Unpaid overtime

markpb

Hi there,

I work for a small IT company in Dublin and most of our clients are in the US. Because of the time zones, we have to stay late occasionally to speak to them in person. I didn't mind at the start because it was only an hour or two and rare but its becoming more common. My last one major incident was a 9am to 1am support job which annoyed me greatly. The kicker is that my contract says:

Your contracted hours of work are 37.5 hrs a week but you will also be expected to work such reasonable additional hours, without further remuneration, as may be necessary to carry out your duties.

I'm curious about how legal it is to force someone to work and then refuse to pay them?

jester77

That's fairly standard for IT companies that you don't get paid for the extra time. But usually the time you've worked up can be taken off at a further date. So if you've worked over 24 hours extra in a month you should be entitled to an additional 3 days off. Check with HR on it and keep a log of your hours.

garthv

markpb wrote:

Hi there,

I work for a small IT company in Dublin and most of our clients are in the US. Because of the time zones, we have to stay late occasionally to speak to them in person. I didn't mind at the start because it was only an hour or two and rare but its becoming more common. My last one major incident was a 9am to 1am support job which annoyed me greatly. The kicker is that my contract says:



I'm curious about how legal it is to force someone to work and then refuse to pay them?

Sounds like you work for CPL,
At the end of the day its in your contract and theres f*ck all you can do about it.

soma

jester77 wrote:

That's fairly standard for IT companies that you don't get paid for the extra time.

It's unfortunately standard practice in most (all?) I.T. companies. I find that people who don't work in I.T. are shocked when they hear about it.

djkeogh

Same here, Don't get any pay for overtime. We are entitled to take the time worked as time off at a later date mind you.

Victor

markpb wrote:

Your contracted hours of work are 37.5 hrs a week but you will also be expected to work such reasonable additional hours, without further remuneration, as may be necessary to carry out your duties.

Surely the operative word here is 'reasonable' - not that your boss will see it that way.

markpb

djkeogh wrote:

Same here, Don't get any pay for overtime. We are entitled to take the time worked as time off at a later date mind you.

Are you sure about that? I had a look before on oasis and couldn't find anything to back that up. I'd love to believe it though :-)

BC

markpb wrote:

Are you sure about that? I had a look before on oasis and couldn't find anything to back that up. I'd love to believe it though :-)

By entitled I think djkeogh means entitled by the company as opposed to entitled by law so you won't see it on oasis.

I use to work for an IT company had had the same problem. Coming up to deadlines i was regularly in until 1 or 2 in the morning. Like others here, the company was reasonable about allowing us to take additional days off to compensate though.

godtabh

Its not jsut IT. Its a lot of profesional jobs. I dont get over time. I dont do crazy hours but my average week is 45+ hours.

It was explanied to me that the harder (and often longer) I work the bigger a bonus I'd get to make up for it

markpb

BC wrote:

I use to work for an IT company had had the same problem. Coming up to deadlines i was regularly in until 1 or 2 in the morning. Like others here, the company was reasonable about allowing us to take additional days off to compensate though.

Did you have to ask for the time off in lieu or was it offered to you? Several people I work with will happily work crazy hours or come in at the weekends to get projects done but there's never any mention of time in lieu or bonuses.

Moriarty

From memory, your employer is not allowed to make you work for more than 40(48?) hours a week averaged over any 6 month period. If your contract is that open, they can ask you to work extra hours.. but to make sure that your overall hours stay under the statutory limit, they will have to grant you time off at some future date to compensate.

johnny_adidas

i work in architecture and we operate the same system of overtime in return for time off, however it is stated in my contract that this is the procedure. we are fairly casual however and there's never been an issue with days off instead. i sometimes wish i got overtime pay though when i need a few bob extra. guess it just means u work harder when you are doing overtime cos u want to get out quicker rather than being paid for sitting around working at your own pace.

gerrycollins

if its in your contract,its legal and you signed it well thats the end of that argument otherwise you cannot work for more than 48hrs per week but (and i'm open to correction) the european max is 55hrs which can be enforced on employees so based on 48hrs thats about 2 hours extra a day

as for time off in lieu im sure that can be arranged with your line manager at a slack period you know may be coming up?

you dont say if you are allowed to come in late in the day ie flexi time if you know your gonna be on late just to make a phone call?

Gegerty

I too work for an IT company with clients around the world. sometimes stuff happens that needs to be sorted and it means working overtime. Now I don't know about you but my salary is not the best so I have a major problem with them taking this for granted and not giving me anything on return. If I was on 60K+ I would not have a problem with it.

I assume you are getting time in lieu? If not have you asked and been refused? As for all this "Its in your contract and you signed it", its complete rubbish. They can put what they like in your contract but at the end of the day nobody can force you to work for free. There are laws to protect you from what is happening and the laws supercede any contract you've signed.

For gods sake people stick up for yourselves.

ToxicPaddy

kearnsr wrote:

It was explanied to me that the harder (and often longer) I work the bigger a bonus I'd get to make up for it

A company I used to work for tried this little trick, trying to land a huge contract which they claimed would "secure the financial future of the company", that would increase the annual turnover 5 times, triple the annual profit and we would be generously rewarded for our long hours and hard work.

We all got a €500 bonus (pre tax) for 18 months of hard work with pay freeze etc.. needless to say they lost over half their staff in the following 3 months (including me).. and to this day they still cant figure it out :rolleyes:

Idiots :mad:

If they dont state it in your contract, dont expect it to happen..

Our man in Havana

Also remember folks that you cannot contract outside the law. Max working week is 48 hours averaged over 6 months.

ChuckProphet

solution: join the public service

Wishbone Ash

djkeogh wrote:

Same here, Don't get any pay for overtime. We are entitled to take the time worked as time off at a later date mind you.

We don't get paid for unscheduled/unrostered overtime. However, if for some reason, we have to work unplanned extra hours we take twice that number of hours back. I don't think it's official policy but we do it anyway and a blind eye is usually turned.

godtabh

ToxicPaddy wrote:

A company I used to work for tried this little trick, trying to land a huge contract which they claimed would "secure the financial future of the company", that would increase the annual turnover 5 times, triple the annual profit and we would be generously rewarded for our long hours and hard work.

We all got a €500 bonus (pre tax) for 18 months of hard work with pay freeze etc.. needless to say they lost over half their staff in the following 3 months (including me).. and to this day they still cant figure it out :rolleyes:

Idiots :mad:

If they dont state it in your contract, dont expect it to happen..

Its happened so far so I'm not complaining. If it didnt happen I'd be out the door.

My contract says a bonus will be paid depending on how well the company is doing

BC

markpb wrote:

Did you have to ask for the time off in lieu or was it offered to you? Several people I work with will happily work crazy hours or come in at the weekends to get projects done but there's never any mention of time in lieu or bonuses.

My team leader offered it to all of us.

With regards to the 48 hour week - the key to that is that its averaged. So you can legally end up working 60 hours a week for (e.g) a month out of the six.

Kali

In any small IT companies I've worked for, if weekend work, extra hours are required, then I've always mentioned this when it came to taking the odd half-day here and there... as long as it balances out for you then its ok.
If its a case where you are working late every evening and its a flat-out no to time-in-leui then tell them to shove it, there are plenty of jobs out there in good companys, and too often the employee is shafted.. especially in start-ups or companys < 30 employees. I've seen too many friends and colleagues stressed to the hilt because of work commitments... and for no recompensation.