Conquer Club

"Booting" refers to when someone starts or restarts a computer.

During the past year, several companies, including AT&T Inc., UnitedHealth Group Inc. and Cigna Corp., have been hit with lawsuits in which employees claimed that they were not paid for the 15- to 30-minute task of booting their computers at the start of each day and logging out at the end.

Add those minutes up over a week, and hourly employees are losing some serious pay, argues plaintiffs' lawyer Mark Thierman, a Las Vegas solo practitioner who has filed a handful of computer-booting lawsuits in recent years.

"These are hourly employees who are not making much more than minimum wage," Thierman said. "There's a good half-hour a day that they're not being paid for. It adds up."

And it's not as if these employees are sitting there doing nothing while the computer boots up, Thierman said. They're either starting paperwork, making calls or arranging their calendar while waiting on the computer.

Management-side attorney Richard Rosenblatt, a partner in the Princeton, N.J., office of Morgan, Lewis & Bockius who is defending a half-dozen employers in computer-booting lawsuits, sees it differently.

He believes that, in most cases, computer booting does not warrant being called work. Having spent time in call centers observing work behaviors, he said most employees boot the computer, then engage in nonwork activities.

"They go have a smoke, talk to friends, get coffee — they're not working, and all they've done at that point is press a button to power up their computer, or enter in a key word," Rosenblatt said.

But the lawsuits keep rolling in.

In California, hundreds of customer service representatives at call centers are suing Cigna Corp., claiming that they were denied pay for the time spent booting up computers before and logging out after their shifts at the call centers. Hazel v. Connecticut General Life Insurance Co., No. C08-03552 (N.D. Calif.).

In Georgia, AT&T and BellSouth Corp. are also battling computer-booting claims, filed by sales consultants and associates who claim, among other things, that they were denied pay for time spent booting up and shutting down computers before and after their shifts. Brooks v. AT&T, No. 1:07-cv-3054 (N.D. Ga.).

In Missouri, UnitedHealth Group also is battling a proposed collective action that claims it failed to pay employees who work from home for time spent booting up their computers. Wolfert v. UnitedHealth Group Inc., No. 4:08-cv-01643 (D. Mo.).

Wow... 'Cause pushing a button is oh so hard...

hecter wrote:Wow... 'Cause pushing a button is oh so hard...

Nobody said it was hard...

Nor is it hard to sit there waiting for your computer to be ready....

But you should certainly be paid for the time you spend/waste doing it...

its a half an hour, say they were getting paid 10$ an hour and worked 7 days a week thats a good $35

studlymcgee wrote:its a half an hour, say they were getting paid 10$ an hour and worked 7 days a week thats a good $35

$1820 a year times the number of employees....that could hurt a lot of businesses.

Where I used to work hourly assistant managers had to punch out before the end of day process could begin. Lets say it took 1 minute for the assistant to punch then start the end of day process. Doesn't sound like much time does it? Lets say the assistant makes $10 an hour, thats about 16.66666 cents a minute times 6000 stores the company is saving about $1000 dollars a day. $363,000 (stores are closed 2 days during the year.) Not a bad chunk of change for just 1 minute a day.
Lets not mention the gas that management personal use to make daily deposits that the company doesn't offer to pay them for.

hecter wrote:Wow... 'Cause pushing a button is oh so hard...

But if they are required to be at work to push that button they should get paid for it.

I feel that that's like saying that people should be paid for their time to commute to work. While it's not exactly part of the job, it is required to do the job.

hecter wrote:I feel that that's like saying that people should be paid for their time to commute to work. While it's not exactly part of the job, it is required to do the job.

If they have to do it, it's part of the job. It's not the same as the commute because commute is different for everyone and it doesn't take place at work. Booting is a task that needs to be performed at work and it takes time out of the employee's day.

If it's not an issue because it's so inconsequential let the manager go around booting up and logging off of all of the computers each day. Heck, they could probably set it so that the computers turn on and off automatically each day.

It sounds like these companies are just trying to cut corners at the employees expense.

I still don't see how it's any different. Really, they could do anything during the alleged half hour boot up proccess. Besides, just because something is required for work doesn't mean they should be paid for it. If you have a child that needs baby sitting so you can work, the company shouldn't be required to pay for or provide that service (though good companies do). Just because everybody has to get to work everyday doesn't mean the company should be required to pay for it or provide a shuttle service. Just because you're required to eat food to continue living (and working) doesn't mean the company should be required to provide you with food. These people are being paid to call other people and try to sell them products. In order to do that, they must log into their computer, just like they have to commute to work, just like they have to feed themselves.

Half an hour? What the hell are they running?

hecter wrote:I still don't see how it's any different. Really, they could do anything during the alleged half hour boot up proccess. Besides, just because something is required for work doesn't mean they should be paid for it. If you have a child that needs baby sitting so you can work, the company shouldn't be required to pay for or provide that service (though good companies do). Just because everybody has to get to work everyday doesn't mean the company should be required to pay for it or provide a shuttle service. Just because you're required to eat food to continue living (and working) doesn't mean the company should be required to provide you with food. These people are being paid to call other people and try to sell them products. In order to do that, they must log into their computer, just like they have to commute to work, just like they have to feed themselves.

None of the examples you've provided are tasks which the company requires the employee to do on the job. When an employee is payed, they are payed for their time, regardless of the task that they are performing.

The child sitting example has no relevance to the topic at hand. Niether does eating and the commute to work does not involve company property and it is not a task performed at work.

Once you arrive at work everything that an employer commands you to do while there is part of the job. If they don't want to pay for boot up times they need to take care of that themselves, but to not pay an employee for thier time but obligate them to be present is stealing.

I agree with Gabon.

[checks pulse, looks in mirror to make sure its still me]

Yes, I still agree with Gabon.

Frigidus wrote:Half an hour? What the hell are they running?

I was wondering that too..

Probably some kind of full system scans....

Obviously the better way would be to pay someone to come in 45 minutes before the rest of the staff to turn on all the computers...or figure out a way to have the computers turn on themselves...using wake on LAN or some BIOS setting or whatever works...

this story is about companys running windows vista,witch ive got myself,and it can take ages to boot up sometimes,took me 15 min the other day

Hecter, I have to disagree with you. I should not be required to be in my office building for any time that I'm not getting paid for. You can get around a commute by living next door. This time between pressing the button and clocking in is required for all workers. If they made it paid time, then workers should be required to do work activities during this time, of course. But if I'm told that my paid time starts at 9:00, then I should be able to walk up to my work station at 8:58.