Time Clocks

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480sparky said:
Maybe he spent 2 hours at lunch somewhere talking with a builder about a $XX-million contract that will keep you employed for the next two years.
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Maybe....

Or maybe he spent 4 hours at the track betting on the ponies but either way it really none of my business unless the bets where made with the payroll.
 
got_nailed said:
I had one job that I had to carry a work pager. I didn?t know why they wanted me to carry a pager when I always had 2 cell phones with me at all times.

After about a moth of the pager I found out it had the GPS in it to track where I was 24/7.
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Did they ever give a reason why they wanted to know where you were off-the-clock? (Not that there would be a valid one, IMO)


I could care less if my employer had one on the van, or even on my company Nextel, but my time is my business.
 
Well I was a manager of a small chain of mom and pop restaurants. I ended up dating one of the other managers. My boss thought something was going on so we all got pagers. Instead of asking he got us all pagers so we could be reached in an emergency (so he know were we were).

Well he went ape shit when he found out that we all hung out and many nights me and one of the other managers we at each outers house all the time. The only ones that know in the company were the managers. The thing I don?t get is she worked 20 miles from were I worked.

Well we all turned in our 2 weeks and went our way and about 1/2 his staff flowed us.
 
I am a one man company so I have no need to track my movements (unless I go Multiple Personality Disorder). I do have a GPS in my truck and have found it very useful on service calls where the customer swears I was "never on the job that long." I just pull out the unit and show them (down to the atomic clock second) when I arrived and when I left. Usually get an apology at that point.

Also helped me beat a speeding ticket once. I had the record of exact speed, location and time to argue in court.

Mark
 
got_nailed said:
I had one job that I had to carry a work pager. I didn’t know why they wanted me to carry a pager when I always had 2 cell phones with me at all times.
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How did they compensate you for requiring you to carry a pager?(unless you are on salary) It is a violation of federal labor law to make you carry a phone or pager in non-working hours without some type of compensation.
Don
 
don_resqcapt19 said:
It is a violation of federal labor law to make you carry a phone or pager in non-working hours without some type of compensation.
Don
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Don, I am not so sure of that, you would be doing me a favor if you can find something official on it.

I have looked in the past and have not found anything unless being 'on call' requires you to stay at the place of employment.
 
iwire said:
Don, I am not so sure of that, you would be doing me a favor if you can find something official on it.
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Carrying the pager during off-hours does require you to perform some action on behalf of your employer (carry the pager). Otherwise, you could just leave it lay on the night stand.
 
mdshunk said:
Carrying the pager during off-hours does require you to perform some action on behalf of your employer (carry the pager). Otherwise, you could just leave it lay on the night stand.
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Agreed, but if we call that 'work' then the minimum wage would apply and highly doubt many people get the minimum wage for all the off 'normal' work hours carrying the pager....then after 40 is time and half....

All I am saying is it's not that clear.

I carry a phone 24/7 and I am compensated for it, but I think the compensation could be more.
 
Bob,
I am only going by what I was told by an attorney for a full time paid fire department union. The city wanted the fire fighters to carry pagers when off duty, but was not willing to compensate them in any way. The firefighters were not required to carry pagers as the city did not want to fight this out in court or negotiate it in the union contract. It may be something specific to firefighters. I think it also has to do with how often you have to respond to a page.
Don
 
I was paid by the hour and worked 60 to 80 hours a week. I was not paid for being on call in any way but during working hours I had to be there. If I did get a call I was paid $30 for the first hour form the time of the call then paid as normal after that.

I was making $15 an hour and our hours were Monday thought Saturday 11:00 to 9:00. Between the restraint, and the bakery there was someone there almost 24/7 accept part of Sunday.

I did not know that I should have on call pay. I would refuse to work on salary and still do.
 
After 911 and the Patriot act all cell phones made after 2005 were required to have GPS. I may have the date or some specifics wrong on that but all new cell phones do have them. So this means a cell phone provided by your employer can potentially be a GPS tracking device. I don’t know about other brands but Sprint/Nextel gives me full tracking ability of all phones on my account and it is as easy as logging into a website and selecting “track”.

An old contractor once told me not to look too closely at the work habits of people you did not wish to fire. Well that is one more piece of advice I should have taken to heart. After tracking a long time employee, I now have to make a judgment call of whether his production warrants keeping him on the payroll despite the fact he as not worked a 40 hour week in months, but is getting paid for one.

This guy out produces any 3 younger men any day of the week, but only works about 6 hours a day, gets general foreman’s pay, and drives a company truck home every day. The math is in his favor on this one, but it still gives me heart burn. So the time clock may be the solution, or he may quit me anyway.

As for the asinine comment about tracking your boss, go start a business work 80 hour weeks and risk everything to be your own boss then come talk to me about some employee who thinks it’s a good idea to track his boss.

After 3:30 I could not care less where my men are, and they generally turn their phones off.
 
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ITO said:
After 911 and the Patriot act all cell phones made after 2005 were required to have GPS.
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That is correct it also has to do with the 911 system and a member here who works for some large phone company says that law enforcement regularly send in warrants to track people.

One other feature.....the phone can be shut off and he can still locate it, I imagine a dead or pulled battery kills that feature but I don not know.
 
After 911 and the Patriot act all cell phones made after 2005 were required to have GPS.
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That is not correct. The cell phone providers were required to provide a location to the 911 call center when an emergency call is made. Some providers do use GPS, but many use triangulation from multiple towers to provide the location information.
Don
 
don_resqcapt19 said:
That is not correct. The cell phone providers were required to provide a location to the 911 call center when an emergency call is made. Some providers do use GPS, but many use triangulation from multiple towers to provide the location information.
Don
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Don, talk to Dereck or do some Internet searching.

All cell phones now sold in the US can be GPS tracked, not all carriers may use GPS for the 911 info but they could as the phones all have to have that capability.

They may have to keep the triangulation system up and working until all the old non-GPS enabled phones leave the market.
 
Don, here is a USA Today story about how the feds got a phone company to turn a cell phone into a listening device remotely while it is turned off.

For good or bad the "Patriot Act' has had far reaching effects.

Cell Phones
 
iwire said:
Don, here is a USA Today story about how the feds got a phone company to turn a cell phone into a listening device remotely while it is turned off.

For good or bad the "Patriot Act' has had far reaching effects.

Cell Phones
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That is frustrating. I can't remember where I was at 8:02 am Friday, but the the gov knows, or could. Suppose they will just share that info with me? My income would go up and consequently my taxable income. We both win.
 
Bob,
I don't see anything that says the phones have to have GPS. The law calls for the ability to locate the phone within 100 meters, but does not require the use of GPS. This can be done by methods other than GPS.
Don
 
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