posted on April 16, 2001 03:13:27 AM new
We get Xmas day, Boxing Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, New Years Day, Labour Day, Anzac Day, Australia Day, Queens Birthday, Show Day and if you're lucky enough to be in Bob's area of the country - they get Melbourne Cup Day. (I think that this one should be nationwide as employers have a hard time finding people who would work on Cup Day anyway ) I always arrange my leave in advance to have that day off anyways...
posted on April 16, 2001 03:14:30 AM new
Business over here usually give 4 weeks paid holidays for full time workers, or if you are part time casual you are usually entitled to some holiday time as well.
Public holidays that we get are of course Christmas day and Boxing day, if they fall on a weekend we get the following Monday and Tuesday off, Australia day is 26th January, and we have as you know good friday and Easter Monday, then we have Anzac Day on 25th April, the Queens birthday holiday falls sometime after that, 7th May is Labour Day holiday, than in August we get the show holiday (that changes from state to state), in November we have the annual Melbourne Cup Race day (horse race), only Melbourneites get that day off and I think that is it as far as public holidays go.
posted on April 16, 2001 03:18:44 AM new
You know we must be desperate or something, the fact that we know all the public holidays off by heart, and can tell you when they fall. LOL
posted on April 16, 2001 03:20:49 AM new
I love my public holidays!!! Where I work you get double time if you work them or if you're not rostered on you get normal pay and a day in lieu! Don't ask me why about that last one - it has us all baffled at work but we ain't complaining
posted on April 16, 2001 03:22:31 AM new
Boxing day is the day after Xmas day. It's for boxing up all the crap gifts you got in readiness to take back to the shops!!!
posted on April 16, 2001 03:23:02 AM new
Over here overtime (beyond 40 hours in a week) is paid time and a half. If we work a holiday we get double, if it's over the 40 hours, we get double time and a half. I've had a couple of those. But it's kinda useless because the extra pay is taxed even higher
posted on April 16, 2001 03:24:04 AM newMouse do you really not know what boxing day is and why we have it??
Boxing day is the day after Christmas, and it first got the name Boxing Day, because that is what they did, collected up and threw out the boxes from christmas day. LOL
Everyone has the day after Christmas don't they? Well at least I thought they did.
posted on April 16, 2001 03:24:58 AM new
So you get stiffed on the overtime too? The first 2 hours overtime is time and a half then double time for every hour after that...
posted on April 16, 2001 03:28:04 AM new
Nettak - to tell the truth I've only ever had one truly awful gift that I just had to send back. I've been lucky I guess
posted on April 16, 2001 03:28:47 AM new
LOL, and here I thought it had something to do with the sport! Nope, we don't get the day after Christmas off. A lot of people get the day after Thanksgiving off though. That's because we're all to full to do anything!
How much vacation time do companies usually give? Or is it part of the 4 weeks you mentioned?
posted on April 16, 2001 03:29:12 AM new
What about Superanuation, do you have Super taken out of your pay each week? Just in case you don't know what it is, it is a type of pension plan, so that the government does not have to give us a pension when we retire, we are supposed to have enough in our Super funds to support ourselves for the next 30 years after we retire.
In reality most people will not have enough to live on and the government is going to have to pay out some pension money to a lot of people.
posted on April 16, 2001 03:30:52 AM new
4 weeks is a standard time for holidays. For every 12 months that you work, you are entitled to 4 weeks paid leave.
posted on April 16, 2001 03:40:34 AM new
So is 40 hours a normal work week for you then? Most places here do 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. Then some places, mostly manufacturing and medical do 4 10's or 3-4 12's. Where I work we were doing the 4 10's, but I hear we're going back to the 12 hour shifts before the end of the month. so one week we'll work 3 days, the next week 4. I hate 12 hour shifts! They're really hard on the body, especially a night shift. I did 12 hour shifts at night for 5 years and was so happy when we went to the 4 10's.
Every state is kinda different in the overtime. Our state sucks as far as that goes. A good company will pay the first 8 hours of overtime at time and a half, and then double after that. A lot of companies don't, because they don't have to. California pays overtime after 40 hours in a week or 8 hours in a day. I worked for a place who was headquartered in California, so they just paid every one the same way no matter what state (I'm sure it was purely a bookeeping thing )
posted on April 16, 2001 03:40:59 AM new
I forgot to mention the sick leave. But the other thing is that some employers let you accumulate your sick leave days up and if you do not take any through the year, some companies let you attatch them to your holidays. With the 4 weeks annual holidays we also have a leave loading that is added to the top of it and that gives you a bit more holiday pay.
I used to hate it when I used to do the pays for a company that I worked for, the different amounts and the different leave loading that each person was entitled to was a big pain in the butt, and they always seemed to know exactly how much they should get right down to the last cent and if you made a mistake they were on to you like a shoot.
posted on April 16, 2001 03:45:33 AM new
Most people say that they work a 40 hour week but in actual fact most only work 37.5hours a week that is the normal allotment. Most companies have a set amount of hours that they expect you to work, and anything over those hours in deemed to be overtime, but not everyone gets paid the overtime due, it really depends on your boss or the company policy. If you are in a union then you would most definetly get all of your overtime pay, if you didn't the union could call a strike and cause all sorts of trouble for your boss and company.
posted on April 16, 2001 03:53:32 AM new
Ok, we get somewhere between a week to 2 weeks for holidays here. Most places base your vacation time on how long you've been there. Like right now I think I get 4-5 weeks of vacation a year since I've been there for 6 years. My company does it oddly, we get so many hours per month based on how many years of service. Most companies give you your vacation at the beginning of the year, again based on years of service. You usually start out with a company with either 1 week or 2 weeks vacation. Most places only give you one week worth of sick time no matter how long you've been there. My company let's you roll the sick time into like vacation time at the end of the year if you haven't used it or get cash.
We have income tax, medicare tax, and fica taken out of our check. I believe fica is social security (sort of like public pension, but it's never enough to live off of). Now the push is to invest in a 401k plan so your money grows over time. It's a voluntary thing and you have a certain percentage taken out of your check (you decide how much). Not every company has it, but most do now. For instance, mine is worth about $12,000 right now and I've only been putting in like 3% for 4-5 years. My company also matches a certain amount, free money! That way each person controls their own funds, because what you get from the government is pathetic. Mine would be worth more, but I had quite a bit of company stock and it's gone way down in the past year
Some companies also have a pension plan. Most of them are wholly paid for by the company. It's not much, but it helps to add it to social security!
posted on April 16, 2001 03:55:09 AM new
We are going to confuse Mouse with all the different hours. LOL You see Mouse it really does depend who you work for as to how many hours you are expected to work per week. The other thing that is a big thing also is whether or not you are on full time permanent or part time casual. There really are a lot of things to take into consideration with different jobs, because some don't pay sick leave or holiday pay, like I said it really does depend on your boss and the company and whether or not you are part time or permanent.
posted on April 16, 2001 03:55:44 AM new
Most people don't get paid lunch here either, so we would work an 8.5 hour day instead. I like your way better!
posted on April 16, 2001 03:59:48 AM newMouse what you are saying about the holiday time depending on how many years you have been with a company, sounds like what we call Long Service Leave.
The plan you are talking about, where you put an amount of money into a fund for the future sounds like our Super funds. Some companies pay extra into these Super funds but not all of them do it , they only pay what they have to. We also have to pay into Medicare, that comes out with our tax each year. But we have to pay into a private health fund if we want top cover and the doctor of our choice.
posted on April 16, 2001 04:03:09 AM new
Mouse, when you go back to work, are you going straight back to night work or are you going to ease your way back and start with some day shifts?
posted on April 16, 2001 04:04:50 AM new
Well, it sounds like when you get down to it, we may call things differently, but it's all very similar. We have full time, with full benefits and part time, little to no benefit workers too. And like you said Netta, it all depends on the company.
posted on April 16, 2001 04:08:34 AM new
I think that when it all boils down, we have bosses and companies all over the world that are the same. It makes sense, when you think about it, if you have a company with it's head office in Japan, and another in New York and another in Sydney ect, there has to be some ground rules and I will bet that most of them have the same benifits no matter what country they live and work in.
) I always arrange my leave in advance to have that day off anyways...
Hippy wannabe 
~^~
