This new job of mine is making up their own laws

figured this is a good time to chime in about my job. print shop without a union. they very rarely give out raises and when they do it's like 20 cents. we work 7.5 hours a day with an hour lunch thrown in. we get a 10 minute break at 10am and only the girls get a second break at 3pm. we get a whopping 10 days of vacation for a whole year. if you're sick, use vacation. if someone dies, use vacation. want to take a vacation? sorry.....no more days. then when somebody quits they never pay out the vacation time they have left, which to my understanding is illegal. vacation time is earned time and if you don't take it and quit, they owe you the value back. the thing is with such a small amount of value there nobody has yet to challenge it because going through the process to fight for it would cost much more.

so why am i here? bacause i get to do design work and print out all the shit i need for my portfolio for free. trust me, since i started i've been trying to find an out.

Shinobi - quit AND report them to the labor board. Not only will you be happy in your new job, but a couple weeks after you start, you'll receive a fat check for your back overtime from those fuckers. My last job tried to pull that shit with a lot of employees and someone reported them. I was on salary and I still got a huge check for all my hours.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Hubbitron

Shinobi - quit AND report them to the labor board. Not only will you be happy in your new job, but a couple weeks after you start, you'll receive a fat check for your back overtime from those fuckers. My last job tried to pull that shit with a lot of employees and someone reported them. I was on salary and I still got a huge check for all my hours.

---

Don't sleep on this. In PA there is a simple anonymous online form to fill out and Dept of Labor and Wages will audit the past three years of the employer's payroll. The state will make the employer cut checks to all the employees they've stolen from over that period. And don't kid yourself - they are stealing from you.

A former employer regularly would shave 15-20 minutes off of our checks. The guy who I replaced warned me about it, so I'd photocopied all my timecards. Sure enough on most any week I worked over 40 hours there would be time missing, and a few instances where the more hours worked the more time was missing (a 60 hour week was shorted 2 hours OT) I didn't want to rock the boat at first, but after being cheated out of a day of bereavement leave, I added everything up and realized he owed me over $400 for about 9 months of payroll. After much dodging and excuses from the boss/owner I finally got my money once I demanded it and threatened to file with the state. Then I was fired two days later (for my bad attitude), so now I've been collecting unemployment on his tab.
(And btw, it was a print shop exactly like Dyne described - only we just got 7 days vacation, 1/2 hour lunches, and if you didn't smoke cigarettes you were regularly questioned what you were doing on your 10 minute break, and it would not be unusual to be so busy that we were required to work through our lunches.)

Good to see you around Shooting Love :P post more.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Shooting Love

Don't sleep on this. In PA there is a simple anonymous online form to fill out and Dept of Labor and Wages will audit the past three years of the employer's payroll. The state will make the employer cut checks to all the employees they've stolen from over that period. And don't kid yourself - they are stealing from you.

A former employer regularly would shave 15-20 minutes off of our checks. The guy who I replaced warned me about it, so I'd photocopied all my timecards. Sure enough on most any week I worked over 40 hours there would be time missing, and a few instances where the more hours worked the more time was missing (a 60 hour week was shorted 2 hours OT) I didn't want to rock the boat at first, but after being cheated out of a day of bereavement leave, I added everything up and realized he owed me over $400 for about 9 months of payroll. After much dodging and excuses from the boss/owner I finally got my money once I demanded it and threatened to file with the state. Then I was fired two days later (for my bad attitude), so now I've been collecting unemployment on his tab.
(And btw, it was a print shop exactly like Dyne described - only we just got 7 days vacation, 1/2 hour lunches, and if you didn't smoke cigarettes you were regularly questioned what you were doing on your 10 minute break, and it would not be unusual to be so busy that we were required to work through our lunches.)

---

interesting that your story is from a printshop as well. i also didnt know about the online form. my place tried to incorporate a "if you don't work a full hour OT you don't get paid for it" type of bs. meaning if you worked 45 minutes over you got nothing for it. if you work an hour and 45 you got the one hour. after i said it was illegal that idea disappeared. can i also use that same online form to ask about safety concerns, or would that just be through OSHA? they use the press exhaust to heat our bindery and claim it's just ambient heat, yet the duct backed up one day and a pile of black soot fell on the floor. they also have people driving the forklift without a license. i used to be certified from my hs job at Lowes but only one guy here has one and 3 of us drive it. i also taste the smell of this place driving home (as weird as that sounds) so the air quality can't be the best. any flying bug that comes in here is always lethargic and close to death. i mean how often can you pick a live fly up with your fingers and just have it sit there? this happens all the time here.

where are you at in PA btw?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Dyne

interesting that your story is from a printshop as well. i also didnt know about the online form. my place tried to incorporate a "if you don't work a full hour OT you don't get paid for it" type of bs. meaning if you worked 45 minutes over you got nothing for it. if you work an hour and 45 you got the one hour. after i said it was illegal that idea disappeared. can i also use that same online form to ask about safety concerns, or would that just be through OSHA? they use the press exhaust to heat our bindery and claim it's just ambient heat, yet the duct backed up one day and a pile of black soot fell on the floor. they also have people driving the forklift without a license. i used to be certified from my hs job at Lowes but only one guy here has one and 3 of us drive it. i also taste the smell of this place driving home (as weird as that sounds) so the air quality can't be the best. any flying bug that comes in here is always lethargic and close to death. i mean how often can you pick a live fly up with your fingers and just have it sit there? this happens all the time here.

where are you at in PA btw?

---

No, there would be a different form; I imagine, for safety concerns.
Here is the page for the complaint form for unpaid wages. I had also found an 800 number and spoke with someone who was really helpful and supportive, I'm sure something similar exists for OSHA.

We also had some severe ventilation problems. I'm evidently more sensitive to toner dust than most people - I found out at my first copy shop job that if I got some on my hands and didn't wash them immediately my skin would get red and dry and itchy. While at the more recent job, you could see the air ducts were black with toner dust, along with the obvious black boogers, my eyelids, earlobes, lips, and around my nostrils were frequently sore and inflamed while working there. And I was also diagnosed with bronchitis shortly after being fired. Your situation with the press exhaust is definate BS. Let us know what you find out with OSHA (I sort of remember hearing Bush neutered a lot of their ability to act on reports of employer abuse ***).

The company I worked for was based in Harrisburg, but I'd been transfered to manage his shop in York, moved there, then 9 months later he says he's selling that shop, and he'd pay my security deposit if I broke my lease and moved back to Harrisburg. Moved to Hbg - thankfully lived with a friend and didn't sign another lease (got screwed on the apt in York) and got fired shortly after. Been drifting ever since. Loafed in Philly most of the summer, and have been on the road for the past month. (...almost crossed paths with PaCrappa in Seattle) Now looking for work around Phoenix/Tempe AZ. Might end up back in PA if things don't take off here. What part of the state are you located?

***
Under the Bush administration enforcement of OSHA protections has waned

OSHA has altered its regulatory mission to embrace a more business-friendly posture

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Thief Silver

Good to see you around Shooting Love :P post more.

---

Ahw, you're making me blush.
I'd thought I was pretty much regarded as annoying to most around here.

Nono, that was Mode 7

OH SNAP

yeah I miss Shooting Love.

From the owner,

Quote:

---

Sorry to see you go but I think whoever explained overtime to you did not explain it properly.

The company pre-pays the first 2 hours of overtime per day in the form of 1 extra hour per day of regular time. We pay overtime above 40 hours like everyone else.

---

It may be that I didn't get enough sleep, but this doesn't make total sense to me right now.

Regardless, this place wasn't for me.