I’m thinking about quitting.
I work with a forklift moving stuff between several warehouses. My manager doesn’t want me to do extra hours. Fine, then I want to go home exactly when my shift ends.
My shift ends at 5 pm. Before going home I need to take the forklift to a garage 10 minutes away and to recharge it. Then 5 minutes to walk back to the office where I clock out.
On my last shift, I received 2 assignments at 16:30, starting at 16:45 because trucks weren’t already there. Obviously, even doing just one of them means extra hours will be made.
I informed my manager sending her a message with our notoriously unreliable smartphones (issue for another day I already complained about). First I asked her if she wants me to log extra hours today. No, she said, then I told her if I have to do even just one of those assignments, extra hours will be logged in. Then she called me, accusing me of bothering her for the last 10 minutes and demanding to know where I was. I was already waiting for the trucks at 16:35, when she called me, but trucks were not there.
She then sent and deleted several other, smaller assignments at a rapid pace. As soon as I was starting one she would delete them. This happened 3 or 4 times.
She settled for a small one and even with this one I logged in 10 extra minutes, leaving my workplace at 5:10 pm.
What I want to tell her:
Are you aware you give me contradictory orders? If my shift ends at 17:00 and I need 15 minutes to take the forklift to the garage, if you give me an order at 16:45 I’m obviously going to do extra hours. You have clearly stated you don’t want to pay me any extra hour, which is fine by me, but then why do you keep me sending orders at exactly that hour? If you don’t want to pay me any extra hours my last assignment has to be finished at 16:45. Otherwise I’m logging in extra hours.
I don’t see how this can end well, but something has to be done. It’s not the first time she’s reacted so emotionally and I’m tired.
Before I quit I’d like to try and see if a rational conversation with her is possible. Then at least I tried.
If there is an HR dept, I would raise this with them. If you are no longer on the clock at 5pm, there’s nothing stopping you from hopping out of the vehicle wherever it is and going home. Keep a record of everything, what was asked of you and when, what action you took and when, and maybe even have a witness sign off. If they try to fire you with cause, you can sue for wrongful termination. Just remember that HR is there to prevent the company from being sued, they are not your friend.
At the end of the day, the real solution is obvious: this is what unions are for. Collective bargaining is how you even the odds with greed.
Years ago I was working second shift, 4pm - 1230am. My manager had a 2 hour commute and had to wake up at 7am to get his kid to school. He had to be last out by policy and did not want to stay late.
His policy was all your work was to be done by midnight. 12 to 1215 was to clean and organize your station. 1215-1230 was to degown(esd safe/clean room assembly space), get your stuff(lunch boxes, coats etc), use the bathroom, warm up your car and wait for 1230. He was out the door with the alarm set by 1235. If you were still in the building have fun talking to the police.
He would check and if you were still working at 1205 would come by and ask why you’re not done yet. It worked out extremely well.
In my experience trying a rational conversation will not help. You are assuming she is acting from a rational place.
She wants you to clock out and finish the assignments off the clock. She will never say this. And may not even be willing to admit this to herself.
Or she just wants an excuse to be angry. She knows these are ridiculous and knows they will result in her anger but she likes that feeling.
As someone said, her boss would be the only option if you want to stay at the job - hoping that they also have problems with her and would be willing to step in.
Aside from the advice asked and answered in this thread, I’d encourage you to make phone calls when the information is time sensitive, such as being short on time and needing to communicate that overtime will happen and know if the assignment is still approved.
This way you’ll get a response immediately and wont have to sit around for confirmation or start tasks you wont have time to finish or wait for unreliable tech to work to get communication through.