How many hours do employees actually work?

[f95toli]

It does surprise me that so many people seem hostile to the concept of punching a timeclock, which is a totally normal thing that has been around for at least a hundred years. There are a lot of people who will not work their allotted hours unless tracked and there are consequences if they don't. And for basic hourly wage employees of course, they get paid based on the hours they work. This isn't a complicate, profound, or unfair concept.

I think some of the resentment comes from the fact that these days a lot of people are asked to "punch out" but to then continue working (evenings, weekends).
How bad this is will depend a bit on where you are living. Where I live (London, UK) paid overtime for any form office work is very unusual but people are still asked to fill out time cards.
In my case the system we use where I work only allows us book 7.2 hours per day (not counting breaks) and I should work 36 hours a week. I also can't book time during weekends.

Needless to say I work more than this and being a scientist I also (under normal circumstances) travel a lot which frequently means "lost" Sundays because of travel.

We do need to have a system in place since we need to track time used on different projects (and for different customers when I do commercial work); but I do resent the fact that it is set up in a way which allows my company to advertise "36 hour working week" as a perk.

 

[DaveC426913]

I think the OP hopefully deduces from all these replies that this kind of thing is very situational, not unilateral, and not hypothetical.

You'd have to get more specific about your industry, your type of work within that industry, and most importantly, what you supervisor has to say on the subject.

 

[Lnewqban]

“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it.”
- Steve Jobs

 

[symbolipoint]

DaveC426913 is justified saying this:

I think the OP hopefully deduces from all these replies that this kind of thing is very situational, not unilateral, and not hypothetical.

You'd have to get more specific about your industry, your type of work within that industry, and most importantly, what you supervisor has to say on the subject.

Rules about pay and time worked will be different in all the many companies, jurisdictions, and departments.

Think on this one: A retail shelf restock worker does a regular number of hours of work per week. He is paid according to how many hours he works. He is paid for and strictly works on-the-clock. No off-the-clock time happens.

Think on this one: Lab person in small production company which also designs some of the products it produces - Strict MONTHLY salary for full-time, minimal 40 hours per week work. There is no on or off the clock but a regular start time each day. Normal production works happens 8 hours per day ON THE CLOCK, but there is still some other work (design studies and testing) which MUST BE DONE, even if some of it happens OFF THE CLOCK. The lab person will work average of 10 hours per day, which varies day by day.

Think on one more: Part time teacher(in some non-traditional instruction mode) works on the clock, consistent number of hours per week, may be part of a team of teachers. Pay is hourly by time worked. Some tasks are absolutely necessary and cannot all be done on-the-clock. In one system, teacher MUST and WILL do some of these tasks off-the-clock, and will not be paid for this time. In another system, if teach does do this necessary work off-the-clock then administrator adds extra pay-time just this once, and strongly discourages the p.t. teacher from doing ANY off-the-clock work.