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Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

reuters.com

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Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#331

Post by semanticist »

skizm wrote: post #243
red_admiral wrote: post #140

I like the Swiss implementation of this. A manager _can_ contact an employee on a Sunday, but then the employee is immediately on weekend-rate overtime even if they just got an email with "deal with this next week". So, many companies have systems that hold back e-mail sent outside of working hours until the next working day unless specially authorised and costed. Never underestimate an economics-based solution to a…

Is everything hourly there? Would this work with salaried employees that don't log hours? Or maybe everyone does? A running joke in my first company out of school was "can't wait to see that overtime check!" whenever we saw someone working after 5. The implication is no one ever gets overtime as a salaried employee.

Even 'salaried' in the UK means a contract that has a specified number of hours in it. In theory if you work more than that you should be getting either overtime or time in lieu, but in practice that might not always happen depending on your role in the company and the type of company.

I don't get overtime, but I do get time in lieu - I did about four hours extra the week before last doing set up for one of our busiest days of the year, and I'm taking Thursday afternoon off to make it up.

Things like 60 hour work weeks also aren't even legal without signing away your EU Working Time Directive (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Time_Directive_2003) rights (which isn't even an option in every EU country). I don't _think_ the post-brexit legislation did away with that, but it wouldn't surprise me.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#332

Post by sharkjacobs »

eric_cc wrote: post #319
dathos wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean interrupting is one of the harder social actions in my opinion, especially in the workplace. So much of this comes from culture, family and your personality. I say this as someone who interrupts, and loves to be interrupted. Am I a kid in an adult body, or are my norms different than yours?

> “I … love to be interrupted” Can you elaborate on this?

The imagined exchange is something like this

"To get you up to speed on foo I'll explain some important ways it differs from bar. First, of all—"

"Wait, I'm not familiar with bar, can you use a different frame of reference or briefly explain bar to me first?"

"Oh, I'm so glad I didn't waste your time and mine trying to give you information you don't have context to make sense of."

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#333

Post by prmoustache »

KoolKat23 wrote: post #144
red_admiral wrote: post #140

I like the Swiss implementation of this. A manager _can_ contact an employee on a Sunday, but then the employee is immediately on weekend-rate overtime even if they just got an email with "deal with this next week". So, many companies have systems that hold back e-mail sent outside of working hours until the next working day unless specially authorised and costed. Never underestimate an economics-based solution to a…

I'd rather not work on the weekend, even for an overtime rate. Thanks.

Law again takes care of that, because the right to rest also exist. So if you are asked to work 1h during the weekend, you usually gain 2.5 to 3 hours of rest in exchange.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#334

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

neom wrote: post #329
ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 6 reliable sources provided, which I trust you read in the 30 minutes between their posting and your reply, speak for themselves. If you can convince all 6 reliable sources I linked, to correct their story, such that it reflects your own personal narrative of what happened, I will believe you. Alternatively, you could provide 6+ equally-reliable sources which explicitly point out that the 6 reliable sources I cit…

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/940944/0000940944140... https://goldengatecap.com/vereit-announces-sale-of-204-milli... https://fortune.com/2014/06/30/why-private-equity-investors-... Darden had a very interesting pitch to GGC, going so far as to secure covenants from franchisees holders in advance to sale+leaseback - GGC in spite of S+LB, obligations, the in fact bought millions more in real estate to try an…

It seems we're in violent agreement: The sources you provided don't actually dispute the ones I did: indeed, they confirm that the real estate was sold out from under the restaurants. To further cement this point, your last link flat out says what we're all already saying: Private Equity can't/didn't save Red Lobster.

This action further distressed individual restaurants, rather than helping them out.

Instead, the sources you provided instead simply say that it was advantageous for Private Equity and the Private Equity deal, which is the point here: it was good for PE, bad for the individual restaurants.

Which makes sense, it's not a complicated concept: how does jacking up rent on an individual restaurants help it? It doesn't, as the sources I provided pointed out. If you were paying X today, and now you have to pay >X, that doesn't help you.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#335

Post by consteval »

nine_zeros wrote: post #326
consteval wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I've said, you can be less exploitative. You can't be not exploitative. > happy employees Trader joes employees are not actually paid very well. They're paid okay. Also trader joes is not very successful. They're a small niche, only profitable in the whitest and richest parts of the country. > seems rather naive and stupid from a branding and long term return perspective Yes, to an extent. But branding, as I've al…

> You can't be not exploitative. This is not true. Specifically because you are pointing out that exploitative companies will retain more money than non-exploitative ones and thus not be beaten in competition. However, it is paradoxically also true that the same competition is beaten merely by high quality - leading to higher margins. Cost cutting is not the only way to squeeze margins. > Trader joes employees are no…

No, because if you're not exploitative that would mean you're producing exactly as much money as you're paying out to your labor, or less. This is impossible in a capitalist system, because you go under.

It can be done and sometimes is, but we call that charity. I've seen some businesses that take 100% of their profit and just redistribute it to their employees. But they can never expand, only float, and the company exists on borrowed time.

The difference here is made up with capital - as in, we're told the myth that capital is the reason why businesses pay less for labor than it produces. Because they provide the capital.

In reality, capital can be democratically owned and capital is also not the cornerstone of our economy. People, labor, is.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#336

Post by wesselbindt »

dathos wrote: post #292
gwbas1c wrote: post #283

> But the Australian Industry Group, an employer group, says ambiguity about how the rule applies will create confusion for bosses and workers. Jobs will become less flexible and in doing so slow the economy, it added. Whenever I encounter someone professionally who can't deal with a little ambiguity about when it's appropriate to interrupt someone; I feel like I'm working with a child trapped in an adult's body. "Ch…

I mean interrupting is one of the harder social actions in my opinion, especially in the workplace. So much of this comes from culture, family and your personality. I say this as someone who interrupts, and loves to be interrupted. Am I a kid in an adult body, or are my norms different than yours?

On behalf of humanity I ask you to please stop interrupting us.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#337

Post by phatfish »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #130
crossroadsguy wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am from India and this is very common thing from Indian managers whether they are in India or working abroad (and I am sure this is not limited to India but since I am from there I am sharing this example). It's just a thing. I often am a pariah at workplace when it comes to views on work-life balance. So I have learnt to never get into discussions about it and just shut up and keep my head down while never giving…

This isn't some Indian specific thing. Private equity is destroying US infrastructure to make a quick buck. It's happening in almost every sector of the economy you can imagine. I'm not exaggerating when I say that PE firms are buying up nursing homes, transfering ownership of the land and building off into a separate entity, and have that entity charge the nursing home rent which keeps going up and up. This forces m…

Don't worry, this happens everywhere that caves to free market ideologies. In the UK local government (tax payers) get ripped off exactly the same for social care. Private equity firms know the local government has a legal duty to provide care for the elderly and those with chronic conditions. So they can charge whatever they want.

Obviously the global investors have no problem morally with this, they are more than arms reach away. It's an executive in one of the companies they own that takes the heat for a couple of weeks, and then it goes away (and the executive gets their bonus for being the face of immorality).

If anyone wonders why public services are crippled, this is the main reason.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#338

Post by neom »

ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #334
neom wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/940944/0000940944140... https://goldengatecap.com/vereit-announces-sale-of-204-milli... https://fortune.com/2014/06/30/why-private-equity-investors-... Darden had a very interesting pitch to GGC, going so far as to secure covenants from franchisees holders in advance to sale+leaseback - GGC in spite of S+LB, obligations, the in fact bought millions more in real estate to try an…

It seems we're in violent agreement: The sources you provided don't actually dispute the ones I did: indeed, they confirm that the real estate was sold out from under the restaurants. To further cement this point, your last link flat out says what we're all already saying: Private Equity can't/didn't save Red Lobster. This action further distressed individual restaurants, rather than helping them out. Instead, the so…

Why was it worse for the restaurants than the alternative?

Why was the rent increased, by how much, and by who?? What was the difference between the payments and how much did it diff from market over time or at whatever time you're talking about.

I'm an LP in GGC so I have lots of thoughts, happy to hear yours in detail!

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#339

Post by 0xEF »

space_oddity wrote: post #271
billybuckwheat wrote: post #3

I don't live or work in any of those places, but I've been ignoring work emails and calls after hours for a long time. Helps that 1) I don't have a work phone, 2) apps that my company uses on my personal phone, and 3) never log into the company network or services on my own laptop. In the few instances when I was called out about it, I asked Could the message/call have waited until the following morning/Monday? The a…

You've set some healthy boundaries when it comes to work-life balance, which is great!

This is important, right here; healthy boundaries. The best time to set them up is right at the start, too. I've had 3 employers that privided me with a phone and laptop because the jobs involved travel, but I made very clear that work hours are work hours, so when I am off the clock, so are those devices. The respected that each time because the expectations were negotiated upfront, instead of waiting for one party to get ticked off and trying to pivot from that.

Re: Australian employees now have the right to ignore work emails, calls after hours

#340

Post by glitcher »

fred_is_fred wrote: post #296
CalRobert wrote: post #281

Are people here treating emails like IM's? An email is inherently asynchronous. Why would I expect a response to an email before working hours? When did people start confusing them with synchronous communication?

Sometimes I get a random thought on a Saturday and send an email so I don’t forget. I have people on my team who view that as a “drop everything, cancel the wedding, pull the car over” level emergency. The issue is they ALL do this to themselves. They put work email on their phones, they have notifications enabled. Nobody asked them to do this, nobody asked them to read email all weekend. Even if I tell them “please…

Help them out by scheduling the email to be sent during business hours?
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