtime") = $364/week = $18,928 a year as "salary"
Now, it was never explained why we were paid hourly, because if you worked 50, 60, or 80 hours in one week (like your assistant was on vacation), you didn't get overtime. But on your paycheck was your hourly wage. But it was salary. You had to clock in, too, but you weren't allowed to report the real hours and so the timecards never matched anything in reality.
Now, tell someone you want hire, "We'll pay you less than what people around here are getting paid for assistants, but you have to work six days a week, 48 hours a day." Then tell a part timer he or she's getting minimum wage and can only work no more than 10 hours a week. I never got many applicants, and many managers were totally starved for staff. 80 hour weeks were common. Those who had a staff often worked other stores that didn't have staff just so the only employee could get a day off. For nothing. My record was 2 months of 12-hour days with no time off, and I wasn't even close to the record holder. It was insane.
Confused? Yeah, those who questioned the legality of it got fired. This was back during Bush Sr's recession of the early 90s, so I was happy to have a job at all (previously, I had been unemployed for 2 years, and was living in the projects - I could NOT afford to be choosy about my employer).
Wall-Mart uses the same tactics. They hire people for low wages, and those that agree they know are too stupid, have no self-confidence, or otherwise unable to get a job elsewhere, either because of local economies, or previous employer problems. In fact, if you DO sue a company for defrauding you, good luck getting a job elsewhere! Maybe that's not legal, or even true in some states, but try telling that to your average Wall-Mart employee, who wasn't able to get a better job in the first place. They may bitch about having rights, but they can't afford to go to court if they want to also put food on their table.
Re:Cue Management apologists! (Score:3, Funny)
MOD PARENT UP (Score:4, Funny)
Anyone know where we could buy him an oversized novelty hat? (Oversized... it's funny)
Uh, that would be me... (Score:5, Insightful)
Or, well, sorta.
Point #1: this is illegal. The United States has a bewildering array of laws and regulations governing how people are paid. They're bewildering because they're written by lawyers, and they're written by lawyers because a seemingly endless list of companies have tried to cheat. But the bewildering array--in the end--ain't all that tough to understand: if she works for 40 hours, she gets paid for 40 hours. You can define the weekly pay period (in the sense that some employers count Sunday as the first day of the week, some Monday, some Saturday, etc.) but it must apply to everybody. Overtime applies after 40 hours (and after 8 hours per day, in some circumstances).
But there's more: if the worker is under 18, there are limits on the number of hours worked per week, and worked per day, during the school year. If the worker is under 18 (for some equipment), or under 16 (for *lots* of equipment) the worker cannot use some kinds of equipment, and generally can't clean any equipment more sophisticated (or dangerous) than a spoon. There are all kinds of rules. And all kinds of draconian penalties that the government will slap you with if you get caught.
Point #2: The question is, who gets caught? Notice a theme that runs through the article: over and over again somebody says, "the district manager told me that overtime was prohibited, so I had to make sure we had none on the books." Put another way, somebody in senior management issues a decree: payroll will be less than N% of gross sales for the month, Or Else. And the local store manager is left with the problem of making sure that payroll stays below N%--because he or she is perfectly aware of what "Or Else" means. Or--perhaps--because he or she has figured out that being a senior company manager is a nice life, and wants to stand out as a cost-cutting superstar. Either way, (and here's the crucial point) the local manager is the one who is fiddling with the time cards.
So somebody (oh, say, like the irate father of a cheated employee) calls the cops. If the call goes to the company's "confidential" reporting line, the manager gets yelled at. If the call goes to the state Department of Labor (and every U.S. state has one) the company will put on a charade--they'll have big meetings, they'll express all kinds of sensitivity, and they'll issue a press release saying that they have fired the manager. And firing the manager, of course, solves the problem.
And if you think this problem is caused by the chump store manager...
Firing the guy two rungs up on the ladder from minimum wage doesn't stop the problem. When a consistent pattern exists of timeclock cheating (which the Times article flatly asserts) the problem belongs to the company. (Note, particularly, the last item in the story: the writer expressly makes the point that McDonald's does not do this.) We've been down this road with civil rights and sexual harassment: a pattern of practice across the company is more telling than a few memos telling managers not to do something wrong.
The solution:
Launch a federal task force into wage and timeclock abuse at Wal-Mart. There is an ongoing investigation into the use of illegal aliens on cleaning crews at Wal-Mart--now this. Clearly there's grounds to dig into the mess. Find a few smoking guns, and then start arresting people. Who told you to do this? Who showed you? Who knew what? When?
Send a CEO to prison, and maybe people will pay attention.
Re:While I don't doubt (Score:5, Informative)
Did you even read the article? It doesn't show from your comment.
I know that you can round time's to the nearest 15 minutes. As long as you do it consistently for each employee each week for non punchcard/computerized employee's you're fine.
Rounding an employee's time to the nearest quarter-hour is one thing. Shaving off 10-15 hours from an employee's recorded work-week is something completely different.
The article makes it sound that if you work 41 hours in any job you get overtime, which in the United States is wholly untrue.
Quote from the article: "Federal law generally requires paying time-and-a-half to nonmanagerial employees who work more than 40 hours a week."(emphasis added)
Re:LARGE chains? (Score:4, Funny)
Your observation that abuses can happen in little businesses contravenes the accepted group-think that such problems are the sole domain of large evil soulless mega-corporations.
Please report to the nearest re-education facility immediately for your proper anti-corporation indoctrination.