NC Nursing Assistant Not Getting Promised Hours

[NCNursing]

Am a nursing assistant in north carolina - employed by one of the largest systems in the state. I was hired to work full time (3 12 hour shifts per week). Our unit has seen a decline in patients and management has decided the best way to address is to call off at least 1 assistant per shift. I have basically become a part time employee getting 24 hours of work a week. However, we have the choice of using a vacation day or take the day without pay. Most of us are about to use up our vacation pay, and thus will soon see our pay cut to 24 hours a week vs. the promised 36.

Is there anything I can do about this(besides a new job)?

 

[cbg]

Not unless you have a legally binding and enforceable contract that guarantees that you will never have fewer than (x) hours. If they don't have work for you, they don't have work for you.

 

[commentator]

Any week that you work all the hours they have available for you, and in the week that runs Sunday through Saturday, regardless of when or how you are paid (weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, etc.) you do not make as much (in GROSS wages,)as you could draw in unemployment benefits (top right now in NC is somewhere around 14 weeks at $350 a week, chinchy third world state that it is) you can file for a week of partial unemployment benefits while still employed. When you file, you tell the system that you are working all the hours that the company has to give you and you only made .... so many dollars, like $235 for example. (gross, remember) in that Sunday through Saturday week that has just passed. They will do the calculation and you may be eligible for part of the weekly full benefit of unemployment you qualify for.

This is the legitimate option when the company doesn't have enough work for you, and you fall below the amount you could make in unemployment insurance, while still working all the hours they have to provide to you. There will be a decision, and the company will probably holler, but if you make this little, you are definitely not working enough and are in need of additional income which unemployment is legally designed to provide. You should also, of course, at the same time, be diligently seeking another job with a place that has more hours to offer you.