Do you stop work for lunch?

[jeffreyclay]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

usually at 5 so the days are 9 hours long unless I have calls outside of my normal area. On those days I'm expected to be there at 8:00 and when I stop at 5:00 the drive back is on me. Those days can be 11-12 hours while I get paid for 8.

[michaelc]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

I am expected at my first call at 09:00. I take my full hours lunch and am usually home around 18:00. Some days I get finished early and get home for around 17:00 give or take.

That sounds pretty rough. I am told to take my 1 hour lunch. There are no problems or pressure on us not to take it unless its an important call that needs to be done. Then you can usually finish an hour earlier that day.

When you say keeping the numbrs up, I am assuming you have a set amount of calls to get done each day?

[Ollie1981]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

Officially we get an hour for lunch, that must be taken because the company apparently gives a crap about your health and wellbeing.

Unofficially, your calls are a break from driving and driving is a break from your calls, you find time to eat wherever you can. This is because in reality the company only gives a crap about it's figures and in the end you are nothing but a line on a spreadsheet. Also because you are a mobile worker the company has no legal responsibility to make sure you can take your break, the responsibility is the tech's alone to manage his or her time... how very convenient.

I accepted long ago that companies as commercial enterprises will always prioritise figures over practically everything else, I just wish they wouldn't keep patronising me with glossy crap from head office that pretends that they give a shit.

[jeffreyclay]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

Ollie1981 summed things up exactly as I see them.

[Ollie1981]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

That sounds pretty rough. I am told to take my 1 hour lunch. There are no problems or pressure on us not to take it unless its an important call that needs to be done. Then you can usually finish an hour earlier that day.

When you say keeping the numbrs up, I am assuming you have a set amount of calls to get done each day?

Speaking for myself, I am expected to get on average get a bare minimum of four calls per day done, that is closed down without recourse to generating a further activity (i.e ordering additional parts, carrying a call over to the next day due to customer closing etc). I am always being pressurised to "get the figures up" by closing calls over the phone. My start and end times are monitored to make sure than on average I'm booking as onsite at 8:30am and not closing my last activity until at least 5:00pm. There are no early finishes officially sanctioned even if you have taken no breaks.

Lunch is very rarely mentioned, in the past I have been unofficially told that the sensible way to view lunch breaks is as an allowance of an hour's "unproductive time" within the day, therefore if I have issues with the dispatch system not working (as it frequently doesn't because it is, without exaggerating the most unbelievably useless, unreliable and difficult to use piece of shit I have ever had the misfortune to be burdened with), get stuck in traffic or a flat tyre, get stuck with a machine that's being a bit of a PITA, basically anything that doesn't contribute to the all important figures, then use the hour's break as a buffer.

[jeffreyclay]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

8:30!!! We're told that no matter where the first call is located (sometimes 70-90 miles away) we're expected to have our hands on it at 8:00 and the timeclock for pay doesn't start until 8:00. On my network calls I"m given 1.1 credits over a repair call to offset the extra time to load drivers (fax & print) create shared folders, discover passwords and write firewall exceptions for scan to folder and show the group how to use everything.

[zed255]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

Man, some of you guys have it rough.

I start at 8:30, from my home. My morning drive to the client is considered business time, besides many clients aren't open until 9:00 anyhow. Lunch is usually consumed on the fly in the car between calls, or a brief stop for the 10-15 minutes it takes to actually eat. I will however pause for a coffee at least once in a day, often with other area co-workers and so do manage a little more down time. We are entitled to an hour, so between a short lunch, a coffee or two and maybe knocking off a little before 5:00 I often get my hour or so but not always.

In any event we manage our own time and work flow (not which calls we get, but the order or priority given) and as long as we are averaging about 4.5 calls per day and the clients are happy then there are no issues.

[Ollie1981]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

8:30!!! We're told that no matter where the first call is located (sometimes 70-90 miles away) we're expected to have our hands on it at 8:00 and the timeclock for pay doesn't start until 8:00. On my network calls I"m given 1.1 credits over a repair call to offset the extra time to load drivers (fax & print) create shared folders, discover passwords and write firewall exceptions for scan to folder and show the group how to use everything.

Our management had the same attitude until about eighteen months ago, I was on occasion leaving home sometimes at 6am to get to customers 100-120 miles away, staying up in that area until gone 5pm and only getting home at damn near 8pm for no extra pay. The rather glib reply when this was raised was "We don't make you do this every day so what's the problem?".

They have softened on the issue, not completely, you are expected to be there on average at 8.30 and finish on average at 5pm. Whether that's due to genuine concern over employees "Work life balance" or just fear of an impending legal bitchslap is anyone's guess. I'm probably going to opt for the latter.

I'm not familiar with U.S employment law, I don't know whether it is mandated Federally or on a State by State basis, but over here we are subject to the European Working Time Regulations which employers by European law must be in compliance with. However, like I said before in my initial post about lunch breaks, as a mobile worker who very rarely actually attends company premises and is not directly supevised, the onus is on myself to make sure that I am in compliance with the regulations.

Hence the often used glib argument that it's somehow my fault if I can't take a break and hit the correct figures, I have had managers tell me in one to one, off the record conversations that to consistantly hit 4-5 calls per day, servicing the machines to the required standard is impossible if you take your full lunch hour, it's possible if you do a shitty half arsed job like many do, it's possible if you get a good run of low/mid volume boxes with straightforward faults, it's possible if you get all your days calls within a small geographical area (if you're really lucky within the same building). Hence the unofficial expectation that you do not stop for lunch. It's a double bind, if you take your legally and contractually mandated break, you will get nailed to the wall for your figures, if you don't you are screwing yourself out of your own time just for the sake of some senior suit's promotion (who doesn't even care to know your name, never mind thank you for your efforts).

Now I don't know whether it's genuine ignorance from the upper echelons, or whether it's unofficially mandated but never alluded to. I just feel aggrieved when I see all this crap about how the company is allegedly concerned about my health and wellbeing. It just has a ring of contempt about it. They treat you like a mere number in reality but then produce glossy handouts with grinning model-agency employees telling you how much the company values you. After all changing working culture and practices would be difficult and expensive, however because you know your employees are dipshits who'll swallow any old crap, printing up a few thousand handouts (when you are a company that provides printing/copying equipment) and putting a section on the company intranet apparrently achieves the same goal for a lot less moolah.

[michaelc]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

I have no set amount of calls to do a day. My manager is really good and so is the company. They would rather I do less good calls a day than more bad ones, if that makes sense. I tend to just work on a machine until I am happy with it. If not i rebook it for parts or whatever it may need. There can be pressure at times, but its not to bad and if it is I will use some of my lunch hour to take the pressure off a little for myself and the rest of the team.

[erodz85]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

I make it a point to stop because my company would rather we dont and work through. Just call it "Sticking it to the man, legally."

[Ianizer]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

Sometimes I find it difficult to stop lunch for work.

Lol...

'Sometimes' seems to be typical, and I guess I'm no different.

When I was a young Toner Sucker, a Snickers bar while driving, another cup of coffee and a smoke was the order of the day.

I've run the cycle of no-lunch, to always, to when I can...

IMO, consistantly not taking a short work stoppage for lunch is a good way to burn out. But the fashionable mandatory hour-long breaks seem counterproductive to me. One develops a pace, and any more than 30 minutes for me interrupts that cadence. However, I am allotted a full hour. Occasionally, I take it. Doesn't hurt my feelings but, predictably, I have to reestablish my pace.

I find it annoying that a company would send the mixed message of requiring a mandatory lunch hour to satisfy the lawyers, yet frown on the practice behind the scenes. Stick with one message.

-I

[Ollie1981]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

I find it annoying that a company would send the mixed message of requiring a mandatory lunch hour to satisfy the lawyers, yet frown on the practice behind the scenes. Stick with one message.

-I

From what I can see, this is carried over from a time where there was a lot more flexibility and give and take, i.e you work through lunch but you can go home a corresponding amount of time earlier.

It's just now they've closed the door on early finishes with a computerised dispatch system, but now they've come to take for granted the extra productivity of techs taking a minimal lunch break, also with tight responses on some contracts it's basically accepted that you don't take more than 5-10 mins out to eat..... well as long as the lawyers aren't in earshot.

It's not that anyone particularly wants to work through.... there's just a feeling that with job security as uncertain as it is, if you don't work through but the other guy will, then it's you who's going to get canned when the axe eventually falls.

It's cowardly and dishonest, it does nothing for morale, but I'm not under any illusions that there is anyone senior who gives a shit. I for one will be gone as soon as I have an exit strategy because here you are nothing but a number.

[Ianizer]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

...but now they've come to take for granted the extra productivity of techs taking a minimal lunch break...

Ah, and that's hit on the real matter, hasn't it?

More computerization tends to lock things down into an "unalterable" state... Or, does it just provide a good excuse to satisfy the tax and civil rights attorneys, while washing ones hands of internal pushback?

It's fine. I get it. And let's face it, abuses do occur. When it gets to be a problem, something must be done. Different entities deal with it in different ways.
But there is the Law of Unintended Consequences...
While flexibility certainly affords room for abuses, it also has its benefits, as we've discussed here.
Can't always have your cake and eat it too...

-I

[Ollie1981]

Re: Do you stop work for lunch?

Ah, and that's hit on the real matter, hasn't it?

More computerization tends to lock things down into an "unalterable" state... Or, does it just provide a good excuse to satisfy the tax and civil rights attorneys, while washing ones hands of internal pushback?

It's fine. I get it. And let's face it, abuses do occur. When it gets to be a problem, something must be done. Different entities deal with it in different ways.
But there is the Law of Unintended Consequences...
While flexibility certainly affords room for abuses, it also has its benefits, as we've discussed here.
Can't always have your cake and eat it too...

-I

The funny thing about computerised systems is ... they are always introduced as a means of "streamlining workflow", "improving efficiency" and "facilitating flexibility" but it seems to me that by and large they end up achieving the opposite. When more can be achieved with a five minute phonecall to a well trained dispatcher than can in 30 minutes of fruitless dicking about with a laptop computer, a company has taken a distinct step backwards. However, despite the complaining I have done on this thread, there are folks out there who I have witnessed first hand, have it a lot worse.

Being a copier tech puts you in a somewhat unique position .... who else gets to be such a fly on the wall in other people's workplaces?

I've seen the difference in workplaces in general as I'm guessing we probably all have, both in the public and private sectors prior to, during and after the economic crash and the one thing that seems far more ubiquitous now is fear, jobs are being cut, companies are downsizing and public sector workers are being laid off in droves to plug the huge gap in government finances. No-one has the stomach to complain now whereas they may well have done two or three years ago.

I don't know if things are levelling out more now in the U.S, but here in the U.K despite politicians talking crap about "recovery" and "growth", things still seem very much still on a downward spiral.

[Ianizer]

I don't know about 'leveling out', but firms do seem to be getting slightly less mileage out of the You're-Lucky-To-Have-A-Job card... Though, I do consider myself fortunate to be working: plenty enough aren't.

It is best -- in keeping with our topic -- to *break* conservatively and to *fix* liberally. One ought to record one's time carefully; accountability tracking is at an all time high. Such is just the way of things... We have a saying here in the Colonies: You can't fight City Hall.

-I