Takin' Care of Business and Working Paid Overtime

theodp writes "About 800 CA-based Siebel employees who held the job title 'software engineer' or 'senior software engineer' stand to pocket $27,000 each from the proceeds of Siebel's $27.5 settlement of an overtime dispute. And while IBM's 32,000 techies won't make out quite as well, they'll still divvy up $65M in OT pay that IBM's shelling out to settle a federal class action suit."

Comments

Companies use salary to circumvent labor laws

[JPriest]

It is true, after sticking it out working a 75 hour week for 12 months salary in the US, I nearly refuse to even entertain the idea of taking a salary position. I would rather make minimum wage and be paid hourly than ever do that again.

Re:Companies use salary to circumvent labor laws

[Anonymous Coward]

It is true, after sticking it out working a 75 hour week for 12 months salary in the US, I nearly refuse to even entertain the idea of taking a salary position.

I want it spelled out, in writing how many hours per week I am to work on average, how many hours maximum and what additional compensation I am to receive for working an extremely long week.

Hell, employers don't even need to use salary to cheat on labor laws. I once worked for a company that falsified time sheets. If you worked 42 hours in a week, the time sheets said that you worked 40.

Re:Companies use salary to circumvent labor laws

[Venner]

>>I don't understand this whole unpaid overtime anyway. If these companies are so bought into capitalism, then they ought to buy more of your labor when they need more.

Exactly. I always wonder how we've gotten to this point. Henry Ford, who made positively vast amounts of profit at the time, did so not only through efficiency and affordable products (i.e., he sold below even what the market forced him to sell at), but also by *doubling* industry wages for his workers and creating the standard 8-hour-a-day, 5-day-a-week work-week. He wanted loyal, efficient workers, and that's sure one hell of a way to get them.

Re:Companies use salary to circumvent labor laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Why did you work 75 hours per week? Were you kept there at gunpoint?

Companies I've been with have tried shenanigans with me. I just didn't play along. I came at 9, I left at 5, and when the manager whined I ignored him. I didn't get fired because I did a good job, and had they tried they would have had an expensive lawsuit on their hands. I even had the president of the company call me one weekend, and I cut him off in mid-harangue telling him to get back to me on Monday.

Yet I survived three rounds of layoffs. Obviously they liked me.

I'm sorry, but if they scammed you into working 75 hours a week through mere words, you're a patsy.

Re:Companies use salary to circumvent labor laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Standard practice in most organizations. Timesheet entry is more about recording that you state you only worked 40 hours, not more. Timesheets due on Friday by noon, even though the workweek ends Sunday night, is one example of how the system works. When I first started out in my career, I was concerned about it. Now, I recognize companies will expect extra time from you on occasion, regardless of the fact they also want you to document 40 hours. What I have never been able to rationalize is the expectation of a 1 hour unpaid lunch each day. Office professionals are expected to give 20+ hours each month for lunch, when they often are simply eating lunch at their desks or eating with their co-workers. I have never worked any position where the 8-5 or 9-6 work day was not the norm. All that said, it is not like office professionals are doing back-breaking labor, either, and we often spend more than a few hours on the Internet doing non-work-related activities. As I look over my shoulder for my boss, I had better get back to work myself!

Re:Companies use salary to circumvent labor laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Minor point: they're not about capitalism per se, they're about exploitation (which, if you're a Marxist, amounts to the same thing).

Important point: I've always thought that the best argument for paid overtime is that it encourages management to use people more efficiently and prevent burn-out. If my boss can get me to do the work of two people for the pay of one, he'll do it even if it means I'll do a lousy job because I'm tired, hungry, and overworked. On the other hand, if it's going to cost him what he'd pay two and a half employees working normal hours, then he might as well hire another person and let us both go home at 5pm. We'll both get him more bang for his buck since our comparatively shorter days mean we'll have plenty of time to rest, unwind, and have enriching personal lives that drastically reduce workplace stress and increase output. That way, the job not only gets done, but it gets done better and in less time.

In summary: paid overtime isn't just to award employees who go beyond the call of duty; it's to punish management for losing its focus on efficiency in favor of short-term savings.

IBM overtime

[kyrre]

Does this mean IBM will start paying for overtime in the US now? How about Europe? It is a bit odd that it is the US branch that pay for overtime first. European laws seems to be a bit more on the Employees side in such cases. I am wondering how IBM got away with this in all those years.

Now if only..

[ari wins]

If only we could get the *Mart(s) of the world to stop firing people for having 2 minutes overtime. Just saw it happen this week. Unsafe equipment, ignorant bosses, and corporate mandates aside, I think it's quite silly for someone to lose their job for trying to stay and make sure it's done right. Should get even more interesting, with corporate instituting a uniform and taking over scheduling soon(at least in my store, in Michigan. A few thousand miles from Home Office).

Re:Wow!

[tomhath]

The lawyer only took $5Million? That sounds kind of low.

Similar situation

[macdaddy]

I'm in a similar situation. My company recently re-evaluated their classification system for employees. Now everyone, unless you are a lowly field tech, is in a salary position. They do pay out bonuses but conveniently enough they forgot to mention that it wasn't going to be considered "pay" but instead would be considered a "bonus" which means that they won't pay any of the taxes on it. You, the employee are left paying about 45% of it out to taxes yourself. Likewise since it's a bonus and not part of your pay they don't include it in their end-of-the-year calculation for profit sharing and instead only calculate your profit-sharing off of your base pay. They didn't give me a choice when I had my review. It was either sign the paper and switch to salary or else. In their words the salaried position "was the only position available" to me.

This is a very small IT community. There aren't a lot of IT-related jobs that don't have something to do with my company. At some point even if I did leave this job for another in the area I will likely work for or with one of the people that I believe is causing these problems at my company. I don't particularly want to move to a new market. I'm hopeful that the people causing the problems at this company will leave. However, having been in a similar situation before I know that the chances of that are slim to none. In the mean time my medical and financial health suffer.

Since we're talking about OT, maybe someone here can explain to me what our position is (by "our" I mean all of us in IT) thanks to Bush's changes to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) in 2003. My understanding of his pro-employer changes to the FLSA mean that I can now be classified in such a way to prevent me from being eligible for OT. If that's so then how are these 2 lawsuits proceeding? The Sieblel article says 2000 to 2005 but my understanding is that 2004 and 2005 and the last 5 months of 2003 are times when OT wouldn't have applied. I'm assuming that's why my company decided to re-evaluate their position on job classifications. Comments?

Re:Not everyone can switch jobs easily

[Anonymous Coward]

In the Phillipines there are people who are brought there from china under $5000 of debt and told to work hard for their money. After they pay back the $5000 in debt they are american citizens and are able to go to america.

Their bosses then threaten them with firing if they don't work free overtime. The headhunters; paid part of their wages plus the interest on the debt; threaten to cut off limbs and bash in heads , and some even occasionally do so, are done to keep everyone in line. Then, they pay them just enough to keep them going; to service the debt and buy some food and cardboard for shelter.

Some of them have been working in sweatshops for 20 or 30 years.

If you want to be a slave, then be a slave. Fact of the matter is, if you stick with a bad manager you're basically giving him the fruits of your labour for which he will not only work to enslave you more, but also hire more people and turn your job market to shit.

I, and most of the rest of earth, however, refuse to be slaves. Which means when a manager says it's salary or the highway you take the salaried position, work 40 productive hours, go home, get written up a bunch for not finishing the job and find another job during the meantime and basically fuck with them. They will not like it; they will yell, they will scream, and they will get violent. They will try to control you in every way they can.

Let them.

Grow some balls and realize managers are not gods, they're humans and most of them are idiots in suits who have no clue as to how to do their job. Let them hire someone less qualified and less apt to make them money. Eventually their tactics will end them up with the bottom barrel bunch of thumbwarmers and in a nightmare of lawsuits and bankruptcy.

They deserve every moment of it.

Find yourself one good manager or a good company, and you've got it made for a few years. Sure, good companies go bad, but there are plenty of places out there looking for talent.

And if you need knowledge and skills, again, grow balls, get skills. If you suck at It, use the money to train yourself in another skill and go for that.

Am I the only one...

[Darth Liberus]

...who finds that I work LESS as a salaried employee than I did as a contractor? It used to be that they paid me for the work I did; now they pay me $X dollars a month plus $Y dollars a year not to leave them - and all because I'm really the only person who knows enough about the project to explain what needs to be done and how to do it to the contractors, and because I'm the only person who is willing to show up when something goes wrong at 3am... but nothing ever goes wrong at 3am simply because every decision I make includes the fact that if I fuck up I'm going to have to show up at 3am while the contractors dream about collecting their next paycheck.

Have fun working hard; I'm enjoying my 35 hour workweek and 2 hour lunches.