Alan F.

I also pay by the minute. I do have a 5 minute grace period that someone can clock in before their scheduled start time and it counts as clocking in on time. I am in Missouri.

cabmaker, I used to have a schedule like yours with the only requirement that the work is done by the end of the day. I changed to a 9 - 5:30 schedule and it has yielded benefits. Before, everyone went on break when they felt like it. Some were abusing the system and taking breaks every hour. Now everyone goes on break at the same time and it has resulted in more interaction between the employees while on break. It has made a more cohesive team. With everyone working the same schedule, I no longer have petty jealousy about who is working harder / longer / more than the others.

Those were not the idea behind doing a regular schedule. The idea was that it would easier for me to manage up to 15 people on the same schedule rather than on 15 different schedules. It has become much easier for me to manage all of the people and we started daily meeting at the start of the day. This has really helped in that everyone knows the plan and hears the same plan for the day.

Puzzleman,
If someone is scheduled to work from 7 to 3:30 and takes his scheduled breaks and lunch and clocks in at 6:55 and goes to his bench and starts working or asks the foreman what he wants him to work on and clocks out at 3:30 do you pay him 8 hours and 5 minutes or 8 hours?

If he is 5 minutes late do you pay him from 7:00, 7:05 or at 7:15?

A-

We started 6:00 for years ( Im always there by 5:00) but got tired of some guys dragging in 15 minutes late. So I asked them what time they wanted to start that they felt like they could get there on time. Everyone agreed on 7:00. So be it! worked great for a month or two, then same ones started dragging in late. I had always been soft on being a little late but now I pay by the exact hours( for those that are usually late) and am still leinant on those that are regularly early and on time. BUT if we are are leaving shop to install and waiting on someone that is late , I add all the guys time up that are standing around waiting plus my time and deduct it from those that are late. And hope they question me about it when they get their check ( only questioned me once) To quoteJohn Wayne in McKlintock "I wont give you anything. Ill trade you a fair days wage for a fair days work and we will both hold our heads up!" ( sorry about my typing and spelling)

Alan

We have 14 people some of the staff comes in a few early and actually clock in and gain an hour of OT per week doing this and are very productive, I think it's great and they always get their 40 hours in.

For the chumps that always clock in 15 mins late and then go load their lunch in the refrigerator,etc to hell with them I am tired of it.

I provide simple ira with 3% match, steel toed boots every six months, full pay in travel, lunch out of town, etc, 1/2 of medical and the want to actually come in late and be paid for it ?

Cabinetmaker,

As long as its legal in your state then I wouldn't worry.

We can't do it in California.

Our shop starts at 6 or 7 depending on the weather in winter and at 5 in the summer. My brother comes in about 20 minutes before the shop starts, I come in around 8 and usually leave around 6, tonight I will be here another hour.

When we are busy we try to work 9 hour days to stay ahead.

Alan F.

When someone clocks in 5 min before till 5 min after scheduled start time, they get paid from their start time. We have a meeting every morning to start the day, so no one goes to their station until the meeting is over.

Concerning attendance, we have a tardy/absent points policy that we feel is easy to understand and administer. So if a person is 5 min late, they get paid for start time but accumulate attendance points. If someone is habitually late, they will point out shortly. This policy is explained in detail by me on their first day and is included in the employee handbook that they are given the first day as well.

Keith, I think you are playing with fire by not paying them for the time that they have worked. That is something the government would not look kindly upon. I realize that you are trying to penalize the ones who are late and holding up the rest. However, I think that a different punishment might go over better with the labor board.

it is against the law to withhold payment for hours worked, a good attorney could take you down in civil court and hurt you seriously

I have no clock to punch I write down the time I say they get there So if you are ten mintues late ( and holding up $30 per hour worth of other guys I just divide the $30 by ten minutes and say they started at 20 minutes after. Just because you are on the premises doesnt mean you get paid I say when they are starting If they dont like it they can go down thre road where they pay less money and fire you after three tardys.. Mind you Im very fair with these guys Most have two -three weeks vacation ( and take it all in a check within two monthes after the first of the year) I max match 401k and pay all the holidays I let anyone off without pay anytime they need , I let them work extra hours if they want to make more BUT I wont take a loss because of tardiness. I have never fired anyone( except a fall down drunk once it was obvious I knew about him) , many have quit and most have come back wanting back on

In this state you have to pay by the minute to be correct. Several years ago I know of an employer who broke at the quarter hour. So if you worked 12 min over you didn't get paid for it as it was not 15 same with starting time. Federal Marshals (as in US Treasury Dept) went back 7 years on payroll and checks were written. Don't mess around with it, if they are clocked in they are being paid, no exceptions, no company business, meetings etc off the clock. Its the Law.

Ralph, that's funny stuff about the marshals, but 100% inaccurate.

Federal marshals work for the Dept of Justice, not Treasury.

Federal marshals have never done a Dept of Labor audit in their entire history and they never will, they're LEOs, not labor hour and wage auditors.

And the statute of limitations on recovery of back-wages is 2 years, not 7. No doubt checks were written, but the story is either faulty recall by someone or grossly exaggerated or both.

However, you are right about DoL wage and hour rules -- they must be followed.

I once had some jerk I'd fired call the DoL on me and had DoL auditors crawling all over the place for 3 days.

They slunk away after they'd talked to all 30 or so employees in the joint and audited payroll records for the last 2 years.

They said "Thank you for your time, we've concluded our examination and didn't find any violations."

Not even a single objection to any employee I'd classified as "management" (which completely obviates the hourly rules)? Imagine that. Gosh, those employees actually had management responsibilities and were properly classified. No doubt that pained them no end.

I said something like maybe you should pay more attention to the credibility of the moron making an allegation before you waste 100+ hours of government time, not to mention my time on total BS.

Close enough for government work.

Since they found their own way in, I let them find their own way out of my 20,000 square foot building.

Wow, lots of interesting info/thoughts here.

I am a Time Nazi. Disclaimer: I am 50% German, but have no True Nazi tendencies, although have been accused ot lots of general German stereotypical traits. We use a time clock. If your start time is 7:00 and you clock in at 7:01 you are late. IMO that's being generous, as once the clock hits 7:00 it's really at least 7:00.00000001. So we actually provide a 1 minute cushion. I have fired more people for being late than any other single thing. We had one person that lived literally at the end of our (admittedly, relatively long, at 1/4 mile or so) driveway, and he had trouble getting to work at his scheduled time of 1/2 hour later than others that had to drive 30 minutes from another state and deal with Border Crossings.

I really don't know if our State has special laws about how you have to pay people. We pay from Scheduled Start time (or actual clock in time, rounded up to nearest .1 hr if after scheduled start time), to clock out time, rounded to nearest .1 hours. OT is not paid unless authorized.

We have three start times.

* Our production works 7:00-3:30
* Front office is 7:30-4:00
* Sales and back office is 8:00-4:30.
(I am there 6:45-4:30 or later)

Morning Break is 9:30-9:45
Lunch is 12:15-12:45*
Afternoon Break is 12:45-1:00

When we need to work OT we generally work production until 4pm, and if that's not enough the guys would rather start at 6:30. In fact 2 guys seem to compete with each other to be the first on site and generally are there by about 6:30 anyways. The guys seem to really relish having time at the end of the day to go kayaking, fishing, getting a massage or haircut, getting the lawn mowed before dinner, etc.

*we have one person who takes lunch from 1:00-1:30 to ensure there's always someone available to answer the phone.

Monday through Thursday 7am to 4:30pm
Friday, 7am to 11 am

1st break is at 11am
Lunch is at 11:15am
2nd break is at 11:45

I pay for the breaks, lunch is unpaid.

Very interesting Karl. I don't believe I've ever heard of anyone else that combined paid break with unpaid lunch.

I would think working 4-4.5 hours straight with no break in a physically demanding environment like a shop would be taxing. We end up with 3 sessions each of 2.5 hours and that seems to work great.

We did try the 4-9s and 1-4, but too big of a percentage of our business is dependent on a "full business hour day" and we get too many different schedules that are markedly different. Just makes for a lack of team environment.