Legally, if you work more than a certain number of consequetive hours, you are supposed to get a paid 15 minute break (or longer). Do you?
I recently started a new job where they automatically give us our "breaks" at the end of our shifts. Does this make any sense? In my opinion, it would be ten times cooler if the break was actually treated LIKE a break; as in a way to break our shift into half - rather than extra time to sit around after our shift ends and do nothing (while we all really just want to get the heck out of there).
What do you think? Have you ever had a job where they make you take your breaks at the end of your shift?
[question posted by maezee]
responses and comments:
No, I have never had a job that made me take my break at the end of my shift. That seems very odd. The whole idea of taking breaks is to give the employees a chance to break away every so often and refresh a little. Most commonly, a break is every 2 to 3 hours, at least that has been my experience. The only time I had a job where breaks didn't run this way was when I worked in a restaurant and my breaks had to coincide with the volume of customers. Other than that, breaks were always set at regular times and fairly regular 2 to 3 hour intervals. [lynnemg]
Luckily now, in the position i have at my workplace, i get to choose when i take my breaks and lunches. Because iw ork 4 hour days, i am allotted two 15 minute breaks and one half hour lunch. As i usually work 7-3:30, i take my first break @ 9...my luch at 11 or shortly there after, my second break at about 1:30, then go home at 3:30. This splits the dayt up nicely, as i have a brek about every 2 hours. When i first started where i worked, i was working as a cashier. Because there were so many of us, sometimes it was hard for them to schedule the breaks at decent intervals, and occasionally i would get my last break...then come back and work 15 minutes, then it was time for me to go home. I really disliked that. At that point i would have rather just worked 15 more minutes, then gone home 15 minutes early, but i know that accoding to law, if you work 4 hours you have to get one 15 minute break, if you work 6.5 hours, you have to get one 15 minute break and a half hour lunch, and if you work 7.5 or more, you have to have 2 breaks and a lunch. My company is pretty strict on making sure that peopleget their mandatory rest breaks, to prevent fatigue and possible injury, so i guess i understand that we HAD to take our break...but it sucked when we didn't get them til almost the end of our shift... [fruitcakeliz]
Hi maezee! Lucky for us, we take our break every 2 hours of work, like if you have an 6-2 shift, you'll get your break at 8 am and 12 noon. I think it is useless to have your break at the end of your shift, since just what have you said you just want to get out of the company and go home by then. The only advantage I can see in this is you could immediately get out of work earlier (maybe at exact time), because you could arrange yourself already for home. But just what you have said, a break is a break and should be given fairly to all workers. Have a nice day! [tholitz]
hi ther i really agree with you... as u told tht ther mst b a good community break between each time gap in our shift. but as u knw some organizations follow tht in in ther own manner so tht thy cn b differ from others, so i thnk u hav to take it cool or else u cn also refer to your senior employees.... I thnk as i told before i completely agree wth u..... [anilv1989]
No of course not…it would not make any sense as you say! What the point in enjoying a break from work when the day's work is already done and I'm just dying to get out of office! I think this is just a ploy on the part of the management to cheat on break time…like if the break is taken in between working, its not possible to end it at exactly 15mins…people do tend to stretch the break time to some more minutes. [sudiptacallingu]
No. It never happened to my work giving a break after the shift. It always end if the working hours is certainly done. We have a break such as lunch break and snack time. But the lunch break only takes for an hour and 10 minutes for snack time. [irene3184]
I'm very lucky at work in this respect. We can pretty much come and go as we please as long as we don't overdo it. I work in an office, hours 9-5.30. We can pop out to the shop or wherever when we want and smokers are allowed out for a cigarette a couple of times in the morning and afternoon. Lunch is an hour and can be taken anytime between 12 and 2. It makes for a nice relaxed atmosphere and I think it helps boost productivity. The system at your work sounds very unfair and I'm sure staff would perform better if they got a break in their shift - it seems pointless adding it on to the end! [magickat]
Taking a break at the end of your shift really doesn't make sense. What were your employers thinking? A break should be taken in the middle of the shift, not after a shift. If you're gonna take a break after your shift you might as well just go home already. Honestly, maybe you should consider working for someone else if your employer can't even see what nonsense it is. If they can't make a good decision about breaks, how are they going to make good decisions about more important stuff? [angelajoy]
I have never had a job with the breaks being at the end of the shift. Kind of defeats the purpose of a break. I get three breaks at work and they are about every two hours. I get the two 15 mins then the 25 mins for lunch. One of the 15 mins is before lunch then the other is after. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me to give breaks at the end of the day. [JenInTN]
Hmm, that's really weird. Because usually I take mine in between the shift and be honest it's up to me there's no certain time. I just come up to my boss and tell her that i would take a break. [ibuemma]
Hi! I recently (and I mean really recently! hahaha.. just last Friday) got hired to be an English tutor in one of the English learning centers here. We don't get to pick when our break is, as we automatically have a break every 50 minutes, for 10 minutes. Example, I have a class at 8:00. The bell rings at 8:50, and I can do whatever I want with the remaining 10 minutes till I have the next class :) [aixshaonline]
This is hard to contend with as every office is going to vary on this kind of thing. One reason I like the work I do is that its on the road. So I spend most of the day outside of direct supervision and I can always find a reason to go out almost when I want. If you like minutes off or time off during the day get a job on the road. Anytime you're tied into an office there's going to be supervision and limits to everything. [Bluepatch]
My mom get's to pick when her break is. Usually it's like in the afternooon. When I get a job I would want to pick when my break is. I think it would be hard to pick though? I'd rather keep up with a schedule it seem's more easier. XD [Melbee11]
If your break is at the end of your shift, then why do you have to stay around? I'm not sure with state or city that you're in what the laws are. But where I am, by law, you should be allowed a break after 4 hours. On the other hand, if the company or you agree to have the break after the shift, then you should be able to leave early. [bounce58]
I've never heard of that. You should try getting a few people together and speak to your employer about that, or maybe send around a petition and see if you could request a meeting with everyone and your employer to talk about changing it. If you're working for 7 3/4 hours, for example, before you get a break, it isn't really a break if you're getting sent straight home afterwards. [votenoonpineapple]
No, and that seems really bizarre! Wouldn't be so bad if they gave you your break and you could just take off 15 minutes early everyday, but would still kind of defeat the purpose of having a break, which as you said is taking a BREAK halfway through the day. I can sort of pick when I want to take my breaks, except on days I have to cover the receptionist's breaks. Otherwise 10, noon and 3 seem like the most logical times for me to take one. [breepeace]
Here in Florida, which is a right to work state, they don't legally have to give you any breaks. They do give 30 min lunch, but the 15 min are not guaranteed, and they have no problem telling you that. It stinks really. [missliss08]
Break time is whenever the customers aren't bothering me. [Dendrobium]
breaks in my office are every 2 hours but then I dont usually go on break during my 15 minute breaks. I only go to lunch break. I dont smoke or drink coffee anyway which what people do on their breaks. And I also have a team to watch over so Id rather watch over them than go on break =) But whenever I would like to go on break, I get to choose when. I think it depends if you are already on a supervisory level, i think you get to choose when you want to take a break. =) [redphile]
Yes i do....i take a break every 20 mins and i love it!!! my jo is so high profile i get to dictate when i want work,break,lunch whatever lol [vikkiz]
I've never had a job where we were required to take our breaks at the end of the shift, but I have had jobs where even though we were required to get paid breaks and an unpaid lunch, we were lucky to ever have the opportunity to have our lunch time uninterrupted by our co-workers. As many times while I worked at the hospital that I never got to sit down and eat lunch, I really started to feel that they should have gone to giving us a paid lunch. [dorannmwin]
No that doesn't make much sense. Over here it used to be law that you must have a lunch break in between four and five hours of work. A lot of places these days seem to do as they like and nobody complains. I suppose if you don't work too many without a break and you get paid for it then it's not too bad, but the line must be drawn somewhere. [DiamondDogs]
In my work, if we get to go overtime for four hours, we are entitled to one more break (aside from the two allotted 15-munite break). If we go for 8 hours I believe, we get to have second lunch break and that's for an hour. If the management is opening for overtime, I usually can go for 5 hours. 8 hours is a little bit too much considering you have to work for another day plus overtime. [thaMARKER]
HA HA! My last job sucked at that. The smokers were out the door just about every hour smnoking sometime 2 cigarettes on one of these trips. They also took their cell phones with them so one time two of them together(one was the manager) were outside for over 20 minutes. When they came back in I asked my manaer if I could take a bubble gum break(thinking I would be funny). BOY DID SHE FLIP OUT. Shes actulaly had the nerve to say"but you don't smoke." Well to make a long story short she made my life there a living hell. Why they make you take it at tne end I can not fugure out. It should be after 3 hours or no more than 3 and a half hours. What country are you in? OH and there were times when I had no co worker and the manager was off or helping out at another store and I would work 830 am to 545pm with no breaks, or lunch. I locked the door for 5 minutes to go pee and as luck would have it someone tried to get in the door and fumed to the head office about ruining her damn day and I really got in trouble. SORRY for the rant this just brought back unhappy days at the beauty supply store. [muscles4me]
I have never had a job like that. I would definitely report them for that. I work 9 hour days and if I didn't get a break until 6:45 in the evening I would be extremely mad. We are supposed to punch out for our half an hour lunch, but I never have, and I will keep doing that until I am forced not to lol. [svrider88]