
Ask HN: Is it fair to expect 40hr work weeks and be available for on-call work? - deedubaya
I see so many salaried employees expected to work a regular 40hr work weeks + be available for on-call work, restricting their off-hours plans in the event of an emergency.<p>This is expected even more in startups where manpower is limited and self-sacrifice is the expected norm.<p>Is this fair? Is this acceptable? Is it legal?
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jrnichols
Fair? I don't think so. part of the job and quite common? yes. Legal? yes.
Last time I had to put up with it was in California, which has some peculiar
work laws to begin with.

And this wasn't while working in a startup either, it was a very well
established and large technology company. Pretty much every IT job I've had
came with this issue. One particular job required me to be in by 7-730am
because we had _one_ user that still had Outlook and she adamantly refused to
use anything else, saying that without Outlook she couldn't do her job. (the
rest of the company was already on a standard IMAP setup.) So i was expected
to be there at the crack of dawn just in case this one user had yet another
Outlook problem (she had _frequent_ problems) and I was expected to be
available on nights/weekends in case there were server issues too. I ran into
this at other jobs as well. on-call was common, expected, and I was not
compensated above my regular pay rate for it. There was no on-call pay. You
were just expected to do it.

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kafkaesq
The only factors which determines whether it's "fair" or not is whether it's
worth the compensation -- and whether such requirements are stated in your
contract, or not.

