On call

MY BAD

I have a question about workers who are "on call" for work and rest periods.

I see section 11 “rest period of not less than 11 consecutive hours in each period of 24 hours”

So take my example I'm on call every 3 weeks for 7 days giving 24hours cover. My working hours is 830am to 5pm then I'm on call to cover between 5pm and 830am the next morning. It wouldn't be uncommon for for me to get a call say at 10pm where I have go to work for a hour to resolve the issue, then get I might get another call at 1am where it might take 2 hours at work to resolve. Taking into account 11 hours of rest should that mean I shouldn't be at work until 2pm the next day?

Or if someone could provide me with information about been on call or standby. As I can't seem to find much on line.

dennyk

On-call time generally doesn't count as "working time" absent unusual circumstances, but any time spent actually working during your on-call period definitely would be considered "working time". There are exceptions to the laws regarding the minimum rest periods, and it's possible your situation could fall under one, but it's not likely. I'd give the Workplace Relations Commission a ring to ask for their advice. If the minimum daily rest period law does apply to you, then unless you've had a full 11 consecutive hours of non-work time, you should not be expected to work.

I'd also consider looking into your situation in general. What is it you do and what sort of issues are you on call to fix? Why do you get so many after-hours calls? An ounce of preventative maintenance, preemptive action, or proper redundancy can be worth a pound of being awakened at 3AM multiple times a week because something critical just exploded. You'd also want to consider whether the situations you're being called in to fix actually require immediate action; are these outages actually having a business impact and affecting production, or are they just warnings that aren't critical and could be addressed during the day, or some workaholic dev who's pissed that he can't deploy something to his test system at 2AM?

MY BAD

Thanks for the reply. I'm a electrician in the plant. There are quite a lot of issues in the plant to be honest. Training of operators and team leaders is extremely poor, most don't know their SOPs if there's a issue, or held accountable for their actions. It's a seasonal plant too so during peak times there isn't much time for preventative maintenance as the plant runs 24/7 and they haven't the capacity for schuled shutdowns. Unfortunately for maintenance the peak season has extended in recent years from 8 months to almost 11 months. During peak times operators are working 50 to 70 hours a week, every week so I think that leads to mistakes too. I know its in breach of the working time act but operators and management don't want to change it. Then there is a culture in the plant of call a electrician first if there's any issues and let them diagnosis it. I'm not employed in the plant very long, I took the job roughly the time a maintenance service company took over the maintenance management. They tried to implement changes here but since have walked away as they were unable to work with local management in the plant.

slavetothegrind

look for other work, that place will break you. They should have lads on shift if the demand is that high.
Also consider your time on call is not your own as you have to respond to a call immediately.
I appreciate you might not have options where you are but that kind of work life balance will mess with you.

Add up all the hours you are working and on call and do the sums, is it an hourly rate you are happy with?

noel100

I know lads stay at home all week to be on call 24/7 when it comes to there turn. There will be techs in during the week and he's on call for the hours no one is working and weekends.

OMM 0000

Do you at least get paid for all these calls and overtime?

mazwell

They should have electricians on nightshift that's a terrible system. The company is obviously too tight to pay shift allowance. My husband is an industrial electrician, theres an abundance of work in that area at the moment. Look for another job