Salary pay/ridiculous hours

[laurack]

Oh my goodness! Well they’ll never hire more staff if he keeps working these hours.

I’m in IT also (software engineer) and I definitely do push back on projects now as I found myself in situations in the past where I did a lot to be helpful, took on too many projects, and then kept being given even more work. Then I would be working weekends, crying a lot, not able to sleep etc.

I refuse to work long hours now and not see my kids but if I did agree, yes my boss would gleefully accept and not hire anyone else. The nature of companies is that I think, at least in America.

I hope he can find it in him to say “respectfully I cannot continue to work these insane hours, it is taking a toll on my mental health and I am missing important family time.”

His boss needs to come up with a plan B because him working himself into the ground and having a mental breakdown isn’t worth it. But I guarantee the company will NOT come up with another plan until he pushes back and pushes back hard. I suggest email for the paper trail and pleasantly ask to discuss the matter with HR if necessary (all in writing)

[picksthemusic]

This situation reminds me of this issue (though the circumstances are different). Your H should do what they did.

www.boredpanda.com/employee-quits-work-messes-with-vacation-boss-losing-money/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic

[isabel]

What state are you in?

[FastHands]

I did this for about 7 months. It was truly soul crushing. I felt guilty about letting people down and not getting done what needed to be done to meet deadlines, so I kept doing it. I believed in the mission of the company and the work benefitted people. BUT the company cared more about profit than its employees and didn't hire staff to allow realistic workload and also meeting deadlines. They kept saying everyone was doing the best they could and we all just had to pitch in.... People were quitting left and right, and then the instituted a hiring freeze, so not even backfilling for thr losses due to burnout. That was my last straw, and thankfully I was able to find something else. Which also is not easy to do when working insane hours! Tech is incredibly hard right now... Encourage him to work his network -- that's the best way to get your foot in somewhere new in tech currently.

All of that is to say I feel that pain, I'm sorry, and I hope he finds a way out soon.

[felicity]

Would they really fire him if he pushed back on this though? Who would step in and do all those overnight hours?

Because if this scenario exists in a hypothetical firing, it could happen now, while he still works there. If he's truly working that many hours, nobody could fill in for those hours.

Who is "making" him? Can he just quietly...not work some of them? If anyone calls him out, it would be reasonable to say he's putting in 9 (or whatever) hours today from x to y times. He needs to just start saying when he'll be working. Expecting a manager to give him permission isn't going to happen. If they say he has to, he can just say he can't.

Would he qualify for unemployment if he was fired?

[arielroux]

Feel free to PM me if you want to discuss, but what does he do in IT? What is his background and does he have any certifications? Does he work in a corporate setting, or in public sector? I work for a global technology/software company and we are always looking for more technical people, engineers, product specialists, etc. We are also fully remote. I’d be happy to send you some job openings if we have anything that might fit your H’s skill set. We are a FANTASTIC company to work for.

[jinkies]

Tagging leviosa to make sure that she sees the offer from arielroux!

[arielroux]

Mar 7, 2023 8:22:24 GMT -5 jinkies said:

Tagging leviosa to make sure that she sees the offer from arielroux !

Thank you!! I tried to tag her and it wasn’t working!

[shauni27]

Mar 6, 2023 15:24:29 GMT -5 leviosa said:

Mar 6, 2023 15:18:29 GMT -5 sdlaura said:

leviosa , you're exactly right - he needs to set up a meeting with the biggest boss at the org ASAP and outline the unsustainability of the situation and outline his much more limited possible work hours going forward, or tell them they need to start paying him hourly. Unfortunately that's not something you can do for him.

I hope he has also applied to some other jobs?

Yes. He applies to 4 or 5 jobs a week. Competition in IT around here is rough.

I have told him multiple times that he needs to say something because this is not sustainable. Even 3 years has been too long.

He just says ‘I’ll stop complaining about it so it doesn’t stress you out.’ Except it’s the bad moods that stress me out. Not the complaining.

Mar 6, 2023 15:41:53 GMT -5 thebreakfastclub said:

Control what you can control, which is not feeling guilted into 90 hours. It can start today.

Man, leviosa, that is really awful. I have 100% been there; my spouse is in a totally different field, but we have been in this exact situation and it made us miserable. Down to the "I will stop complaining to you" and then instead having to deal with his bad mood from being so over worked and exhausted. He was resentful of the work (as was I), and I was resentful of HIM for not doing anything to improve the situation.

I had been telling him for years he needed to get anxiety and depression screening and see if meds would help. he finally did this year and it made such a difference. He was able to see more clearly that he was NOT responsible for doing everything on his own, was able to push back a bit about his insane hours and know that in reality he would not be fired for speaking up. He is much happier now that he was able to set boundaries. he basically is able to do exactly what thebreakfastclub said, which is to only care about what he can control and let go of worries he does not need to have.

[midwestmama]

leviosa , I just want to say I'm sorry your partner is going through this and that it is impacting you and your family. Ridiculous, unsustainable working hours is one thing that I hate that the FLSA does not address. I do think there should be a max amount of hours for an exempt employee, and if they work above that, they need to be paid for it.

If you are in California, IT employees must be paid as non-exempt (hourly rate and eligible for overtime) if their salary is below $112,065.20.

To me, the company needs to hire another employee, because routinely working 70+ hours a week is essentially two full-time jobs.

I think others have given great advice. I do think your partner should start setting boundaries, continue to actively look for other jobs, and quiet-quit.

[leviosa]

Thank you all for your thoughts/recommendations.
For those who asked. We’re in Vermont.

100% they would fire him if he stopped working the hours. There is no doubt. They have done it before to other employees. He started 3 years ago and is one of the longest lasting employees. His boss, the CEO, and one other part time employee have been there longer. My SO took over the position from someone who was let go. They had no on site IT support for 3 months. He took over a disaster.
Red flag. He completely developed their entire infrastructure.

If they fired him I expect it would be the same as when he was hired. 10 hours of overtime, max. And there would be nobody to tell the new person otherwise.

If he were fired I think he’d be able to prove that he qualifies for unemployment. But it would be very little.

Last night he didn’t work overnight and we had a conversation about things. I told him he needs to really work toward a change in the job. And if they fire him, we will figure it out. But we can’t keep living the way we are. Their requirements are completely unsustainable and unreasonable.

For the recommendation of comp time. He requested that once. They refused. In fact one day he was leaving work 2 hours early to pick up a kid (after working 6 hours overnight) and his boss said ‘this comes out of your vacation time. We don’t do comp time here.’

He’s going to try to meet with his boss next week he says. He’s not confrontational at all. So I’m not sure how it will go. But hopefully he’ll have some bullet points to focus on and be firm on.

I did reach out to Ariel. Thank you for the tags! If this place miraculously saves us from this situation with a new job I will be sure to share the joyous news. 😊

[ECB]

Good luck. Eventually this company is going to have a reputation that precedes itself and no one will even apply!

But yeah, your DH needs to get out. As soon as he can. Obviously you have to put $$ in the forefront, but if there is anyway for him to just quit and focus 100% on job hunting, I'd consider that.

[googled]

Seeing as how unreasonable his boss is, I would reach out to an employment lawyer ASAP to see if he has a case to sue for unpaid wages. Most lawyers that specialize in this will provide a free consultation and their fees come out of any settlement reached.

[wanderingback]

It sounds like they’ll never change.
Would you be able to survive without his salary?
If so, I would save save save for the next 3 months and then tell him he should quit.
Otherwise apply for jobs like crazy and get out of their ASAP.

[thebreakfastclub]

I wouldn't quit unless I had a new job. I'd reduce hours on my own, make them fire you and collect unemployment. Frees up time to job search anyway.

[leviosa]

Mar 6, 2023 18:28:01 GMT -5 picksthemusic said:

This situation reminds me of this issue (though the circumstances are different). Your H should do what they did.

www.boredpanda.com/employee-quits-work-messes-with-vacation-boss-losing-money/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic

This is exactly what will happen. Nobody knows how to run anything and they have 0 interest in learning it. Even if they fire him I think they’d beg him to come back and train a new person. Nobody recognizes how essential IT is until they’re gone.

they’ll be paying out quite a lot if he agreed to it.

[midwestmama]

I would hope the former employees are blowing up Glassdoor with reviews of how horrible this employer is.