3 ms·

Wait, so in Japan, you got paid for overtime (at a higher rate than regular time, presumably) as a journeyman?

by ph0rque 16y ago

patio11 16y ago
Yeah. This isn't universal, but my company was pretty reliable about paying for overtime: the first 30 minutes every day are free, after that it X + 25% until 9 PM, X + 50% until 1 AM, another 30 minutes free, and then X + 75%, where X was the base salary divided by the number of hours theoretically expected during a month. Don't get too excited on my behalf, though: base salaries for engineers in Japan are really, really low. The compensation package outlined on my job offer includes a line "overtime pay, calculated for company average in engineering track". Without that line, you might as well be working food service. (With that line... have I mentioned recently that I'm glad I quit?) Please shoot me if I ever again work for a company which has a defined bracket for overtime between 1:30 AM and "the start of business the following day".
- rdl 16y ago
  Wow. For a lot of ops jobs, there is scheduled off-hours work (i.e. we need to upgrade servers when it won't affect customers) and unscheduled (oh shit, a redundant system wasn't). I generally find the best way to deal with this is flexible comp time, vs. cash, and making sure it doesn't become too much difficulty for ops people. For instance "oh, you got paged last night and worked really late? Come in (or call in) late tomorrow so we can have the post-incident meeting, and then take another day off later this week", but in general just using flexibility to figure out what people want (if someone had to come in and it ruined a dinner with SO, I'd probably encourage expensing a replacement date/meal; other people might prefer a comp day or a new 30" monitor. I'd personally want "actually fix whatever broke so I don't get paged for the same reason again..."; the most demoralizing ops calls are when the same thing happens over and over again and it still doesn't get fixed) There's also a great tradition from the military of the most senior people taking over junior jobs (gate security, food service) on major holidays, to give the other people a break. I actually like working xmas to new years, inclusive, because I end up getting a lot more work done in that week than in any other month.
- alnayyir 16y ago
  >Please shoot me if I ever again work for a company which has a defined bracket for overtime between 1:30 AM and "the start of business the following day". No, but I'm pretty certain given some of your more rarefied skills that you'll always have someone willing to pay for your time.
rmc 16y ago
I think in many areas you are entitled to extra pay for over time. 1.5 * hourly wage ("time-and-a-half") is common.

Wait, so in Japan, you got paid for overtime (at a higher rate than regular time, presumably) as a journeyman?

by ph0rque 16y ago

Wait, so in Japan, you got paid for overtime (at a higher rate than regular time, presumably) as a journeyman?

Yeah. This isn't universal, but my company was pretty reliable about paying for overtime: the first 30 minutes every day are free, after that it X + 25% until 9 PM, X + 50% until 1 AM, another 30 minutes free, and then X + 75%, where X was the base salary divided by the number of hours theoretically expected during a month. Don't get too excited on my behalf, though: base salaries for engineers in Japan are really, really low. The compensation package outlined on my job offer includes a line "overtime pay, calculated for company average in engineering track". Without that line, you might as well be working food service. (With that line... have I mentioned recently that I'm glad I quit?) Please shoot me if I ever again work for a company which has a defined bracket for overtime between 1:30 AM and "the start of business the following day".

rdl 16y ago
Wow. For a lot of ops jobs, there is scheduled off-hours work (i.e. we need to upgrade servers when it won't affect customers) and unscheduled (oh shit, a redundant system wasn't). I generally find the best way to deal with this is flexible comp time, vs. cash, and making sure it doesn't become too much difficulty for ops people. For instance "oh, you got paged last night and worked really late? Come in (or call in) late tomorrow so we can have the post-incident meeting, and then take another day off later this week", but in general just using flexibility to figure out what people want (if someone had to come in and it ruined a dinner with SO, I'd probably encourage expensing a replacement date/meal; other people might prefer a comp day or a new 30" monitor. I'd personally want "actually fix whatever broke so I don't get paged for the same reason again..."; the most demoralizing ops calls are when the same thing happens over and over again and it still doesn't get fixed) There's also a great tradition from the military of the most senior people taking over junior jobs (gate security, food service) on major holidays, to give the other people a break. I actually like working xmas to new years, inclusive, because I end up getting a lot more work done in that week than in any other month.
alnayyir 16y ago
>Please shoot me if I ever again work for a company which has a defined bracket for overtime between 1:30 AM and "the start of business the following day". No, but I'm pretty certain given some of your more rarefied skills that you'll always have someone willing to pay for your time.

rmc 16y ago

I think in many areas you are entitled to extra pay for over time. 1.5 * hourly wage ("time-and-a-half") is common.