Last year my weekly average was 35 hours. I qualify for benefits but I couldn't apply for medical because I hadn't been with the company for 12 months in January. I used to cover call outs all the time, but they haven't called me in months. My hours have been consistently lower and I've used up all the vacation hours I'd saved to keep my weekly average up.
I keep asking for more hours and I get the run around. They tell me to crosstrain(even though I'm trained in 3 departments), then they never give me any crosstraining when I ask for it. They'll say things like, "If you REALLY want hours, you can always cashier or push carts", assuming I'll say no. But I tell them they can throw me on a register or out in the parking lot, I'll do anything as long as I'm getting paid. Even saying that gets me nowhere. I've even reached out to the overnight team leaders when I hear the LOD tell them, "Well, you've got 7 call outs tonight". But they just look at me like I'm an idiot.
I'm a great worker, I've received team member of the month and I got an EX on my annual review. The only reason I can think of for them resisting me so much is that they plan on cutting my hours low enough that I don't qualify for medical before I can actually apply for it. I don't even care that much about medical, but if they plan on keeping me below 29 hours a week then I think it's time to start looking for another job.
Are their any leadership parameters where the leader gets some sort of bonus or bump in pay if they minimize the number of employees who have insurance? Or, any parameter where where they lose pay if too many employees have insurance?
In absence of either of those, there isn't any reason why leadership should try to limit insurance qualification for TMs.
I could see limiting hours so you could have a larger employee base...the need to keep hiring more and more employees...cause you never know when employees might quit and you don't want to be short staffed. Heck, give adequate hours, and insurance when needed, and people wouldn't quit! A vicious circle!
They do it all the time. 3 out of 4 weeks a month I work about 35-40 hours. But one week each month they drop my hours down to like 20 so that the average stays low.
To give you the short answer;
Yes, they absolutely will do this.
In fact, they probably receive an email when your average hours worked goes above 25 telling them you are in danger of hitting 28 hours.
To give you the long answer;
With the ACA, Target is forced to carry insurance coverage for each employee with an average hours over 28 regardless of if they choose to carry this insurance themselves. As a result, spot (and most other retail companies) have shifted to a hire more, work less mentality which allows them to cover shifts while carrying as little benefit impact as possible. It's a discussion purely of profit. To Target (the company, not your manager) you are a number. As a very good employee, you are a positive number. Most employees are not excellent, and would cost the company more to carry the benefits then they actually benefit the company, and as a result this is the mentality that is driven by the corporation.
If I had to take a guess, they will also soon move to a company wide 5 hour compliance window for lunches, and staff flow in a way that the goal is to get the truck completed in 4.5 hours, so flow TMs do not need to take a lunch, increasing their average hours.
If you don't like this, you can blame the Affordable Care Act, not Target. Washington was short sighted and should have seen that Corp. America would dodge the intended effect of the bill by just hiring more people and limiting hours. It sounds great on paper, more jobs. But in practice it just means people are working for essentially nothing.
If that were the case your average hours would still be around 32. They would have to cut you to like 8 hours after working 35 for 3 weeks.
They do it all the time. 3 out of 4 weeks a month I work about 35-40 hours. But one week each month they drop my hours down to like 20 so that the average stays low.
Oh, you certainly can blame Spot.
If they are doing it on purpose then it is illegal and they should be prosecuted for it.
Washington recognized that greedy bastards might do shit like this and specifically wrote rules against it.
The sad thing is that corporations were pulling this shit way before the ACA came along.
They had started turning insurance to shit and cutting peoples hours down to the bone years before it passed.
In fact part of the reason it was created was because of the crap the big corporations and insurance companies pulled.
While spot will never confirm it HQ does try to limit the amount of people that are can receive benefits. At the end of the day it cost spot more to provide benefits to someone than it does to hire x number of people and only give them x hours. It's sad but at then end of the day HQ only cares about making a profit and providing a bonus for the CEO and profits for shareholders. Sadly they could care less if you have insurance
HOW do you prove it? I am so irritated because it also means a loss of holiday pay, personal hours, well being hours, etc. I can get insurance, but that is a significant loss in pay!!Oh, you certainly can blame Spot.
If they are doing it on purpose then it is illegal and they should be prosecuted for it.
Washington recognized that greedy bastards might do shit like this and specifically wrote rules against it.
The sad thing is that corporations were pulling this shit way before the ACA came along.
They had started turning insurance to shit and cutting peoples hours down to the bone years before it passed.
In fact part of the reason it was created was because of the crap the big corporations and insurance companies pulled.
HOW do you prove it? I am so irritated because it also means a loss of holiday pay, personal hours, well being hours, etc. I can get insurance, but that is a significant loss in pay!!
I'm not privy to the schedules of others so that's not going to happen. I'll just have to wallow in my sorrow.Commie's right in that you'd have to show a pattern & - if you were able to - it could quickly morph into a class-action suit.
I'm not privy to the schedules of others so that's not going to happen. I'll just have to wallow in my sorrow.