Ask HN: Is it fair to expect 40hr work weeks and be available for on-call work?

2 points·deedubaya··2 comments

I see so many salaried employees expected to work a regular 40hr work weeks + be available for on-call work, restricting their off-hours plans in the event of an emergency.

This is expected even more in startups where manpower is limited and self-sacrifice is the expected norm.

Is this fair? Is this acceptable? Is it legal?

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Fair? I don't think so. part of the job and quite common? yes. Legal? yes. Last time I had to put up with it was in California, which has some peculiar work laws to begin with.

And this wasn't while working in a startup either, it was a very well established and large technology company. Pretty much every IT job I've had came with this issue. One particular job required me to be in by 7-730am because we had one user that still had Outlook and she adamantly refused to use anything else, saying that without Outlook she couldn't do her job. (the rest of the company was already on a standard IMAP setup.) So i was expected to be there at the crack of dawn just in case this one user had yet another Outlook problem (she had frequent problems) and I was expected to be available on nights/weekends in case there were server issues too. I ran into this at other jobs as well. on-call was common, expected, and I was not compensated above my regular pay rate for it. There was no on-call pay. You were just expected to do it.

The only factors which determines whether it's "fair" or not is whether it's worth the compensation -- and whether such requirements are stated in your contract, or not.

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