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Employees Rights in an Emergency?
Waiting-for-Ivan asks: "In Florida in the past month and a half, we have survived 2 hurricanes. During the last one I was within the areas with a hurricane warning (i.e. hurricane conditions are expected within 24 hours). My company (who will remain unnamed) wanted everyone to come in. Those who did not come in had their pay docked (salary or hourly didn't matter) and threatened with loss of their pay for Labor Day. We are not an emergency facility whose services are required during an emergency. Is this legal? Can they make us come in during a hurricane warning (or any other environmental emergency) and if we refuse can they punish us for not doing so? Do we as employees have any rights (and can they dock salaried employees so easily)? What laws are in affect explaining these circumstances?
Workers' rights? You must have forgotten that you live in the United States of Avarice. Now grab your pick axe, and get back to mining that salt.
How ya like dat?
Whether it's legal or not, the management must be fools not to consider what this does to morale!
I guess it's harder to quantify human resources, enthusiasm, and loyalty than missed hours...
It would be one thing if your company had said anyone who didn't show up would be fired but that doesn't sound like what happened. From your description it sounds like the employeer just wasn't going to pay you for time you weren't at work.
... why should they? Are they really taking anything away from you if you didn't work. If you didn't work then the money you would have gotten isn't yours. They didn't take anything.
The question is
One should not theorize before one has data. -Sherlock Holmes-
Why should your employeer pay you for time you didn't work? They didn't dock you anything. If you didn't work they don't owe you the money for said work.
It would be a totally different matter if they had said you would loose your job if you didn't come in.
One should not theorize before one has data. -Sherlock Holmes-
So you think the terms of your job should be "protected" by the government, huh? Obviously you've never heard of the Employment at Will doctrine. The answer to your question is yes, you have rights. You have the right to quit. Don't take that right lightly....you might not miss it until it's gone.
If the government is allowed to set down terms and conditions for when your company is allowed to fire you, what's to stop them from setting down terms and conditions for when you're allowed to quit? Sorry, you can't quit this week, a Hurricane is coming we need every able bodied employee available to stack sandbags. Quitting now would cause "excessive loss of profit" to the company and the "Protect our Jobs Act of 2004" says that's illegal. Try again next week, after the flood subsides.
No thanks. Employment at will means at their will, and yours. If you don't like the job requirements, quit. Get off your ass and find a better job. The market is picking up anyway.
Employers are pretty good at working together to lower wages and benefits. If we as employees could have half as much solidarity and less short term kiss-ass we'd all be much futher along. Workers rights are achieved only by fighting for them, and that's the only inevitablity here.
You know, I'm mighty tired of hearing this perennial bromide - Frankly, it's NOT that easy for employees to switch jobs (Especially in this market), and if you think ANY market is a "free" market you need a lesson in real-world economics.
Hear! Hear!
/. peeves. It hasn't been an employee's market for a few years now. Even if it were, you're being selfish by moving instead of trying to make the employer see the error of their ways. Not only because it only helps you in this instance but also because the employer will just keep doing it.
... and between that and the threat of annoying a supervisor and putting your job in jeopardy in the long-term, we should be -helping- the few people who are considering acting on the injustices, not giving them flippant responses.
The "if you don't like it, take your skills elsewhere" argument is one of my biggest
Will a person always succeed at changing things? Certainly not
It is more productive to voice thoughtful opinions (reply) than to judge (moderate) others.
I don't know about the US, but if I tell an employee to take the day off because of circumstances, it is not his responsibility and he can still expect to get paid.
:)
If I am told by my boss to take the day off, then I will expect to be paid. If it is a problem for the company then it is their problem if they cannot control the chain of command.
If a company doesn't accept it, then I suspect that all employees getting director level confirmation of any management request will soon cure them of that silliness and make them more consistent in their interpretation of the command chain
If only that's what Labor Unions really did. That's their origin, and that's what they were/are meant to do, and that's what's badly needed, today.
But IMHO, there's a class of people that can smell money, and insinuate themselves into money flows. Some time ago, they smelled Union Dues, and the res is, sadly, history. Also unfortunately, some time back they began to smell Health Care, too.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Negotiating the terms of my employment is *my* right...I'd rather have a choice in how I do it. You like unions, and that's fine...don't assume that everyone else finds them a perfect fit.
"Murphy was an optimist" - O'Toole's commentary on Murphy's Law