News

July 1, 2009

Ban on mandatory OT for nurses becomes Pa. law

With few exceptions, measure protects workers from being disciplined for refusing to work OT.

By Jerry Lynott jlynott@timesleader.com
Business Writer
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A state law prohibiting hospitals and health care facilities from requiring nurses to work beyond their scheduled shifts goes into effect today.

The ban on mandatory overtime had taken seven years to enact, said Sue Tonkin, a registered nurse in Mercy Hospice, Scranton.

“There will be a lot of changes,” said Tonkin, a member of the Service Employees International Union Healthcare Pennsylvania.

With few exceptions the law protects Tonkin and other nurses and health care providers from discipline by their employers for refusing to work overtime.

Only in cases of national, state or municipal emergencies or unusual events such as a disease outbreak can the ban be lifted. It also applies when there are unexpected absences that can not be prudently planned for by employers, like two members of a three-member staff calling off, according to Tonkin.

But, “They can’t do it because of holes in the schedule,” she said.

Mercy Hospital, where she works, is getting per diem workers to fill in and there is a form for the employer to fill out if overtime is mandated. “There’s a certain protocol they have to follow,” Tonkin said.

The law, passed last October, gave hospitals and health care facilities until today to prepare for it.

The delay should have given hospitals time to address chronic short staffing issues, added Bill Cruice, executive director of the Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals.

The union represents registered nurses at Wilkes-Barre General Hospital.

“At the end of the day, all research shows tired caregivers are prone to making mistakes,” Cruice said.

But despite the patient safety issues the law aims to address, hospitals are preparing to evade their legal obligations through the use of on-call scheduling, he said.

“We’ve gotten reports already all over the state where hospitals are establishing on-call systems where they never existed,” Cruice said.

He and Tonkin advised employees to learn their rights under the law and tell their unions or the Pennsylvania Department of Labor of suspected violations.

“It’s up to the employee to track if they are mandated,” said Kim Klinger, a registered nurse and SEIU member at Geisinger Wyoming Valley Medical Center in Plains Township. Management has steps to take, but mandatory overtime “is the last resort,” Klinger said.

Kevin McDonald, spokesman for Wilkes-Barre General Hospital, said staffing practices “are in line with the requirements” of the law and the hospital does not anticipate any changes in the way it has been staffing nurses. “Our instances of mandatory overtime are extremely rare.”

Managers in the Geisinger Health System have undergone training about the law, said Tom Shawyer, director of labor and employee relations for Geisinger.

In addition, Geisinger developed an in-house complaint procedure to address issues raised by employees.

“We have been working on this since January,” Shawyer said.

The regulations behind the law will not be ready until March, he noted, but Geisinger is not waiting until then to comply with them.

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