Neverending Covid-19 Coronavirus

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“All These Rich People Can’t Stop Themselves”: The Luxe Quarantine Lives of Silicon Valley’s Elite

Travis Kalanick is throwing (outdoor) parties, private-jet owners are hopping from safe zone to safe zone, and dinner party hosts are administering 15-minute COVID-19 rapid tests—all business as usual. “Coronavirus is a poor person’s virus,” says one source.
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Travis Kalanick is throwing (outdoor) parties, private-jet owners are hopping from safe zone to safe zone, and dinner party hosts are administering 15-minute COVID-19 rapid tests—all business as usual. “Coronavirus is a poor person’s virus,” says one source.
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www.fox23.com

Coronavirus: Outbreak in Oklahoma State sorority house infects 23 with COVID-19, forcing quarantine

A third-party contractor has been hired to disinfect the house and will do so again after the two-week isolation and quarantine period concludes.
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UNC-Chapel Hill went to remote learning today, one week after opening back up, due to 4 clusters popping up in a week.
 
Just heard an awful thing someone's company is doing. Business is down because of COVID-19, so the business has mandated people use all but 10 hours of their PTO this summer while things are slow. They then have to use all their remaining PTO and new PTO accrued by the end of the year.

Now that people have used up their PTO, the business has changed it's covid policies. Instead of being eligible for short term disability / leave with subsidized pay if you test positive for Covid-19, you are required to use your PTO. If you are out of PTO, well too bad. Tough Luck. No pay, and your job might be in jeopardy.

Oh, and by the way, management at this company is insisting that they are not a work from home company. Working from home has no longer been tolerated since the stay at home order has been lifted. Even though 95% of the people in this office could work from home, working from home is not an option any longer, and will not be an option if they are in quarantine.

How fucked up is that.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
Just heard an awful thing someone's company is doing. Business is down because of COVID-19, so the business has mandated people use all but 10 hours of their PTO this summer while things are slow. They then have to use all their remaining PTO and new PTO accrued by the end of the year.

Now that people have used up their PTO, the business has changed it's covid policies. Instead of being eligible for short term disability / leave with subsidized pay if you test positive for Covid-19, you are required to use your PTO. If you are out of PTO, well too bad. Tough Luck. No pay, and your job might be in jeopardy.

Oh, and by the way, management at this company is insisting that they are not a work from home company. Working from home has no longer been tolerated since the stay at home order has been lifted. Even though 95% of the people in this office could work from home, working from home is not an option any longer, and will not be an option if they are in quarantine.

How fucked up is that.
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I don't understand this. Are you saying they intentionally made people run out of PTO by paying them not to work just to be able to fire and/or not pay people later for getting COVID? I'm not sure how that is in the best interest of the business owners. Can you explain what motive they might have had for that?
 
dhodo said:
I don't understand this. Are you saying they intentionally made people run out of PTO by paying them not to work just to be able to fire and/or not pay people later for getting COVID? I'm not sure how that is in the best interest of the business owners. Can you explain what motive they might have had for that?
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No, I don't think they intentionally did that.

I think management was just looking at numbers, and wanted people to use banked PTO hours instead of sitting idle or having layoffs. This may have been done by local or regional management.

Their corporation, a global corporation, just changed COVID policies so that PTO must be used when out of work for COVID. They put an end to short term disability and subsidized pay.

Corporate has also been telling the Boston Office that working from home is not an option since day one. Local management was for it when everything started doing it, they were told it wasn't an option. Then they were forced to work from home when the state mandated it. As soon as the stay at home order lifted and people were legally allowed back in the office, this company required them back in the office stating working from home is no longer acceptable.

The new corporate policy on using PTO does not address what happens if you don't have PTO. And not having PTO under policy and taking sick days could result in disciplinary action up to and including termination.

So over all, very poorly planned and way to strict / oppressing treatment of their employees. Got to love conservative business management / leadership.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
No, I don't think they intentionally did that.

I think management was just looking at numbers, and wanted people to use banked PTO hours instead of sitting idle or having layoffs. This may have been done by local or regional management.

Their corporation, a global corporation, just changed COVID policies so that PTO must be used when out of work for COVID. They put an end to short term disability and subsidized pay.

Corporate has also been telling the Boston Office that working from home is not an option since day one. Local management was for it when everything started doing it, they were told it wasn't an option. Then they were forced to work from home when the state mandated it. As soon as the stay at home order lifted and people were legally allowed back in the office, this company required them back in the office stating working from home is no longer acceptable.

The new corporate policy on using PTO does not address what happens if you don't have PTO. And not having PTO under policy and taking sick days could result in disciplinary action up to and including termination.

So over all, very poorly planned and way to strict / oppressing treatment of their employees. Got to love conservative business management / leadership.
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It still doesn't make sense to me. What advantage does making someone take PTO instead of sitting idle give them? PTO doesn't prevent layoffs, as the company is still paying them the same money either way. Maybe they anticipate a lot of work coming down the line and don't want people to take vacation, but assuming their PTO includes their sick time, anyone can see how that is a stupid plan, as people will still be out sick and then you'll need them when they're out whether you pay them or not.

It seems to me that the conservative choice there is to lay people off if there isn't work for them to do. That's what the enormous corporation I work for is doing and it's pretty hard to blame them, since the work literally isn't there and not coming back soon.

I'm not a manager or an executive, so maybe I'm missing something, that's why I ask.

The no working from home policy is definitely completely stupid and inexcusable though.
 
dhodo said:
It still doesn't make sense to me. What advantage does making someone take PTO instead of sitting idle give them? PTO doesn't prevent layoffs, as the company is still paying them the same money either way. Maybe they anticipate a lot of work coming down the line and don't want people to take vacation, but assuming their PTO includes their sick time, anyone can see how that is a stupid plan, as people will still be out sick and then you'll need them when they're out whether you pay them or not.

It seems to me that the conservative choice there is to lay people off if there isn't work for them to do. That's what the enormous corporation I work for is doing and it's pretty hard to blame them, since the work literally isn't there and not coming back soon.

I'm not a manager or an executive, so maybe I'm missing something, that's why I ask.
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I believe the fear with laying the people off is they would lose talent that is highly specific to the job they do. And by the way, this company did layoff around 30% of their employees this past April already. The use the PTO was for remaining employees after layoffs to avoid more layoffs.

Asking people to use PTO when slow is not uncommon when it comes to business management, but is shitty nonetheless.

They look at people sitting idle as losing money. The PTO is already owned to the employees, so effectively they are telling their employees we don't have enough work for you, our bad, use our PTO so we don't have to pay you.

They are not expecting more work later that would prevent people from taking PTO. They just don't want to pay people to work when they don't have enough work available.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
Just heard an awful thing someone's company is doing. Business is down because of COVID-19, so the business has mandated people use all but 10 hours of their PTO this summer while things are slow. They then have to use all their remaining PTO and new PTO accrued by the end of the year.

Now that people have used up their PTO, the business has changed it's covid policies. Instead of being eligible for short term disability / leave with subsidized pay if you test positive for Covid-19, you are required to use your PTO. If you are out of PTO, well too bad. Tough Luck. No pay, and your job might be in jeopardy.

Oh, and by the way, management at this company is insisting that they are not a work from home company. Working from home has no longer been tolerated since the stay at home order has been lifted. Even though 95% of the people in this office could work from home, working from home is not an option any longer, and will not be an option if they are in quarantine.

How fucked up is that.
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Link?
 
RenegadeMonster said:
I believe the fear with laying the people off is they would lose talent that is highly specific to the job they do. And by the way, this company did layoff around 30% of their employees this past April already. The use the PTO was for remaining employees after layoffs to avoid more layoffs.

Asking people to use PTO when slow is not uncommon when it comes to business management, but is shitty nonetheless.

They look at people sitting idle as losing money. The PTO is already owned to the employees, so effectively they are telling their employees we don't have enough work for you, our bad, use our PTO so we don't have to pay you.

They are not expecting more work later that would prevent people from taking PTO. They just don't want to pay people to work when they don't have enough work available.
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The only way it makes sense to me is if they temporarily shut down completely and make people take PTO instead of giving them some kind of suspended operations pay.

Requiring them to take it within a time allotment doesn't save the company any money if they plan on keeping the employee.

I guess you could say that the company could look at it as saving money if they don't have the work when they make them take it, but want them for work later before they don't need them again and then lay them off (if MA requires them to pay out all unused PTO when they lay them off). But it doesn't really work if they don't want to lay off the employee.

If they're keeping the employee, they are losing the same amount of money if the employee is doing nothing at work or using PTO. They're just ensuring they don't take intentional vacation at a different time, which ostensibly by your description would be the same value to the company since there won't be enough work then either.

The alternative seems to be to lay off more people, so I'm struggling to see the motive behind them jerking them around with PTO, which is weird and bad for morale, instead of just firing them. And what's the better alternative for the employees, paying them to not work indefinitely until the company goes bankrupt?

Sorry, I'm not trying to argue, I'm just thinking out loud because it doesn't make any sense to me and I want to understand it.
 
dhodo said:
The only way it makes sense to me is if they temporarily shut down completely and make people take PTO instead of giving them some kind of suspended operations pay.

Requiring them to take it within a time allotment doesn't save the company any money if they plan on keeping the employee. I guess you could say that the company could look at it as saving money if they don't have the work when they make them take it, but want them for work later before they don't need them again and then lay them off (if MA requires them to pay out all unused PTO when they lay them off). But it doesn't really work if they don't want to lay off the employee. If they're keeping the employee, they are losing the same amount of money if the employee is doing nothing at work or using PTO. They're just ensuring they don't take intentional vacation at a different time, which ostensibly by your description would be the same value to the company since there won't be enough work then either. The alternative seems to be to lay off more people, so I'm struggling to see the motive behind them jerking them around with PTO, which is weird and bad for morale, instead of just firing them. And what's the better outcome for the employees, paying them to not work indefinitely until the company goes bankrupt?

Sorry, I'm not trying to argue, I'm just thinking out loud because it doesn't make any sense to me and I want to understand it.
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I don't think the company can just shut down in MA and say use your PTO. I believe they would have to pay out unused PTO and have their employees be eligible for Unemployment. Also people have different amounts of PTO.

Their mindset is there is some work, so we don't want to shut down fully. We just want to up the amount of PTO being taken to offset people sittle idle. PTO must always be paid out in MA. So whether they use it now when not busy, later or when their job ends. The company is banking on that work will start to pick back up. So hopefully they will be closer to 100% utilization of their employees later. And that is how they save money. They will have increased productivity later or at least hopes of it. That PTO needs to be paid out at some point in time, and it's more beneficial to the company for it to be used when employee utilization is down and get it out of the way now. And that's why businesses make these decisions to jerk around PTO.

Hope that helps explain the mind set as too why businesses make these kinds of decisions.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
I don't think the company can just shut down in MA and say use your PTO. I believe they would have to pay out unused PTO and have their employees be eligible for Unemployment. Also people have different amounts of PTO.

Their mindset is there is some work, so we don't want to shut down fully. We just want to up the amount of PTO being taken to offset people sittle idle. PTO must always be paid out in MA. So whether they use it now when not busy, later or when their job ends. The company is banking on that work will start to pick back up. So hopefully they will be closer to 100% utilization of their employees later. And that is how they save money. They will have increased productivity later or at least hopes of it. That PTO needs to be paid out at some point in time, and it's more beneficial to the company for it to be used when employee utilization is down and get it out of the way now. And that's why businesses make these decisions to jerk around PTO.

Hope that helps explain the mind set as too why businesses make these kinds of decisions.
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You may have misunderstood what I meant by shutdown. I meant temporarily cease operations and then start up again in a couple weeks or so. My reference is manufacturing and the company that I work for is nice enough to pay us out of a different bucket that doesn't affect our PTO when this occurs. I have heard that some companies give the option of PTO and if you don't have enough, do not pay. That may depend on state law and almost certainly on union vs non-union.

If you didn't misinderstand, that may be right, I'm not sure what the state laws say. Not sure if it depends on length of furlough or not, but yeah it seems like if they didn't have PTO it would be like a furlough and they should be eligible for unemployment. I don't think all states require PTO payout.
 
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According to this site, PTO is not guaranteed anywhere unless it's in your contract. Sick time is in some states.

I have accrued vacation time/sick time/personal leave days that I will not use before leaving my company. Is the company required to pay me for that time?
It depends on your employer and where you live. 24 states—Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island (after one year of employment), Tennessee, West Virginia, and Wyoming—and the District of Columbia have laws regarding payment of accrued vacation time. However, in those states, you are only given a legal right to challenge an employer over unpaid accrued vacation time in your final paycheck if the employer has promised payment of unpaid accrued vacation time in your final paycheck. In the rest of the states, there is no state law that requires your employer to pay you for accrued vacation leave, although your employer may do so voluntarily, or may have to do so if required by a policy or contract.

Unless required to do so under an employment contract, collective bargaining agreement, or other legally binding agreement, an employer is not required to pay employees for accrued sick time or personal leave when they leave their employment. In this respect, accrued sick time is unlike accrued vacation time which, in some states, must be paid as part of an employee's final paycheck. Some employers do pay employees for unused sick time, possibly as an incentive for employees to not misuse sick leave. However, this practice is generally completely voluntary, unless required by a contract as discussed above.
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www.workplacefairness.org

Final Pay Rights: Getting Your Last Paycheck | Workplace Fairness

Final Pay: Getting Your Last Paycheck Getting your final paycheck and being paid everything you are owed can be a tricky situation. What do you do with your accrued vacation days? What if your former employer doesn’t want to pay? Do you get paid during your two-week notice? This page can help...
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