Can I refuse to do overtime?

Xterminator

Xterminator wrote: »

I think give and take is the key.

im my job is my kid is sick or i have to go somewhere i can ask to work from home, or leave early etc. It doesn't cost me a days holidays or a 1/2 day etc. So when i have a task that has to be done out of hours to minimize impact - i don't mind. If i do a 1/2 or a full day, ill get time TIL, at a time when its quiet.

............

I will tell you one thing more, do you think richard branson, steve jobs or Mark Zuckerberg count the hours they work when trying to get a project over the line? all 3 companies are reputed to be decent at work life balance policy, but does anyone personally think they clock out at 37.5 hrs on a friday ?

IMO peoples attitude to this subject, reflects their personal values and their relationship with their employers. So to people who say they wont do overtime when needed except when paid by the hour, more power to you.

i think it does say something about you and your employer.

What would it say about you if you were expected to do 45 hour weeks and every 2nd Saturday for no TIL and you didn't do it?

nsa0bupkd3948x

Xterminator wrote: »

I will tell you one thing more, do you think richard branson, steve jobs or Mark Zuckerberg count the hours they work when trying to get a project over the line? all 3 companies are reputed to be decent at work life balance policy, but does anyone personally think they clock out at 37.5 hrs on a friday ?

There's a bit of a difference between a salaried person on an average wage and the founder of the company who will become a billionaire if the company takes off.

Peregrinus

Augeo wrote: »

What would it say about you if you were expected to do 45 hour weeks and every 2nd Saturday for no TIL and you didn't do it?

That you were actively looking for another job, and didn't really care if you were let go from the one you're in.

Peregrinus

Peregrinus wrote: »

That you were actively looking for another job, and didn't really care if you were let go from the one you're in.

Or that you aren't a door mat.
I'd love to see a company trying to let anyone go for the situation you described.

beauf

One place I worked did constant unpaid overtime 8-10 days and a lot of weekends.

I ran the stats that charted out that they were created more bugs than they were fixing and it was getting exponentially worse. They didn't get it. So I left.

Xterminator

Augeo wrote: »

What would it say about you if you were expected to do 45 hour weeks and every 2nd Saturday for no TIL and you didn't do it?

one of 2 things.

i would consider if the other benefits of the job make this worthwhile and continue to work there or i would consider the jobs was taking advantage of me and i would move on when it suited me. the good news about ireland is its not indentured service.

there are bad employers. no-one here doubts that.

PS i would consider documenting my hours and send them to them to my supervisor every month. then when i', leaving id consult a lawyer and see what my case was for claiming payment.

the_syco

Xterminator wrote: »

IMO peoples attitude to this subject, reflects their personal values and their relationship with their employers.

IMO, it reflects the relationship of employee and employer.

Caliden

Xterminator wrote: »

I will tell you one thing more, do you think richard branson, steve jobs or Mark Zuckerberg count the hours they work when trying to get a project over the line? all 3 companies are reputed to be decent at work life balance policy, but does anyone personally think they clock out at 37.5 hrs on a friday ?

IMO peoples attitude to this subject, reflects their personal values and their relationship with their employers. So to people who say they wont do overtime when needed except when paid by the hour, more power to you.

i think it does say something about you and your employer.

I have zero desire to be like those you mentioned.

If I did of course I wouldn't count the hours. Silly comparison to make.

dennyk

Gone Drinking wrote: »

I'd also like to know how those who don't believe in unpaid overtime would feel if they were waiting on a service or product, but didn't get it because the person helping them downed tools at 5pm on the dot because they don't get paid overtime.

Frankly, I'd be annoyed at the company for being too stingy to hire adequate staff to ensure that their employees aren't so overworked that they can't complete their tasks within their normal working hours.

That said, there's a vast happy medium between "Instantly stop whatever task you're in the middle of at 17:00:00.00000 on the dot even though it would have taken you like two minutes to finish" and "regularly put in several hours of uncompensated overtime a week." The latter should be absolutely unacceptable to any reasonable person, while the former does demonstrate a rather poor work ethic. Putting an occasional bit of overtime is reasonable enough, as sometimes that's just how things work out due to unforeseen issues and such, but a company expecting their employees to work significant amounts of overtime on a regular basis is a ****ty company.

Zubeneschamali

This is why in industrial relations there is a "work to rule" as well as a strike. Working rigidly and only to the rules like stopping at 5.00.00 is one step short of a strike exactly because most people most of the time are reasonably flexible

davo10

dennyk wrote: »

Frankly, I'd be annoyed at the company for being too stingy to hire adequate staff to ensure that their employees aren't so overworked that they can't complete their tasks within their normal working hours.
y.

I absolutely agree, but by the same token, should companies be able to easily dismiss employees when there isn't enough work for everyone to work on tasks during their normal working hours? Should that be recognised as a quick and fair means for dismissal? I suspect it is difficult to get that balance right, considering the demands often made by customers. I think it's also a big assumption that every employee carries out every task exactly on time every time, machines do, people often don't.

CeilingFly

The op works in the retail area in admin.

The retail market has specific periods where extra work is required in a time constrained manner such as start on new season, sale time and Christmas.

If op understands the trade they should understand the pressures at some times of year.

I would guess that the overall hours will be 41/42 hours per week on average with many weeks at 39 hours and some at 45 hours.

With the attitude and queries, I don't think the op is suitable for a trade that has seasonal highs. Personally with the type of query I'd be saying they "are not suitable for the position"

beauf

I think if there are busy periods and slack periods and more time is required then that should be mentioned in the job description and discussed in the interview. The problem is when its not mentioned then expected. Something is off with that.

Most people have worked in jobs were working extra hours is needed. Usually its rewarded by time in lieu, or overtime. The only issue is when there is no give back and its a one sided deal.

Worse still where its not peak or seasonal but all the time. Then its just taking advantage.

micks

How many of the people that have posted that they are often asked to work extra time with out compensation are allowed to work less when they need it?

Its strange that all these anti union/public service etc posts think its fine for the employee to give a little

I have always worked in places where extra hrs were paid with OT sometime TIL

Where i am now pays OT for extra time/projects however we were recently expected by a new manager to stay back 10 to 20 minutes per day without compensation, he said it was only 10-20 minutes what difference did it make
Strangely when he was asked if it was ok for us to be only 10-20 minutes late each day it was a big deal

Another type of this one sided expectations i came across was a mate who if 1 min late was docked 15 min pay
Not an issue as he or his workmates were very rarely late
Until a new bio scanner time clock was installed and every 2nd employee took multiple attempts to clock in, resulting in 10-20 people being a few minutes late clocking, to which they were told they needed to get in earlier to ensure they were on time
Anyway a trip to the canteen and using up the full 15 minutes the were docked put a stop to that practice

frozenfrozen

If I can't be on the moon on a particular day because of you, I get paid

shaunr68

CeilingFly wrote: »

The retail market has specific periods where extra work is required in a time constrained manner such as start on new season, sale time and Christmas.

I don't think anybody would object to that, as long as they are paid for the additional hours worked. I value my time far too highly to give it away for free.

CeilingFly wrote: »

If op understands the trade they should understand the pressures at some times of year.

If the employer understands their business they should plan properly to cope with seasonal pressure. This might be offering overtime, it might also include taking on seasonal staff, which is common enough in retail.

Buzz84

myshirt wrote: »

We still have this per hour mentality which stems from the public service. A per hour rate is suitable for a less developed economy, less complex work, unskilled, minimum wage, or manufacturing led for example. There used to also be a piece rate if you recall, where you would get paid per unit you produced.

The per hour rate is not at all suitable now. Op you should work a minimum of 39 hours excluding breaks, but overall I would expect you to average out at anything from 42 to 48.

In my profession, it is not uncommon for people to work every second Saturday unpaid, and a few odd half day Sundays. Other than that, normal hours are 8.00 or 8.30ish to 7 or 8 that night with two 15 minute breaks and a 30 minute break, usually lunch al desco. Get rid of this civil service mentality, it is for a different age.

Civil service mentality to get paid for the work you do. Madness.

Working every second Saturday unpaid? They are idiots

mrslancaster

PhoenixParker wrote: »

I used to think it worked like that.

It doesn't. Seen it time and time again.....

Saw it across everywhere in the recession. Redundancies didn't take any account of who was a great employee and who was a moron.

A little unpaid overtime is fine in a salaried position if it's during crunch periods and there's give and take with your employer. Anything beyond that and you need to stand up for yourself. If you don't respect you, they certainly won't.

+1
An employer that expects people to do regular unpaid overtime is taking advantage.

Maybe trade unions will become active again in the private sector to put a stop to this and the joke of "independent contractors" but that's probably for another thread

kurtainsider

The OP says that he/she works in retail. How much of their stock does this retailer give away for free? You're a worker. Your time is your stock. Think about how much of it you want to give away to these people for free.

kurtainsider

Colonel Claptrap wrote: »

Unpaid overtime in a salaried position is very common.

FYP
Unpaid overtime in a salaried position is a very common pi** take.

Akrasia

Employers love asking workers to stay late when they're busy, but refuse to allow workers to leave early when the job is done.

And then they wonder why workers aren't motivated...

the14thwarrior

Buzz84 wrote: »

Civil service mentality to get paid for the work you do. Madness.

I must be mad. I like to get paid for the work i do.

mlumley

Your contract may have said, overtime is expected, but when they ask and you refuse they will ask why, just tell them that payment is expected.

grogi

the14thwarrior wrote: »

Buzz84 wrote: »

Civil service mentality to get paid for the work you do. Madness.

I must be mad. I like to get paid for the work i do.

https://tinyurl.com/zzev45j

Zubeneschamali

While I agree that constant overtime is a bad thing, I have worked in places where getting a promotion from grade A to grade B means a pay rise but you lose overtime. If this is stated upfront, it is fair enough. If you do the sums and don't like the numbers, don't take the job, and tell them why.

mrslancaster

mrslancaster wrote: »

Maybe trade unions will become active again in the private sector to put a stop to this and the joke of "independent contractors" but that's probably for another thread

Taking on temporary production staff repeatedly essentially to avoid increasing headcount is a joke.

However there are thousands of very well remunerated independent IT & Engineering contractors who wouldn't have any aspirations of ever taking an actual staff position.

In accounting though the contractors are paid less than staff folk too and the contract is often a prolonged interview

JollyBustard

I work 45 hours p/w and get paid for 39 of those (arguments to be made about the lunch break and smaller breaks in general, but I spend most of these at my desk). I however, do leave on the dot when my obligatory hours are done, as I have to take into account my commute. I'm in the minority with this mentality of working just my hours (and colleagues have mentioned it to me), but no one gets paid overtime so I refuse to work beyond what I'm paid for, when there's absolutely no reason to do so. I'm honestly surprised that some people I work with work the 50/60 hours (for, again, 39 hours pay) that are almost expected, but their reasons are their reasons. I just happen to like to try have a bit of work-life balance insofar as possible.
In previous roles I did get paid overtime, so I didn't mind the odd additional hour or so when they were necessary.

sashafierce

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