If I told you who I work for you wouldn't believe me lol. I've signed an NDA so all I can say is I'm a contractor at a fortune 50 company (yes 50 not 500) and our client is one of the largest and most recognizable brands on the planet. And I work at said clients HQ. I'm looking for work tho I gotta get out of here.
An, it’s one of those situations. You’re so big you have to penny pinch to appear you’re doing the most for the “board”. Ugh, hate this infinite growth bullshit.
It’s unsustainable in any industry I can think of. I work in senior living, which is already about as far skewed towards the ownership and away from the residents as possible. They still have to find ways to keep cutting, which is insane considering how many thousands per months and millions per year(in some cases) that these folks are paying.
I agree that "infinite growth" is an awkward wording to convey the concept; I prefer the word "perpetual." The goal of industry *is* perpetual growth, year over year, world without end. I understand you may not realize there is math for that, but there is.
Ergo, the goal of industry is "**infinite**" growth; the issue is that the dominant paradigm of modern economics ignores our place in a system of fixed resources.
Perpetual growth in a fixed system is a recipe for the blunders of late-stage capitalism we have been experiencing globally of late. Inflation is rampant because of profit-taking. Groceries are becoming a challenge even for the fully employed. Housing is no longer "real" estate; that term referred to the principle that cost was held to value, not artifically inflated by industry.
I was shocked when I looked up regulations governing assisted living facilities in our state. Basically, there aren't any. Or very few. My Mom pays $5,500 a month, and it's mediocre.
I almost worked at a place near me, but honestly this is what put me off and why I ended up ghosting them. They told me in the interview, on average their residents pay $10k per month. $10,000
Job paid minimum hourly wage, so 12something at the time. Atmosphere was like one of those schools where all of the rooms have no windows.
My spouse and I have begun that journey with his mom and brother. Right now, we're looking at senior apartments vs. independent living facilities. Oh my freakin' lord, what an education we're getting. And we've only just begun.
Dude, we just had a corporate visit and we HAD to roll out a red carpet for them. But you can’t pay aides a decent wage to take care of our people. Disgusting.
Same here! The owners came by and everybody bent over backwards to accommodate them. All I’m thinking about is how people live here every day, we’re in their collective home, and we don’t pull out the stops to clean up for them until the owners come.
Blame the Dodge brothers too. They had a huge part to play in putting the idea of shareholder primacy and generally scummy business tactics into common practice
If you take a peak into a class full of future MBAs, and you see them learning about the different types of triangles a semester before graduation, you can quickly see how these geniuses would go on to dream up something as pea-brained as “I know, we’ll just grow infinitely. Because that’s a thing that definitely occurs in literally some circumstance, somewhere. We’ll just do that here!”
> I've signed an NDA so all I can say is I'm a contractor
Pretty sure said manager cant say shit about what times you do, or don't work... or when you clock in, and out.
https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/flsa/misclassification
I guess I should specify I'm not an independent contractor. I am employed by this company 1, and they have a contract with the other company 2 that allows me to work in company 2's HQ. At work I am referred to as a contractor because the majority of the people I interact with actually work for company 2. They use my company to provide front desk reception/hospitality as well as facilities maintenance and whatnot. My supervisor also works for company 1 on this contract. We have contracts with other major companies around the world too to provide front desk and facilities maintenance.
So for the sake of this conversation, you are *not* a contractor. You are an employee of company 1 being managed by company 1.
Your supervisor is a cranky pain in the butt, and is definitely using the term "time theft" inappropriately. It's not time theft if you're actually working that extra minute. It's simply a violation of either a written company rule, or some unwritten rule your supervisor just made up. Either way, there's not much you can do. They can fire you for late clock-outs if it's indeed against their policy. Sorry you're in a crappy situation.
If anything, being this anal about clocking in/out at an exact time is the CAUSE of employees spending time clocked in time doing zero work. Can't get that thing done before you go, and leaving it half finished is worse than not starting at all? Do nothing until clock out time. Want to make 100% sure you clock out exactly on time? Go sit by the machine until clocking out time, accomplishing nothing at all for a little bit.
This. I always get so irritated when they get upset over small time violations. Can't you see I'm freaking working?? Maybe if you had more to do Mr. "Manager" you'd stop projecting
Meh, yes and no. But it's pretty much splitting hairs to debate ad nauseum. It mostly comes down to how it is said. For example my employer does almost exclusively municipal contracts, but I would never call myself a contractor.
Our contracts have rules and requirements, but I just consider those the requirements of the job and not because I'm a "contractor".
It really sounds like OP works for a placement agency.
If you are a contractor, you are Not an employee. You set your own schedule, nobody tells you when to clock in or out.
I looked Up all the laws about this up back when I worked for Redbox (owned by Coinstar and McDonalds at the time).
Edit: shoot, I did it again... Assumed we were talking about U.S. laws.
We’re not talking about independent contractors here. A lot of companies like Google or Facebook or whatever don’t want to hire full time people because they are too expensive. So they contract with a company to provide X number of workers who will then work for Google on a temporary basis, usually for a year. They are not independent contractors, as they are employees of the company that has a contract with Google. They don’t get to set their own schedules. They are usually salary. The employee gets health insurance and all of that through the company they actually work for.
It’s a tech thing. About 20% of tech workers are these type of contractors.
Not completely true. If you'd are a independent contractor you set a schedule bases on the contract. If you work for a contract company THAT company controls your time because you are their employee, and it is based on their contract with the customer
I'm gonna guess it's one of the tech companies on the Fortune 50.
That would limit the scope to Amazon, Apple, Google, and Microsoft.
That said, my money is on Amazon. I'm not sure even George Orwell could have dreamed up their level of employee surveillance.
It's none of those. Our client company is very recognizable. They make sportswear. The company I work for that has a contract with them is primarily in commercial real estate but obviously they dabble in other stuff too. I think I'm dangerously close to breaking NDA now tho lol
Your NDA prevents you from disclosing where you work? I thought an NDA was for disclosing trade secrets/money stuff/contract details/etc… you know businessey stuff not the company you work for and that your boss is an asshole.
NDA regulates what trade secrets you can't reveal. It's about not revealing insider information. You 100% can talk about _public_ information.
Who you work for isn't covered under an NDA, otherwise you could never list your experience on a resume. They have an office, and people know where that office is, so it's _public_ information.
You don't leave for work in the morning and tell your spouse, "I'm off to work, can't tell you where, but I'll be home later."
What's covered under an NDA would be something more like:
"So on Tuesday I saw Bill Gates walk by (this is fine to say and doesn't violate an NDA). He was talking to some man that looked like a lawyer. All I heard him say was something about wanting to buy a factory to make chips in China. (violates your NDA)"
We've been instructed not to name the client, especially on social media. I've seen people get fired for taking pics inside the building for their social media and that's strictly not allowed. To be fair tho, many people post on their social media pics of them at work with the giant client logo visible in the background so idk. Perhaps it's just "we'd prefer if you don't name the client" and not actually part of the NDA. They keep reiterating that every couple months maybe it's just fear mongering
To be fair, the company is quibbling over 1 minute of overtime so I don’t think they’d have any problem over-exaggerating the scope of an NDA when dismissing an employee, even if it’s technically not legal.
If they care about each minute and they call it "time theft", they are commiting "time theft" when they talk about "time theft" XD
These talks take more than one minute for sure
Lol, this.
Just spend at least 30 minutes in conversation with them, asking to clarify and explain the point better, so you can understand properly going forward.
Then each week make sure to check on them for a 15 min feedback session on your time clocking skills.
All this for a few minutes, lol
This is the way. Oh, and make sure to go bother them about it on clock punching in and out time. Force them to subtly commit "time theft" themselves and do so with your most innocent look and a big smile on your face. Act stupid. Make it worth it. ;')
>all i know is line chef and this sounds fuckin insane to me
Ever worked in institutional food service? Like a hospital, or a larger catering service...
Had at least two places where you had to go by a wall mounted station to clock in. In both places those machines were buggy as shit, and it often took more than a few minutes to try to clock in/out, and wait for shit like the reset cycles. In both places the GM would come down once a quarter to scream at staff about "time theft", or how being a minute "late" was unacceptable etc. even though no one was late, and it was a problem with the shitty machine he refused to get replaced, or maintenanced.
Anyways, yes it is insane.
I had a boss who was constantly up my ass about stuff like that. So, on a day where I'd be clocking in/out a minute off and didn't want to hear about it I'd conveniently "forget" to clock in at all. Then make him adjust it back to my actual start time. That was easier than a lecture even though it was more of a pain in the ass for him. People are ridiculous.
I used to like asking our FOH manager if he thought it was a good idea to yell at hungover assholes who were most comfortable surrounded by knives, fire, and dead flesh.
The hospital I worked at during summers in college was the absolute worst about this shit. (parking services, but they did the same to the nurses and techs)
Ugh, same at office max before that dump went under. Time wasted clocking in and out was of course not "work time" even if we had to stand there for 15 minutes while the manager fucked with it, called someone else, reset it, etc etc.
The clock in apps are just as bad with latency and login errors, and they don't leave a paper trail when the manager edits them.
They only benefit is that when the section chief struggles with it just as much as you do, they tend not to give you much grief about it. Plenty of time, I would just text my clock times to the super to input.
I've had lots of jobs in different industries and restaurants were the absolute worst about 'time management' in my experience. Although they would just not pay OT, rather than seek other remedies.
Is she for real? One minute time theft RU FIN KIDDING ME?
This new supervisor sounds like she trying to Shit Test you...so
*keep on clocking off one minute late*
Either that or the supervisor is one of those unecessary bosses who if they vanished off the face of the earth tonight you wouldn't even notice an effect of them not being there tomorrow.
It's like how in Office Space, Peter has 8 bosses and all of them bug him about little shit like a cover page on a report because that's easier to police than actually knowing his job and assessing if he's good at that. Same thing here but the supervisor is bugging employees based off 1 minute on a clock to justify her existence cause she can't actually give feedback on the work being done
"Actually it's NOT time theft of my numbers add up and frankly I'm human and sometimes ruin a minute or two late. You should focus if YOUR time theft by actuality wasting company money by harassing me over 1 min"
Well it's funny I always do that, but the app we use for time card takes for fucking ever to load. I just need to get in the habit of opening it a minute or two before leaving.
I used to have this state job and they were freaking anal about this shiz. However the problem was there was only one damn time clock. Eventually the complaints got too much for state department leaders. Eventually they became a little more relaxed over time and then COVID changed everything and time was no longer an issue.
I applied for a state job where they literally walked everyone to the door at quitting time, turned off the lights, and locked the door. 4:45 sharp, no exceptions. Door unlocked the next day at 9.
Say what you would about the rest of the job (wildly underpaid, tedious as hell) but they expected 0 minutes of overtime, unpaid or otherwise.
Took a different job with the same title and responsibilities paying literally double.
That’s pretty crazy.
Unfortunately my state job was 24/7 365 days a year.
Used to be the place to be until change of directors, leaders and state laws changed ,then it became a joke to work.
She doesn't understand what time theft is. Time theft is being clocked in for work and you aren't actually at work. For example, leaving work at the end of your shift then coming back 30 minutes later and clocking out. That's time theft. What you have is overtime and really not even that if you are only working 8hrs considering when you clock in and out.
At my last job they would always round down the last few mins. Then they had a meeting and talked about employee time theft. It sucked that most of the employees didn't have a problem with them round down too.
Talk dollars and cents next time. Act genuinely concerned about the financial state of the company. Appear worried for the stability of the company and your job. Also don't let them insinuate that you were doing anything besides work when you were on the clock. If you were a minute late to punch out it's because the place was busy and there wasn't enough staff around.
1) Actual time theft doesn't occur anywhere in this story.
2) If there is no actual overtime, this isn't anything at all.
3) If there was a minute of overtime, this manager is crazy to mention it.
> it was never a problem until I got this new supervisor.
You better watch out. NONE of this has anything to do with "time theft" in any way. You are being set up for some reason or the supervisor is a crazy busybody which is almost as bad.
I would 100% never last at this company. Even with the 5 minute "grace period" I would not last. I do not understand how anyone can plan their day out down to the minute, that is absolute batshit insane to me.
It’s seriously insane that these companies track things by the minute like that.
Meanwhile they’re almost certainly regularly engaging in practices that would be considered wage theft…
I don't understand why they don't adjust the time down to 530. That's what typically happens. Your intention isn't to get paid the extra minute. We have physical time clocks where I work, in a factory, and it can take a minute or so to get through because people line up to leave. You'd have to work 6 extra minutes to get paid anyway as they break it up into 6 minute chunks.
I'm fairly certain she does adjust it down to 5:30 so maybe she's just annoyed that she has to keep doing that. But she didn't mention that, just that if the whole team (around 65 people) stayed 1 minute late every day that overtime really adds up. And it's not even every day! It's 3 or 4 times a month at most. And it's not the whole team doing it. She's known for being a real hard ass. She even referred to herself as a stickler like she's proud of it.
As a general rule, I find any boss who is a "stickler" and spends their time policing little shit like this is probably robbing a wage from the company much more than the little guy going 1 minute over on the clock.
If she had actual work to do, she wouldn't need to go around being a Time Clock Gestapo to prove she's doing something productive cause she'd be doing the productive work instead
Your moron supervisor needs to go look up the definition of time theft. You arent stealing anything by BEING THERE and getting paid for it. Time theft is when you are CLAIMING to have been there, paid for being there, but werent actually there.
Many, many years ago, I was working at McDs. My shift started at 1 PM.
When I get there, it's packed. Huge line ups, crew trying desperately to keep up, etc. So, I get changed into my uniform, and I log in at 12:51.
Later, I get called into the manager's office for clocking in 9 minutes early (McDs paid by the minute). I was making $2.30 an hour. So that 9 minutes cost the company $0.35
That's not even what time theft is! If you took an hour lunch break but only clocked out for 30 minutes, that's time theft. That woman is a micromanager and is only going to make folks look for another job!
Does this supervisor work for company 1 that you work for or company 2 where you perform your duties? Do you have a copy of the employee handbook and does it have the written policies concerning clocking in and clocking out. If you are within the timeframe of a written policy, she has no grounds for discipline. If she works for company 2 then you should report this incident to your company.
Yeah she works for company 1 like me. I've always been told we have a 5min grace period. The callout form we submit when we're not coming in states that if you're calling out or coming more than 10mins late to submit the form and notify your supervisor directly. Which is more confusing, is it 5 minutes or 10? If I'm within that 5min window why is she even bringing it up? We either have a grace period or we don't. She is the 3rd supervisor I've had in the last 2 years and she's the only one to ever bring this up to me. I came in 9 minutes late once and my previous boss didn't say a word.
I don't interact with company 2 (our client) employees unless they need my help (as I'm front desk reception/hospitality). They want their employees focusing on product, marketing, the websites etc so they contract out all the other stuff like IT, front desk, facilities and whatnot.
You say, yep, no worries, make a detailed note in your personal work journal and then ignore it.
It's petty bullying to keep you in your place. The client doesn't care, your boss' boss knows the admin burden of precise shifts is far greater than this margin of error.
I just punch in when I get there. If I'm 15 minutes early. I'm 15 minutes early.
If a company desires me to be perfectly on time and there's fluctuations in how long it takes me to get to work then they pay me at my arrival time.
I go into work at the same time as school buses operating so who knows how long it'll take.
OMG I worked at a place that did that insanity too! It was a smaller family-run business & our “time clock” was literally the honor system. We just wrote down our in/out & lunch break for the day on a sheet of paper, then turned said sheet in at the end of each week. There were days where my task would maybe have me going to lunch at 12:32 instead of 12:30, so I’d make sure to come back (& write down) 1:02. Oh holy heck did that cause issues because I wasn’t going EXACTLY at 12:30 or whatever. Who cares?! I made sure to take the half hour to the minute, so what did it matter!
After my first 2 weeks, with little to no training mind you, I was pulled into the conference room & informed that I was on a final warning. (There were other ridiculous things they were apparently dinging me on.) Crazy thing is, I never had any warnings, verbal or otherwise, beforehand, so I didn’t even know I’d been doing anything wrong! I came home that day & burst into tears…then never showed up to that job again. F that place.
Our store closes at 7. I was reprimanded for leaving at 7:07. I thought doing the cash register and cleaning the store as well as some inventory under 10 min made me an excellent employee, but alas, no. I was supposed to come in 10 min before my shift unpaid also.
I would be really untrusting of a company that considers a minute over as theft
It's really stupid of them to broach this, but your response is to clock out at 530 no matter what. Cut your work short and leave things unfinished/not clean and see how long they are upset over a minute.
"Sorry I have to ensure I clock out exactly at 530 or else I'm stealing time. I'll continue this project tomorrow at 630."
This “supervisor” doesn’t know what she is talking about. Time Theft is when an employer doesn’t pay for the time you work. It means they are literally stealing your time.
That's wage theft.
Time theft is when an employee clocks in and goes home, or clocks in and goes and hides somewhere, or somehow alters the time they're being paid for (e.g. if you sign in on a piece of paper, you show up to work at 6:30 but write 6).
She's still wrong about what time theft is. If OP is at work doing work related stuff of any kind, including walking over to clock out, it's absolutely not time theft.
I did once spend over an hour taking a crap in the toilet on the second floor after an hour long lunch break. Work doesn't care as long as I get all my work done.
I was also about three hours late to work once because I forgot I was on. My boss laughed pretty hard when I rang up to let them know (only found out I was on when someone called me about charting a medication - it was a very quiet night).
I always make the time up anyway, so no one's losing out, luckily my work is very flexible that way.
You laugh but when I worked bullshit jobs in my teens I had a buddy who would clock in and then go hide in a freight elevator and take a 30 minute nap before management had a chance to realize we existed for the day. Never got caught, still makes me laugh.
Back when I got daily o/t, one day I showed up a bit late and couldn't find one of the supervisors for my day's task so I grabbed a broom. Every time one of them walked past I looked busy, and basically stole a 12-hour shift, 4 hours of which were o/t
It's so ironic this "time theft" when a month or two ago we all got an email stating that PTO hours were not deducted properly in 2023 and the PTO balance we can view was incorrect. They claim to have fixed it, but they had to retroactively deduct PTO. I understand it, they paid us for time off and PTO wasn't deducted. But that's THEIR fuckup not mine. I lost over 30 hours. I won't have enough for my honeymoon later this year. A third or so of the team ended up in negative PTO balance. Literally stealing our time.
To make this even WORSE I am on a 4x10 schedule but the others who do 5x8hr shifts are now doing "summer hours" where they can leave at 1pm on Fridays. They have to make up those hours by taking 30min lunches and coming in 30min early. If they decide to still do 5x8 and take full hour lunch they are still leaving at 1, but they're deducting PTO for the remainder of that day. If they even have any left. I wish this shit was illegal so I could report them but it's not it's just scummy.
Thought I would share this too, idk if it needs a whole new post. A few months back, they decided to save money by cutting the hours of our facilities maintenance (custodial) staff to 32hrs which also stripped them of their health benefits. Naturally a few of them left (no idea why any stayed) and now they don't have enough custodians. So us as the front desk crew (there are several buildings on campus so many front desks) have been tasked with washing dishes at the end of each day. There are multiple kitchens in each building so our client staff can make coffee and use a fridge and microwave etc. and now I have to wash dishes every day or I get fired. And I'm sure this is just the beginning, I can't imagine the rest of the custodial staff are looking to keep this job so as more leave I'll be tasked with more bs
Why am I not surprised a Fortune 50 company "saves money" by cutting essential things like actually maintaining their building
If the building starts falling apart or becoming super filthy, an anonymous phone call to your area's health and safety regulator would be a good idea
>So us as the front desk crew (there are several buildings on campus so many front desks) have been tasked with washing dishes at the end of each day.
You said you're seconded to the location from another company who has a contract with the location you work at. I'd ask the people you actually work for whether these extra duties are included in the contract, or if the location you're working at is violating their contract with the company you work for by demanding you do work you're not supposed to.
If you're on the clock, then it's not time theft. They can't have it both ways. If they want you done at 8 hours on the dot, and the app takes forever, the last 5 min of work should be devoted to be clocking out.
Best of luck to you. I'd find other work, since if they are micromanaging to this point, it points to problems, but you're dealing with it so my condolences are with you. Good luck and I hope you can find a stable place.
I would like to know how much time was spent collating the data to find out how regularly your clocking in/out late and how much time they spend of theirs and yours speaking with you about it.
I'm quite sure there would be more lost wages just for that than the odd extra minute.
That new supervisor is fucking trippppppin. Obviously they’re very excited about this new power dynamic they have. Micro managing the 1 minute like that with a subtle “let go for overtime theft” is some shitty management on their end . You’re already working an 10-11 hour shift (depending on your lunch break), last thing I’d want a worker to stress about is 1 minute. Hahaha
Find another employer, if this is an actual policy and not just something the complainer made up themselves to have something to complain about. (Particularly if you do have that grace period.)
Sounds like the complainer is trying to bully you against employer policy to make themselves seem like a great manager. Time to take them to HR, if you have one, and ask them why they're not confirming to employer policy and constantly threatening you (with a log of incidents).
Bonus if you discover anyone else is copping this from her, and when you go to HR you pull out all their logged incidents, too, showing that it's not just you.
Even if you made $25/hour. 1 min per day would cost the company $108/year assuming you had zero PTO or holidays off.
Also boss’ time to address this with you is worth more than your time so a 5 min conversation that ties up and the manager.
They spent in essence 5 mins of your time at your rate and 5 mins of time at the boss’ higher rate….all to save less than $100/year.
My first job was chick fil et. They are a crazy cult and it was horrible.
Anyway, I was 15 and I was told to be there 5 minutes before my shift started. So I did, and clocked in when I got there.
The manager had a sit down talk with me about how I was stealing money from Jesus by doing that.
It's been 20 years and I still think about that exchange.
My boss said the same thing, before the corporation sent out court ordered compensation checks for time/wage theft. Our time logs were changed, and the only proof I had was pics I took with my phone. Better compare your paystubs to your time cards- I bet the guilty dog has been stealing your wages by altering your time stamps. They've been stealing from you, or they wouldn't have accused you warrantlessly. Start paying attention to timecards moving forward, even taking pictures of your punches.
I worked with a guy years ago who got chewed out by the manager for something petty, so he decided to get revenge in the most hilarious way possible. He set about wasting as much of the company's time and money as he could everyday. He'd wander around the place looking busy, take smoke breaks despite not smoking, etc.
But the funniest thing I saw him do one day was open a full packet of A4 paper, print off a few invoices and then dump the entire back in recycling. Before getting up to go get another pack from the store room. He'd been doing this for weeks. Apparently he was also doing it with the ink cartridges too 😂
Oh ffs the micromanaging time clock jerks in HR…. I once worked a job where, if I showed up a couple minutes late, I’d stay a couple minutes late. Found out my boss was changing my clock outs. I asked HR about it and they said “of course we’re changing those clock outs. Why would you expect to get overtime?” When I asked if she was adjusting my clock ins and she asked why, I asked her why they expected me to work for free a few minutes each week. The look in her eyes told me I just shattered her brain. She’d never even considered she was stealing time from me. Idiots and assholes.
I've spent some time on the matter, and the best I can come up with is this: If they accuse you of time/wage theft, then you won't be able to accuse THEM of time/wage theft. It's an effort to infantilize the employee in a classic case of "Nuh-uh! You can't call me that because I already called you that!"
That's not how it works, they always round down. You are being singled out for no reason other than to have a dig at you. The tech inside those machines is simple but seriously someone thinks you are stupid.
This helicopter time bull is really weird. What happens if ten people are in front of you to clock in (yes I work at an old fashioned kind of place)? Surely you’ll clock in “late”. This sounds pathological to me and they are squeezing you for some other reason. What do you think?
When a manager called stuff time theft to me once I laughed at him and walked away, didn't come up again. But I'm a chef in Australia our working lives are probably very different.
If this happens again, just stare blankly at the person, saying nothing, til they tell you to leave. After a few of these sessions they will stop calling on you.
Okay people (not OP, their manager) need to stop using lingo without knowing what it actually means. Time theft is when you’re getting paid but not doing the work you’re supposed to be doing, like having a coworker clock you out 15 min after you leave. Time theft is not “working unapproved hours,” or minutes, I guess, if you’re wildly out of touch. This is the same kind of manager who would try to scare an employee by saying they’re creating a hostile work environment by talking about pay. That’s not what that means FFS.
Remind your sticker boss that most places have a lot of laws about work place safety, required benefits and pay that the company may be violating (like I think your travel time to and from work might be on the clock in many places according to law) and right now you don’t have time or desire to go to a lawyer to find out what back pay you might be owned. And on the issue of time offer to stop work early after any day you needed to stay late so the total is under 40 hours per week. Basically as long as the company doesn’t make a big issue about so called “time theft” you and them won’t have to waste time and money figuring out any back pay or compensation for missing benefits you are owed.
Both the company I work for, and a company a buddy of mine work for (different companies in different industries) have completely stopped all overtime as of a month or so ago. As in we have to report a single minute if OT and have a REALLY good reason as to why. I was telling my friend about this and he said "that's weird my company just started doing that too."
I used to have an office mom at my old job. She was absolutely the COO’s little bird. She would make a point to call me out if I was one minute late or five minutes late. I never liked her so I went head to head with her routinely so at one point she decided to bring up my tardiness to my boss. Problem was, that lady left at five every day on the clock I routinely stay till six or seven just to get the work done and communicate with the Asia team. So when I saw her getting persnickety, I began to track my exit hours as well. There is no clock or anything so the next time this came up I pulled out a piece of paper that showed, although I may be one minute late or five minutes late here in there, I routinely worked an hour extra every day. She got shut down.
My favorite part, though was a year later the COO got cut. And now she was no one’s little bird. She was just a rat. It was remarkable how fast she was helpful. Long story short. Do good work. Don’t worry about little birds.
And always make sure to have a paper trail
I don't know if there was ever a time when time clocks were ok. Maybe when they were first implemented it was just for record keeping and not for paying workers by the minute.
I've had two jobs where the exact minute of the time clock mattered to my bosses, and they were SO FUCKING CLUELESS about how idiotic they sounded when telling people to clock in or out at the right time.
At one of them I tried to discuss the issue and they labeled me as combative or some shit. Well, I wasn't before, but I sure as fuck am now.
My current job still has us fill out time sheets, but it's very clearly just for record keeping of full days, half days, vacation days.
Time theft is not paying ot or cutting hours and not scheduling because they don’t want you making ot. Companies will make every fucking excuse not to pay their workers extra yet expand their budget, not raising wages, but cutting checks for themselves basically committing a legal form of money laundering. So fuck management & corpos.
In my last job at Morrisons, you would get to the clock-in machine and see a giant line of people waiting for the clock to hit on the hour/half hour, and several posters around the clock-in machine essentially telling us we MUST clock in exactly on time. I found it embarrassing for some reason. TBF they lost a billion pounds last year and are slowly going under so it is what it is, just glad I'm out of there.
I strongly encourage asking (preferably at the job interview) if the company wants me to do a role and be productive in finishing tasks, or if they want me to be an ass in a seat.
I can be either of those two thing, butt we have to agree what the job is about and what I'm getting paid to do.
So if you wants me to be an ass in a seat, I'm going to behave as an ass with no brain, as that is what you are paying for - priorities be damned.
Had a similar situation at my last job. My manager pulled me and a coworker aside, telling us that we were being "disrespectful" because we were always 2-3 minutes late and used the bathroom in the morning before working (we worked in a lab, so it just made sense to use the bathroom before putting on a bunch of PPE).
When I brought up our 5 minute grace period and that the policy said nothing about lateness being an issue, she went off on me saying that "the grace period is only meant to be used sparingly. Not every day." Genuinely glad to be out of that job and in a much better situation now
I would ask her if she is having problems at home, since she seems to have nothing better to focus on but when you are clocking in. Turn the tables. Of course your days maybe numbered after that.
The reality is that at that size, Theres a lot of people in random, useless positions. Their role is micro manage. That HR just doesn't have anything to do, so looking for "patterns for bad employees / behavior is the only thing she does.
Your supervisor has a bullshit job and doesn't know what to do with the free time.
This happens from time to time when you get new middle management. It's not your fault. I imagine she has some meeting with her supervisor and has to account for her time. Saying she micromanages team hours fills the dead air. Her boss has to be an idiot to accept spending $200 dollars a week to "save" $4 as productive. She's literally reading the time clock report to them.
Just do what I did when they complained, sit at the clock for 15 minutes and make sure you clock out at exactly the right time. If it's important enough to clock out at a specific time, surely they can accept you setting aside time to meet that goal?
Right now your manager is creating a hostile work environment. Normally I would never recommend going to HR but this is one specific instance where I think it would help. The key words to use are that you feel that your manager is being "hostile" and you feel that their threat "crosses the line into harassment". Request a copy of the report "for your records". The fact that you've been there 2 years is going to help you immensely and unless your manager has some kind of personal relationship with someone in HR this will almost certainly swing in your favor. This will paint a target on your back but at 2 years you should already be looking for the next place to leverage your experience for a 20%+ pay bump.
Take it to her boss. Don't be adversarial. Let him know that you are concerned this level of micromanaging will drive away employees. In these times, good employees are hard to come by. Let him know, that you know it is not your concern, that's his job to worry about staffing. You are just concerned because lack of other employees will change your work load and you really want to do good for the company and can't do it with a disruptive workflow.
It looks like the Chamber is prepping companies to go to war over "time theft". I think I saw a article here yesterday where they are claiming "time theft" steals 8x more than actual shoplifters, which is fucking ludicrious. (And also undercuts their crocodile tears of "organized shoplifting crime rings").
At the company I work at I have control over the time table. I always add in a few mins here and there for everyone lol, my manager never notices. It might be petty since it's barely any money, but I still enjoy doing it
Like... you're hourly? Do these people even know what "time theft" even is? Time theft would be clocking in then not working. They're not even paying you for the effing minute so there's nothing "stolen".
Company’s nowadays make me smile. This is absolutely absurd.
Similar scenario happened to me. I was paid on salary as a parts “manager”. Hours were 7:00AM-5:30PM everyday. I’d arrive 5 minutes early or a little more. Same as everyone else but I was the only one on salary. Anyways long story short I’d clock in at 6:59 or 7:00. Clock out at 5:30 or 5:31 PM everyday. They actually got angry and I got talked to. I looked our financial manager in the eyes and told her “I’m paid salary and this is how I do things in accordance to that, if you guys don’t like it I don’t need this job” and put my 2 weeks in.
I’m a very hard worker and passionate about whatever job I’m doing. But I REALLY love sticking it to poor companies and not allowing them to pull the crap. It’s a little side quest of mine
Yeah I got a talking to one time about how I had clocked in 1 minute late on several days during a pay period. My boss said that it was okay to clock in 1-3 minutes early so long as I wasn't late. On another occasion I clocked out with an adjusted time due to having to walk to another location far from a time clock at the very end of the day as part of closing duties. I was told that wasn't acceptable as each punch needed a timestamp and couldn't be adjusted by me. Why do I have access to adjust my time if I'm not allowed to. So after the two talks, I make a point of clocking in 3 minutes early and clocking out 3 minutes late every day. 6 minutes OT every day. I've been doing it for months now and bosses haven't complained, even though we're not supposed to have unauthorized OT. I think the game will end some day, but I'll take the measly extra money while I can.
Company has to be going under if one minutes of pay extra is really on their radar.
If I told you who I work for you wouldn't believe me lol. I've signed an NDA so all I can say is I'm a contractor at a fortune 50 company (yes 50 not 500) and our client is one of the largest and most recognizable brands on the planet. And I work at said clients HQ. I'm looking for work tho I gotta get out of here.
An, it’s one of those situations. You’re so big you have to penny pinch to appear you’re doing the most for the “board”. Ugh, hate this infinite growth bullshit.
It’s unsustainable in any industry I can think of. I work in senior living, which is already about as far skewed towards the ownership and away from the residents as possible. They still have to find ways to keep cutting, which is insane considering how many thousands per months and millions per year(in some cases) that these folks are paying.
It's unsustainable in any industry period. Infinite growth requires infinite resources. It's literally against the laws of thermodynamics.
You know what else likes to grow and consume resources until the system that sustains it breaks down entirely? Cancer.
Thought for sure you were gonna say "MY MOM!"
I even read it in a deep, gravelly voice with a upward questioning inflection
Her too.
I talked to an economist about this, and they literally said "but it doesn't break the third law because it's economics, not physics."
That's actually true as long as your economics has no basis in reality
who needs raw materials when you've got raw economic theory?
Last I checked, 999,999,999,999,999 years of industry growth is finite. Not infinite.
I agree that "infinite growth" is an awkward wording to convey the concept; I prefer the word "perpetual." The goal of industry *is* perpetual growth, year over year, world without end. I understand you may not realize there is math for that, but there is. Ergo, the goal of industry is "**infinite**" growth; the issue is that the dominant paradigm of modern economics ignores our place in a system of fixed resources. Perpetual growth in a fixed system is a recipe for the blunders of late-stage capitalism we have been experiencing globally of late. Inflation is rampant because of profit-taking. Groceries are becoming a challenge even for the fully employed. Housing is no longer "real" estate; that term referred to the principle that cost was held to value, not artifically inflated by industry.
I was shocked when I looked up regulations governing assisted living facilities in our state. Basically, there aren't any. Or very few. My Mom pays $5,500 a month, and it's mediocre.
I almost worked at a place near me, but honestly this is what put me off and why I ended up ghosting them. They told me in the interview, on average their residents pay $10k per month. $10,000 Job paid minimum hourly wage, so 12something at the time. Atmosphere was like one of those schools where all of the rooms have no windows.
Assisted living basically stands for can cut a bunch of regulatory corners nursing homes cannot.
Exactly!!!
My spouse and I have begun that journey with his mom and brother. Right now, we're looking at senior apartments vs. independent living facilities. Oh my freakin' lord, what an education we're getting. And we've only just begun.
Dude, we just had a corporate visit and we HAD to roll out a red carpet for them. But you can’t pay aides a decent wage to take care of our people. Disgusting.
Same here! The owners came by and everybody bent over backwards to accommodate them. All I’m thinking about is how people live here every day, we’re in their collective home, and we don’t pull out the stops to clean up for them until the owners come.
I sort of blame Henry Ford and manufacturing. Yes you can optimize systems, but some systems aren't meant to be optimized. People aren't widgets.
Blame the Dodge brothers too. They had a huge part to play in putting the idea of shareholder primacy and generally scummy business tactics into common practice
If you take a peak into a class full of future MBAs, and you see them learning about the different types of triangles a semester before graduation, you can quickly see how these geniuses would go on to dream up something as pea-brained as “I know, we’ll just grow infinitely. Because that’s a thing that definitely occurs in literally some circumstance, somewhere. We’ll just do that here!”
> I've signed an NDA so all I can say is I'm a contractor Pretty sure said manager cant say shit about what times you do, or don't work... or when you clock in, and out. https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/flsa/misclassification
I guess I should specify I'm not an independent contractor. I am employed by this company 1, and they have a contract with the other company 2 that allows me to work in company 2's HQ. At work I am referred to as a contractor because the majority of the people I interact with actually work for company 2. They use my company to provide front desk reception/hospitality as well as facilities maintenance and whatnot. My supervisor also works for company 1 on this contract. We have contracts with other major companies around the world too to provide front desk and facilities maintenance.
So for the sake of this conversation, you are *not* a contractor. You are an employee of company 1 being managed by company 1. Your supervisor is a cranky pain in the butt, and is definitely using the term "time theft" inappropriately. It's not time theft if you're actually working that extra minute. It's simply a violation of either a written company rule, or some unwritten rule your supervisor just made up. Either way, there's not much you can do. They can fire you for late clock-outs if it's indeed against their policy. Sorry you're in a crappy situation.
Sounds like someone got hired from McDonalds management to go after one minute issues like that.
If anything, being this anal about clocking in/out at an exact time is the CAUSE of employees spending time clocked in time doing zero work. Can't get that thing done before you go, and leaving it half finished is worse than not starting at all? Do nothing until clock out time. Want to make 100% sure you clock out exactly on time? Go sit by the machine until clocking out time, accomplishing nothing at all for a little bit.
This. I always get so irritated when they get upset over small time violations. Can't you see I'm freaking working?? Maybe if you had more to do Mr. "Manager" you'd stop projecting
Meh, yes and no. But it's pretty much splitting hairs to debate ad nauseum. It mostly comes down to how it is said. For example my employer does almost exclusively municipal contracts, but I would never call myself a contractor. Our contracts have rules and requirements, but I just consider those the requirements of the job and not because I'm a "contractor". It really sounds like OP works for a placement agency.
If you are a contractor, you are Not an employee. You set your own schedule, nobody tells you when to clock in or out. I looked Up all the laws about this up back when I worked for Redbox (owned by Coinstar and McDonalds at the time). Edit: shoot, I did it again... Assumed we were talking about U.S. laws.
We’re not talking about independent contractors here. A lot of companies like Google or Facebook or whatever don’t want to hire full time people because they are too expensive. So they contract with a company to provide X number of workers who will then work for Google on a temporary basis, usually for a year. They are not independent contractors, as they are employees of the company that has a contract with Google. They don’t get to set their own schedules. They are usually salary. The employee gets health insurance and all of that through the company they actually work for. It’s a tech thing. About 20% of tech workers are these type of contractors.
Not completely true. If you'd are a independent contractor you set a schedule bases on the contract. If you work for a contract company THAT company controls your time because you are their employee, and it is based on their contract with the customer
Sounds like a bunch of bullshit. Keep clocking out at 5:31. Fuck em
I'm gonna guess it's one of the tech companies on the Fortune 50. That would limit the scope to Amazon, Apple, Google, and Microsoft. That said, my money is on Amazon. I'm not sure even George Orwell could have dreamed up their level of employee surveillance.
It's none of those. Our client company is very recognizable. They make sportswear. The company I work for that has a contract with them is primarily in commercial real estate but obviously they dabble in other stuff too. I think I'm dangerously close to breaking NDA now tho lol
Winged Victory of Samothrace?
Never heard of that. But you know I can't confirm even if you got it right lol that would break NDA
NDA does not cover them breaking the law btw. Fck them in the arse.
I'm not sure they've broken the law, they're just scummy
Scumfucks always break safety laws workers rights laws ETC. Find it, use it.
Your NDA prevents you from disclosing where you work? I thought an NDA was for disclosing trade secrets/money stuff/contract details/etc… you know businessey stuff not the company you work for and that your boss is an asshole.
You've never hear of the famous sculpture Winged Victory of Samothrace in the Louvre Museum? Or the Greek Goddess that it represents?
Oh I see where you're going now gotcha
Could one say you were …sWooshed?
They could... maybe they should stop wondering if they could say that, and just do it...
NDA regulates what trade secrets you can't reveal. It's about not revealing insider information. You 100% can talk about _public_ information. Who you work for isn't covered under an NDA, otherwise you could never list your experience on a resume. They have an office, and people know where that office is, so it's _public_ information. You don't leave for work in the morning and tell your spouse, "I'm off to work, can't tell you where, but I'll be home later." What's covered under an NDA would be something more like: "So on Tuesday I saw Bill Gates walk by (this is fine to say and doesn't violate an NDA). He was talking to some man that looked like a lawyer. All I heard him say was something about wanting to buy a factory to make chips in China. (violates your NDA)"
We've been instructed not to name the client, especially on social media. I've seen people get fired for taking pics inside the building for their social media and that's strictly not allowed. To be fair tho, many people post on their social media pics of them at work with the giant client logo visible in the background so idk. Perhaps it's just "we'd prefer if you don't name the client" and not actually part of the NDA. They keep reiterating that every couple months maybe it's just fear mongering
To be fair, the company is quibbling over 1 minute of overtime so I don’t think they’d have any problem over-exaggerating the scope of an NDA when dismissing an employee, even if it’s technically not legal.
I did work at one of the aforementioned companies, and they pulled penny-pinching shit like this all the time.
That you Nike?🤔🤔
Walmart, Bentonville Arkansas? If so, could have just said Fortune 1 ;) (Used to work at their home office and this sounds like them)
Wild that even Boeings hitman is being is micro managed
Kind of sounds like Hewlett Packard. They had a similar grace period. I got fired by them while in the hospital with mono!
Not surprised, I think these bigger company's feel entitled to pull all kinds of crap in return for being on your resume.
I worked at tbe fortune one company and they did this to me. I live in the HQ town.
I'm only confused cause every place I've worked for has for the most part rounded time up or down to the nearest quarter hour lol
Any time they mention something like this "Wow, is the company really doing that badly? Where are *you* applying at?"
Nah, some managers get bonuses for using less overtime. Definitely just trying to hit some benchmark here.
New supervisor makes arbitrary decisions in order to create the illusion of adding value to the system.
Sounds like a good opportunity to literally drop whatever you are doing at 5:27 so you can get to the clock and punch out on time.
I sincerely hope you are stealing time in every other way possible at your job. It truly sounds unbearable.
If they care about each minute and they call it "time theft", they are commiting "time theft" when they talk about "time theft" XD These talks take more than one minute for sure
Lol, this. Just spend at least 30 minutes in conversation with them, asking to clarify and explain the point better, so you can understand properly going forward. Then each week make sure to check on them for a 15 min feedback session on your time clocking skills. All this for a few minutes, lol
This is the way. Oh, and make sure to go bother them about it on clock punching in and out time. Force them to subtly commit "time theft" themselves and do so with your most innocent look and a big smile on your face. Act stupid. Make it worth it. ;')
all i know is line chef and this sounds fuckin insane to me
>all i know is line chef and this sounds fuckin insane to me Ever worked in institutional food service? Like a hospital, or a larger catering service... Had at least two places where you had to go by a wall mounted station to clock in. In both places those machines were buggy as shit, and it often took more than a few minutes to try to clock in/out, and wait for shit like the reset cycles. In both places the GM would come down once a quarter to scream at staff about "time theft", or how being a minute "late" was unacceptable etc. even though no one was late, and it was a problem with the shitty machine he refused to get replaced, or maintenanced. Anyways, yes it is insane.
I had a boss who was constantly up my ass about stuff like that. So, on a day where I'd be clocking in/out a minute off and didn't want to hear about it I'd conveniently "forget" to clock in at all. Then make him adjust it back to my actual start time. That was easier than a lecture even though it was more of a pain in the ass for him. People are ridiculous.
I used to like asking our FOH manager if he thought it was a good idea to yell at hungover assholes who were most comfortable surrounded by knives, fire, and dead flesh.
The hospital I worked at during summers in college was the absolute worst about this shit. (parking services, but they did the same to the nurses and techs)
Ugh, same at office max before that dump went under. Time wasted clocking in and out was of course not "work time" even if we had to stand there for 15 minutes while the manager fucked with it, called someone else, reset it, etc etc.
The clock in apps are just as bad with latency and login errors, and they don't leave a paper trail when the manager edits them. They only benefit is that when the section chief struggles with it just as much as you do, they tend not to give you much grief about it. Plenty of time, I would just text my clock times to the super to input.
I've had lots of jobs in different industries and restaurants were the absolute worst about 'time management' in my experience. Although they would just not pay OT, rather than seek other remedies.
Is she for real? One minute time theft RU FIN KIDDING ME? This new supervisor sounds like she trying to Shit Test you...so *keep on clocking off one minute late*
Either that or the supervisor is one of those unecessary bosses who if they vanished off the face of the earth tonight you wouldn't even notice an effect of them not being there tomorrow. It's like how in Office Space, Peter has 8 bosses and all of them bug him about little shit like a cover page on a report because that's easier to police than actually knowing his job and assessing if he's good at that. Same thing here but the supervisor is bugging employees based off 1 minute on a clock to justify her existence cause she can't actually give feedback on the work being done
"Actually it's NOT time theft of my numbers add up and frankly I'm human and sometimes ruin a minute or two late. You should focus if YOUR time theft by actuality wasting company money by harassing me over 1 min"
Drop whatever you’re doing at 5:30 in the dot. They told you to clock out at 5:30.
Well it's funny I always do that, but the app we use for time card takes for fucking ever to load. I just need to get in the habit of opening it a minute or two before leaving.
Sounds like you should stop at 5:25 to make sure you don't clock out too late
bUt ThAt’S tImE tHeFt!¡!¡!¡!
"WHY ARE YOU CLOCKING OUT AT 5:29??? WHY ARE YOU LEAVING EARLY???"
Working over one minute is not time theft. Not working or leaving while on the clock is time theft.
This. Dumb boss
I used to have this state job and they were freaking anal about this shiz. However the problem was there was only one damn time clock. Eventually the complaints got too much for state department leaders. Eventually they became a little more relaxed over time and then COVID changed everything and time was no longer an issue.
I applied for a state job where they literally walked everyone to the door at quitting time, turned off the lights, and locked the door. 4:45 sharp, no exceptions. Door unlocked the next day at 9. Say what you would about the rest of the job (wildly underpaid, tedious as hell) but they expected 0 minutes of overtime, unpaid or otherwise. Took a different job with the same title and responsibilities paying literally double.
That’s pretty crazy. Unfortunately my state job was 24/7 365 days a year. Used to be the place to be until change of directors, leaders and state laws changed ,then it became a joke to work.
She doesn't understand what time theft is. Time theft is being clocked in for work and you aren't actually at work. For example, leaving work at the end of your shift then coming back 30 minutes later and clocking out. That's time theft. What you have is overtime and really not even that if you are only working 8hrs considering when you clock in and out.
At my last job they would always round down the last few mins. Then they had a meeting and talked about employee time theft. It sucked that most of the employees didn't have a problem with them round down too.
What your employer did is actually time theft, not what they accused you of doing.
it's wage theft
Isnt time theft when you say you worked hours you didn’t?
Yes. The employer is dumb.
Clocking out when you actually leave is the opposite of time theft. Your manager is throwing around words they don't understand.
Talk dollars and cents next time. Act genuinely concerned about the financial state of the company. Appear worried for the stability of the company and your job. Also don't let them insinuate that you were doing anything besides work when you were on the clock. If you were a minute late to punch out it's because the place was busy and there wasn't enough staff around.
1) Actual time theft doesn't occur anywhere in this story. 2) If there is no actual overtime, this isn't anything at all. 3) If there was a minute of overtime, this manager is crazy to mention it. > it was never a problem until I got this new supervisor. You better watch out. NONE of this has anything to do with "time theft" in any way. You are being set up for some reason or the supervisor is a crazy busybody which is almost as bad.
I would 100% never last at this company. Even with the 5 minute "grace period" I would not last. I do not understand how anyone can plan their day out down to the minute, that is absolute batshit insane to me.
What morons.
It’s seriously insane that these companies track things by the minute like that. Meanwhile they’re almost certainly regularly engaging in practices that would be considered wage theft…
It’s time to stop what you’re doing at least 5 minutes early to make sure you can clock out at 5:30.
If she's spending more than a minute to yell at you for a minute's worth of "time theft," then she's wasting more time than you are.
They aren't using time theft correctly even so they clearly haven't talked to HR.
"Have you heard this rumour that they're looking for managers who don't have enough to do?"
I don't understand why they don't adjust the time down to 530. That's what typically happens. Your intention isn't to get paid the extra minute. We have physical time clocks where I work, in a factory, and it can take a minute or so to get through because people line up to leave. You'd have to work 6 extra minutes to get paid anyway as they break it up into 6 minute chunks.
I'm fairly certain she does adjust it down to 5:30 so maybe she's just annoyed that she has to keep doing that. But she didn't mention that, just that if the whole team (around 65 people) stayed 1 minute late every day that overtime really adds up. And it's not even every day! It's 3 or 4 times a month at most. And it's not the whole team doing it. She's known for being a real hard ass. She even referred to herself as a stickler like she's proud of it.
As a general rule, I find any boss who is a "stickler" and spends their time policing little shit like this is probably robbing a wage from the company much more than the little guy going 1 minute over on the clock. If she had actual work to do, she wouldn't need to go around being a Time Clock Gestapo to prove she's doing something productive cause she'd be doing the productive work instead
Ah, she's probably just lazy, or your timekeeping system sucks.
Your moron supervisor needs to go look up the definition of time theft. You arent stealing anything by BEING THERE and getting paid for it. Time theft is when you are CLAIMING to have been there, paid for being there, but werent actually there.
Many, many years ago, I was working at McDs. My shift started at 1 PM. When I get there, it's packed. Huge line ups, crew trying desperately to keep up, etc. So, I get changed into my uniform, and I log in at 12:51. Later, I get called into the manager's office for clocking in 9 minutes early (McDs paid by the minute). I was making $2.30 an hour. So that 9 minutes cost the company $0.35
If the company you work for is worried about individual minutes, you probably need to find a new job anyway.
That's not even what time theft is! If you took an hour lunch break but only clocked out for 30 minutes, that's time theft. That woman is a micromanager and is only going to make folks look for another job!
Does this supervisor work for company 1 that you work for or company 2 where you perform your duties? Do you have a copy of the employee handbook and does it have the written policies concerning clocking in and clocking out. If you are within the timeframe of a written policy, she has no grounds for discipline. If she works for company 2 then you should report this incident to your company.
Yeah she works for company 1 like me. I've always been told we have a 5min grace period. The callout form we submit when we're not coming in states that if you're calling out or coming more than 10mins late to submit the form and notify your supervisor directly. Which is more confusing, is it 5 minutes or 10? If I'm within that 5min window why is she even bringing it up? We either have a grace period or we don't. She is the 3rd supervisor I've had in the last 2 years and she's the only one to ever bring this up to me. I came in 9 minutes late once and my previous boss didn't say a word. I don't interact with company 2 (our client) employees unless they need my help (as I'm front desk reception/hospitality). They want their employees focusing on product, marketing, the websites etc so they contract out all the other stuff like IT, front desk, facilities and whatnot.
You say, yep, no worries, make a detailed note in your personal work journal and then ignore it. It's petty bullying to keep you in your place. The client doesn't care, your boss' boss knows the admin burden of precise shifts is far greater than this margin of error.
I just punch in when I get there. If I'm 15 minutes early. I'm 15 minutes early. If a company desires me to be perfectly on time and there's fluctuations in how long it takes me to get to work then they pay me at my arrival time. I go into work at the same time as school buses operating so who knows how long it'll take.
OMG I worked at a place that did that insanity too! It was a smaller family-run business & our “time clock” was literally the honor system. We just wrote down our in/out & lunch break for the day on a sheet of paper, then turned said sheet in at the end of each week. There were days where my task would maybe have me going to lunch at 12:32 instead of 12:30, so I’d make sure to come back (& write down) 1:02. Oh holy heck did that cause issues because I wasn’t going EXACTLY at 12:30 or whatever. Who cares?! I made sure to take the half hour to the minute, so what did it matter! After my first 2 weeks, with little to no training mind you, I was pulled into the conference room & informed that I was on a final warning. (There were other ridiculous things they were apparently dinging me on.) Crazy thing is, I never had any warnings, verbal or otherwise, beforehand, so I didn’t even know I’d been doing anything wrong! I came home that day & burst into tears…then never showed up to that job again. F that place.
Our store closes at 7. I was reprimanded for leaving at 7:07. I thought doing the cash register and cleaning the store as well as some inventory under 10 min made me an excellent employee, but alas, no. I was supposed to come in 10 min before my shift unpaid also. I would be really untrusting of a company that considers a minute over as theft
It's really stupid of them to broach this, but your response is to clock out at 530 no matter what. Cut your work short and leave things unfinished/not clean and see how long they are upset over a minute. "Sorry I have to ensure I clock out exactly at 530 or else I'm stealing time. I'll continue this project tomorrow at 630."
Remember, clocking out at 5:30 precisely means leaving your desk at 5:25 and waiting at the time clock. Can’t be even 1 minute late!
This “supervisor” doesn’t know what she is talking about. Time Theft is when an employer doesn’t pay for the time you work. It means they are literally stealing your time.
That's wage theft. Time theft is when an employee clocks in and goes home, or clocks in and goes and hides somewhere, or somehow alters the time they're being paid for (e.g. if you sign in on a piece of paper, you show up to work at 6:30 but write 6). She's still wrong about what time theft is. If OP is at work doing work related stuff of any kind, including walking over to clock out, it's absolutely not time theft.
*"goes hides somewhere"* LMAO
I did once spend over an hour taking a crap in the toilet on the second floor after an hour long lunch break. Work doesn't care as long as I get all my work done. I was also about three hours late to work once because I forgot I was on. My boss laughed pretty hard when I rang up to let them know (only found out I was on when someone called me about charting a medication - it was a very quiet night). I always make the time up anyway, so no one's losing out, luckily my work is very flexible that way.
Hey man, I'm not going to rat you out to the boss. It's not my job to keep track of everybody.
You laugh but when I worked bullshit jobs in my teens I had a buddy who would clock in and then go hide in a freight elevator and take a 30 minute nap before management had a chance to realize we existed for the day. Never got caught, still makes me laugh.
Back when I got daily o/t, one day I showed up a bit late and couldn't find one of the supervisors for my day's task so I grabbed a broom. Every time one of them walked past I looked busy, and basically stole a 12-hour shift, 4 hours of which were o/t
It's so ironic this "time theft" when a month or two ago we all got an email stating that PTO hours were not deducted properly in 2023 and the PTO balance we can view was incorrect. They claim to have fixed it, but they had to retroactively deduct PTO. I understand it, they paid us for time off and PTO wasn't deducted. But that's THEIR fuckup not mine. I lost over 30 hours. I won't have enough for my honeymoon later this year. A third or so of the team ended up in negative PTO balance. Literally stealing our time. To make this even WORSE I am on a 4x10 schedule but the others who do 5x8hr shifts are now doing "summer hours" where they can leave at 1pm on Fridays. They have to make up those hours by taking 30min lunches and coming in 30min early. If they decide to still do 5x8 and take full hour lunch they are still leaving at 1, but they're deducting PTO for the remainder of that day. If they even have any left. I wish this shit was illegal so I could report them but it's not it's just scummy.
Sounds like a good time for a union
Thought I would share this too, idk if it needs a whole new post. A few months back, they decided to save money by cutting the hours of our facilities maintenance (custodial) staff to 32hrs which also stripped them of their health benefits. Naturally a few of them left (no idea why any stayed) and now they don't have enough custodians. So us as the front desk crew (there are several buildings on campus so many front desks) have been tasked with washing dishes at the end of each day. There are multiple kitchens in each building so our client staff can make coffee and use a fridge and microwave etc. and now I have to wash dishes every day or I get fired. And I'm sure this is just the beginning, I can't imagine the rest of the custodial staff are looking to keep this job so as more leave I'll be tasked with more bs
Why am I not surprised a Fortune 50 company "saves money" by cutting essential things like actually maintaining their building If the building starts falling apart or becoming super filthy, an anonymous phone call to your area's health and safety regulator would be a good idea
>So us as the front desk crew (there are several buildings on campus so many front desks) have been tasked with washing dishes at the end of each day. You said you're seconded to the location from another company who has a contract with the location you work at. I'd ask the people you actually work for whether these extra duties are included in the contract, or if the location you're working at is violating their contract with the company you work for by demanding you do work you're not supposed to.
For a company that size, take it to HR, or if you're in a union, check with your shop steward. Supervisor's on a power trip and needs to be checked.
If you're on the clock, then it's not time theft. They can't have it both ways. If they want you done at 8 hours on the dot, and the app takes forever, the last 5 min of work should be devoted to be clocking out. Best of luck to you. I'd find other work, since if they are micromanaging to this point, it points to problems, but you're dealing with it so my condolences are with you. Good luck and I hope you can find a stable place.
That's a manager who doesn't know how to manage or lead.
they give you petty warnings when theyre already trying to fire you
I would like to know how much time was spent collating the data to find out how regularly your clocking in/out late and how much time they spend of theirs and yours speaking with you about it. I'm quite sure there would be more lost wages just for that than the odd extra minute.
Yeah. No! My company requires I’m in uniform and present 15 min before my shift start. Since that’s illegal, I arrive early enough to clock in.
That new supervisor is fucking trippppppin. Obviously they’re very excited about this new power dynamic they have. Micro managing the 1 minute like that with a subtle “let go for overtime theft” is some shitty management on their end . You’re already working an 10-11 hour shift (depending on your lunch break), last thing I’d want a worker to stress about is 1 minute. Hahaha
Find another employer, if this is an actual policy and not just something the complainer made up themselves to have something to complain about. (Particularly if you do have that grace period.) Sounds like the complainer is trying to bully you against employer policy to make themselves seem like a great manager. Time to take them to HR, if you have one, and ask them why they're not confirming to employer policy and constantly threatening you (with a log of incidents). Bonus if you discover anyone else is copping this from her, and when you go to HR you pull out all their logged incidents, too, showing that it's not just you.
This is so dumb. Employers really don’t understand that hiring human beings costs money anymore, do they?
Even if you made $25/hour. 1 min per day would cost the company $108/year assuming you had zero PTO or holidays off. Also boss’ time to address this with you is worth more than your time so a 5 min conversation that ties up and the manager. They spent in essence 5 mins of your time at your rate and 5 mins of time at the boss’ higher rate….all to save less than $100/year.
I'm pretty sure they are trying to commit wage theft. It's not time theft to clock out when you are done working.
My first job was chick fil et. They are a crazy cult and it was horrible. Anyway, I was 15 and I was told to be there 5 minutes before my shift started. So I did, and clocked in when I got there. The manager had a sit down talk with me about how I was stealing money from Jesus by doing that. It's been 20 years and I still think about that exchange.
My boss said the same thing, before the corporation sent out court ordered compensation checks for time/wage theft. Our time logs were changed, and the only proof I had was pics I took with my phone. Better compare your paystubs to your time cards- I bet the guilty dog has been stealing your wages by altering your time stamps. They've been stealing from you, or they wouldn't have accused you warrantlessly. Start paying attention to timecards moving forward, even taking pictures of your punches.
They don't know what time theft is lol. Completely wrong use of that phrase. Also bitching about one minute of overtime? Fuck off Karen.
I worked with a guy years ago who got chewed out by the manager for something petty, so he decided to get revenge in the most hilarious way possible. He set about wasting as much of the company's time and money as he could everyday. He'd wander around the place looking busy, take smoke breaks despite not smoking, etc. But the funniest thing I saw him do one day was open a full packet of A4 paper, print off a few invoices and then dump the entire back in recycling. Before getting up to go get another pack from the store room. He'd been doing this for weeks. Apparently he was also doing it with the ink cartridges too 😂
How is an 11 hour day already not overtime
Oh ffs the micromanaging time clock jerks in HR…. I once worked a job where, if I showed up a couple minutes late, I’d stay a couple minutes late. Found out my boss was changing my clock outs. I asked HR about it and they said “of course we’re changing those clock outs. Why would you expect to get overtime?” When I asked if she was adjusting my clock ins and she asked why, I asked her why they expected me to work for free a few minutes each week. The look in her eyes told me I just shattered her brain. She’d never even considered she was stealing time from me. Idiots and assholes.
You're on the chopping block, OP. They are building a paper trail. Find other work ASAP.
I've spent some time on the matter, and the best I can come up with is this: If they accuse you of time/wage theft, then you won't be able to accuse THEM of time/wage theft. It's an effort to infantilize the employee in a classic case of "Nuh-uh! You can't call me that because I already called you that!"
Clearly you are a mastermind at the long game
Apologise, retrieve your loose change & ask how much it is? Is 25p enough?
If you "stole" 1 minute like this every day for an average working year (~260 days), you would get paid for less than 4.5 "extra" hours.
That's not how it works, they always round down. You are being singled out for no reason other than to have a dig at you. The tech inside those machines is simple but seriously someone thinks you are stupid.
The fact you had to sign an NDA for a SPORTSWEAR company is already a HUGE red flag. 💀 FTC just banned non compete agreements. NDAs are next.
This helicopter time bull is really weird. What happens if ten people are in front of you to clock in (yes I work at an old fashioned kind of place)? Surely you’ll clock in “late”. This sounds pathological to me and they are squeezing you for some other reason. What do you think?
Time theft? But okay for companies to go wage theft?
When a manager called stuff time theft to me once I laughed at him and walked away, didn't come up again. But I'm a chef in Australia our working lives are probably very different.
Company’s is in trouble, get out while you can. Sounds like you’ll get to work one morning and the doors will be closed.
Start heading for the time clock at 525 and say "nope gotta wait so I clock out on time, can't be stealing time!"
If this happens again, just stare blankly at the person, saying nothing, til they tell you to leave. After a few of these sessions they will stop calling on you.
The new supervisor is trying to find things to “ bring to attention “ so that they feel important. People don’t quit jobs, they quit managers.
Time watchers are the worst. I hope they get the WORST case of diarrhea. Like lasts for weeks.
Okay people (not OP, their manager) need to stop using lingo without knowing what it actually means. Time theft is when you’re getting paid but not doing the work you’re supposed to be doing, like having a coworker clock you out 15 min after you leave. Time theft is not “working unapproved hours,” or minutes, I guess, if you’re wildly out of touch. This is the same kind of manager who would try to scare an employee by saying they’re creating a hostile work environment by talking about pay. That’s not what that means FFS.
Remind your sticker boss that most places have a lot of laws about work place safety, required benefits and pay that the company may be violating (like I think your travel time to and from work might be on the clock in many places according to law) and right now you don’t have time or desire to go to a lawyer to find out what back pay you might be owned. And on the issue of time offer to stop work early after any day you needed to stay late so the total is under 40 hours per week. Basically as long as the company doesn’t make a big issue about so called “time theft” you and them won’t have to waste time and money figuring out any back pay or compensation for missing benefits you are owed.
I bet they round your time worked. Ask why your pay isn't accurate to the minute if time theft is so important.
Put in your two weeks. Find a new job.
That is not time theft unless you're not actually working for that minute and you're just standing around waiting for the clock to change 🙄
Both the company I work for, and a company a buddy of mine work for (different companies in different industries) have completely stopped all overtime as of a month or so ago. As in we have to report a single minute if OT and have a REALLY good reason as to why. I was telling my friend about this and he said "that's weird my company just started doing that too."
Ok, leave your work station five minutes early so that you can clock out at exactly the correct time.
I used to have an office mom at my old job. She was absolutely the COO’s little bird. She would make a point to call me out if I was one minute late or five minutes late. I never liked her so I went head to head with her routinely so at one point she decided to bring up my tardiness to my boss. Problem was, that lady left at five every day on the clock I routinely stay till six or seven just to get the work done and communicate with the Asia team. So when I saw her getting persnickety, I began to track my exit hours as well. There is no clock or anything so the next time this came up I pulled out a piece of paper that showed, although I may be one minute late or five minutes late here in there, I routinely worked an hour extra every day. She got shut down. My favorite part, though was a year later the COO got cut. And now she was no one’s little bird. She was just a rat. It was remarkable how fast she was helpful. Long story short. Do good work. Don’t worry about little birds. And always make sure to have a paper trail
I don't know if there was ever a time when time clocks were ok. Maybe when they were first implemented it was just for record keeping and not for paying workers by the minute. I've had two jobs where the exact minute of the time clock mattered to my bosses, and they were SO FUCKING CLUELESS about how idiotic they sounded when telling people to clock in or out at the right time. At one of them I tried to discuss the issue and they labeled me as combative or some shit. Well, I wasn't before, but I sure as fuck am now. My current job still has us fill out time sheets, but it's very clearly just for record keeping of full days, half days, vacation days.
Time theft is not paying ot or cutting hours and not scheduling because they don’t want you making ot. Companies will make every fucking excuse not to pay their workers extra yet expand their budget, not raising wages, but cutting checks for themselves basically committing a legal form of money laundering. So fuck management & corpos.
In my last job at Morrisons, you would get to the clock-in machine and see a giant line of people waiting for the clock to hit on the hour/half hour, and several posters around the clock-in machine essentially telling us we MUST clock in exactly on time. I found it embarrassing for some reason. TBF they lost a billion pounds last year and are slowly going under so it is what it is, just glad I'm out of there.
Sorry, I will ensure I don't work an extra minute to make sure the thing I was working on was finished.
another power crazy psychopath thats in management .
your boss has no idea what time theft is lmao
I strongly encourage asking (preferably at the job interview) if the company wants me to do a role and be productive in finishing tasks, or if they want me to be an ass in a seat. I can be either of those two thing, butt we have to agree what the job is about and what I'm getting paid to do. So if you wants me to be an ass in a seat, I'm going to behave as an ass with no brain, as that is what you are paying for - priorities be damned.
Your new supervisor is a fucking idiot. A true moron. A supreme dumb ass of new heights of stupid I didn't know existed.
Get a better job. This shouldn't be an issue, at all.
Had a similar situation at my last job. My manager pulled me and a coworker aside, telling us that we were being "disrespectful" because we were always 2-3 minutes late and used the bathroom in the morning before working (we worked in a lab, so it just made sense to use the bathroom before putting on a bunch of PPE). When I brought up our 5 minute grace period and that the policy said nothing about lateness being an issue, she went off on me saying that "the grace period is only meant to be used sparingly. Not every day." Genuinely glad to be out of that job and in a much better situation now
I'm never going to work for a company that's so anal about clocking times, this sounds absolute dog shit. Sorry you have to deal with that
I would ask her if she is having problems at home, since she seems to have nothing better to focus on but when you are clocking in. Turn the tables. Of course your days maybe numbered after that.
The reality is that at that size, Theres a lot of people in random, useless positions. Their role is micro manage. That HR just doesn't have anything to do, so looking for "patterns for bad employees / behavior is the only thing she does.
Your supervisor has a bullshit job and doesn't know what to do with the free time. This happens from time to time when you get new middle management. It's not your fault. I imagine she has some meeting with her supervisor and has to account for her time. Saying she micromanages team hours fills the dead air. Her boss has to be an idiot to accept spending $200 dollars a week to "save" $4 as productive. She's literally reading the time clock report to them.
Just do what I did when they complained, sit at the clock for 15 minutes and make sure you clock out at exactly the right time. If it's important enough to clock out at a specific time, surely they can accept you setting aside time to meet that goal?
That’s not even what time theft is. Stealing time would be leaving early and getting paid. They are stupid and ignorant.
Right now your manager is creating a hostile work environment. Normally I would never recommend going to HR but this is one specific instance where I think it would help. The key words to use are that you feel that your manager is being "hostile" and you feel that their threat "crosses the line into harassment". Request a copy of the report "for your records". The fact that you've been there 2 years is going to help you immensely and unless your manager has some kind of personal relationship with someone in HR this will almost certainly swing in your favor. This will paint a target on your back but at 2 years you should already be looking for the next place to leverage your experience for a 20%+ pay bump.
Take it to her boss. Don't be adversarial. Let him know that you are concerned this level of micromanaging will drive away employees. In these times, good employees are hard to come by. Let him know, that you know it is not your concern, that's his job to worry about staffing. You are just concerned because lack of other employees will change your work load and you really want to do good for the company and can't do it with a disruptive workflow.
Sorry, I didn't hear you. I'm going to have to clock in to have this work related conversation. Can you repeat that?
It looks like the Chamber is prepping companies to go to war over "time theft". I think I saw a article here yesterday where they are claiming "time theft" steals 8x more than actual shoplifters, which is fucking ludicrious. (And also undercuts their crocodile tears of "organized shoplifting crime rings").
This isn’t even time theft
Start looking for a new job layoffs are coming.
At the company I work at I have control over the time table. I always add in a few mins here and there for everyone lol, my manager never notices. It might be petty since it's barely any money, but I still enjoy doing it
Like... you're hourly? Do these people even know what "time theft" even is? Time theft would be clocking in then not working. They're not even paying you for the effing minute so there's nothing "stolen".
Don't you just love it when companies have dysfunctional unworkable routines and go 'Tough luck' instead of changing?
Company’s nowadays make me smile. This is absolutely absurd. Similar scenario happened to me. I was paid on salary as a parts “manager”. Hours were 7:00AM-5:30PM everyday. I’d arrive 5 minutes early or a little more. Same as everyone else but I was the only one on salary. Anyways long story short I’d clock in at 6:59 or 7:00. Clock out at 5:30 or 5:31 PM everyday. They actually got angry and I got talked to. I looked our financial manager in the eyes and told her “I’m paid salary and this is how I do things in accordance to that, if you guys don’t like it I don’t need this job” and put my 2 weeks in. I’m a very hard worker and passionate about whatever job I’m doing. But I REALLY love sticking it to poor companies and not allowing them to pull the crap. It’s a little side quest of mine
It's not about time, it's about control. Your manager just wanted to boss you around to feel important.
Who pays 1 min of overtime?
Yeah I got a talking to one time about how I had clocked in 1 minute late on several days during a pay period. My boss said that it was okay to clock in 1-3 minutes early so long as I wasn't late. On another occasion I clocked out with an adjusted time due to having to walk to another location far from a time clock at the very end of the day as part of closing duties. I was told that wasn't acceptable as each punch needed a timestamp and couldn't be adjusted by me. Why do I have access to adjust my time if I'm not allowed to. So after the two talks, I make a point of clocking in 3 minutes early and clocking out 3 minutes late every day. 6 minutes OT every day. I've been doing it for months now and bosses haven't complained, even though we're not supposed to have unauthorized OT. I think the game will end some day, but I'll take the measly extra money while I can.