on call laws Nebraska

[dustybottoms911]

what, if any, are the laws in nebraska, regarding how you are to be paid during mandatory on-call hours. i currently work forty hours weekly, now i am being told that one of my 8 hour shifts will now become a mandatory 24 hour on call, and that i will be paid a minimum of eight hours and will be paid over time accordingly. however, that really disrupts the remainder of my day and basically glues me to a phone, and potentially interrupts any thing else i may need or want to accomplish

[robb71]

An employer may require an employee to take "on call" as a condition of employment. It sounds like your employer has a "generous" policy. If you are "on call" and otherwise free to do as you please, the employer has no obligation to extend pay except for hours physically worked; which sounds to be the case here. If you did not take 8 hours work of "on call" then the employer would not have to legally pay you 8 hours. By doing so it sounds like they are making a "good faith" effort to assure that you receive your full week's pay. While I can understand that you'd prefer to not take "on call", the practice that you describe is not uncommon in certain industries.

[dustybottoms911]

i did a little research, i found in the dept of labor an actual article pertaining to my line of work (ambulance). which provides specific rules about this particular subject. since i am required to respond within 15 minutes this basically puts me in a status of being "engaged to wait" vs. " engaged to wait" which the d.o.l. says should be compensable time. however my employer says that this law only applies to non private services. i didnt see any mention in the d.o.l. hand book that made a distinction between public or private service. does any body have info regarding this subject.

[Pattymd]

Well, if we had known that you had to respond within 15 minutes, we would have given a different answer. Helps to have all the details.

I agree that this appears to be "engaged to wait" and it would be compensable. It makes no difference what you do or for whom you do it.

[robb71]

I think a case could be made either way.

This is what DOL says about on-call:
"An employee who is required to remain on call on the employer's premises is working while "on call." An employee who is required to remain on call at home, or who is allowed to leave a message where he/she can be reached, is not working (in most cases) while on call. Additional constraints on the employee's freedom could require this time to be compensated."

Since you are permitted to leave the worksite and do as you please, I'd have to think that you'd be considered "waiting to be engaged". I'm not sure if the 15 minute response time is enough of a limitation to flip you to the "engaged to be waiting" status. You can always ask DOL for clarification.

http://www.dol.gov/esa/regs/compliance/whd/whdfs22.htm