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In reply to the discussion: Eric Cantor will propose Federal Law that Ends Overtime Pay for hourly workers [View all]Moosepoop
(1,920 posts)I was a "specialty" associate at one place for nearly ten years, though not at a home improvement type of store. I was often the only person in the department until my replacement arrived, and often the only one in the store who knew how to do my job.
I ran into the overtime issue a lot (say my replacement calls in sick, or quits), and also the issue of taking lunches or even bathroom breaks, since doing so would leave the department unstaffed and it was a full-service situation. I had to fight for the "right" to take the same breaks and lunches as everyone else. I ended up with overtime, too. They tried to hold that overtime against me.
First step for me was involving the district manager. Told him to check the overtime stats for my department, then informed him that all of that overtime was me. He wanted to know why I had the overtime, I explained that nobody else was trained to do the job, therefore it was either work the overtime or close the department for periods of time. Either choice was a disciplinary issue for me, as I was not "allowed" to do either one.
Second step was when the store manager at the time decided to inform me that as for taking lunch, I was to eat lunch in my department between customers, but I was to keep written track of the minutes I spent chewing my food between customers so that the time could be added up and electronically deducted from the timeclock records and from my pay. Really. He told me to do that. I calmly informed him that I would run that one by the Home Office and the Labor Board, and if they didn't have a problem with it, then neither would I. He turned purple and walked off.
Management ended up having me cross-train a number of regular associates to do my job, so that there was a pool of people from which to call over for breaks/lunches and to avoid overtime. But any overtime that still resulted on occasion was paid, as it should be.
I do hear what you are saying. My story from that workplace could have gone differently if the district manager hadn't put his foot down on store management, or if the store manager had decided to find a reason to fire me. Asshole managers win over lowly employees all the time, I know this.
But I still firmly believe that the answer is NOT in weakening overtime protections for the retail sector. It's in strengthening those protections for ALL workers. In a word -- unions. Peace.