Travel Time

[Bramwell]

My husband is a Field Service Technician for a big Oil company in Houston, Texas, we live in Houston, but he is part of a group that works out of Louisiana. When my husband and about 8 others were offered the jobs this was they were getting paid by. A). Travel to work at Louisiana  will be paid at 16hrs. Employee is to arrive in Louisiana by 12:00 noon and be available to work the rest of the day. Employee could be required to work half a day at DHQ(Houston) prior to heading to Louisiana  this will also cont as 16hrs.

B). Local employees working in Louisiana facility are to charge 0 hrs for travel. The 16hrs paid covers travel.

C). Employee will charge regular day rate for travel time from the moment he/she departs the house for off-shore/over-sea work.

There have been some supervisor changes, the previous supervisor was from Houston, now they are all from Louisiana this is what they told they must abide by.

Our work day begins at 7:00am -5:00pm(beginning with our morning meeting)

If you job is complete the day officially ends upon the completion of the job.

If at the end of the day and the job is not complete and you plan on resuming the next day that day officially ends at 5:00PM This is what we get paid for.

Knowing that we have some guys that live a few hours out of town, the following will apply when traveling home.

If you have put in a full day the day before you travel and if you don not come into work the day you travel you will be paid 8hrs travel time.

If you come but leave before noon you will be paid 10 hours.(including travel)

If you come but leave at 1:00 you will be paid 12 hours.(including travel)

If you come but leave at 2:00 you will be paid 14 hours.(including travel)

If you come but leave at 3:00 or later and drive home you will be paid 16 hours.(including travel)

If you come but leave at 5:00 or later and decide to drive the next day you will get 8 hrs travel.

If you drive on Sunday(8hrs travel time) to be here for 7:00am on Monday, you are expected here by 7:00.

If you drive on Monday morning to be here at 7:00 you are expected here at 7:00 Lets use our best judgment when filling out our time sheets. Cameron wants to insure that you get what you have earned because they know we have earned what we got. Let's not manipulate the system. This system is "more than fair to all" and if we live within this system we will be able to retain it.

My husband refused to sign it because he took a pay cut to work there knowing what he would get paid, can he fight this?

[Fredric]

From the information you have given me, the travel time component seems more than fair. As long as your husband is being paid for all hours worked plus whatever travel is considered less than a normal commute from home to the office(or his first stop), anything extra the company offers is "gravy". Considering that most companies are completely cutting "bonus" offerings and only beginning to pay for what would be minimum qualified travel expenses, I think that he is doing well to take it. Of course, just to make sure, I would see what others in the area are paying for from similar industries and similar work, but my feeling is that he is not going to find much better.

Shannon M. Reising, MSP, PHR