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I blame irresponsible parents (for not instilling good habits into their children), and businesses that never fire people.
Seriously, one of my biggest pet peeves about America right now is that people do not get fired enough. Few people know how to work hard anymore and actually be held accountable for their poor performances. I've worked at tons of companies where people always come in late.
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I don't think some of the top salespeople here would like it if their team leaders started to harass them about coming in at 9:00 instead of 9:05. They'd complain to upper management and upper management would ask the team leaders to back off.
Jumping back in to add one more thing. I am a mental health professional, and I run a tight ship as far as my time goes. If a patient shows up 10 minutes late for an appointment, they receive the remainder of the time allotted to them and no more. I will not push the next person back 10 min. because the first person was late. I feel that such an expectation would be disrespectful to both me and to the people with later appointment times. If every person I see in a day is 10 min. late and I add that 10 min. to the end of his/her time, that means I finish up for the day about an hour behind. I have children who have to be picked up and my sitter certainly doesn't want to leave an hour late.
My patients can be late as often as they wish, but the fee is the same and they don't get "make-up time" (barring a major emergency situation, which is very rare). I respect the time commitments of all my patients equally. No one gets "extra" due to chronic tardiness.
Jumping back in to add one more thing. I am a mental health professional, and I run a tight ship as far as my time goes. If a patient shows up 10 minutes late for an appointment, they receive the remainder of the time allotted to them and no more. I will not push the next person back 10 min. because the first person was late. I feel that such an expectation would be disrespectful to both me and to the people with later appointment times. If every person I see in a day is 10 min. late and I add that 10 min. to the end of his/her time, that means I finish up for the day about an hour behind. I have children who have to be picked up and my sitter certainly doesn't want to leave an hour late.
My patients can be late as often as they wish, but the fee is the same and they don't get "make-up time" (barring a major emergency situation, which is very rare). I respect the time commitments of all my patients equally. No one gets "extra" due to chronic tardiness.
My only problem with the above is that many people's payers (especially public payers like Medicare, Medicaid & SCHIP) require you to see the client for a certain period of time or you can't bill for a whole session. For example, If the payer's requirement is that you must be face to face for 50 minutes for bill a one hour session, and the client comes late, I'm torn between seeing them for the whole 50 minutes and making a living vs, ending at the pre-appointed time and only being able to bill a 30 minute session. As a therapist, we're stuck between wanting to make punctuality a value, teaching the client how the real world has expectations and how to function better within that framework, and needing to make a living. I guess it's different in a setting where people pay out of pocket, but I've always been dealing mostly with people with SPMI and public payers. The system is practically set up to reward tardiness and keep the person from ever getting to the point where they can engage in gainful employment. Very frustrating.
Agreed with the above. The new CPT codes have certainly complicated that as well. However, I also routinely see patients for 50 min. and only bill using the 45 min. code. I guess I figure that 10 min. late is really only 5 min. late as far as the billing goes. But you are correct.
I had a friend in college, a gay oboe player from Holland, who was ALWAYS late--to everything. It is a psychological disorder; when people do this, what they're saying, essentially, is that they're so important that everyone has to wait for them. We say that when he dies, we'll bring the coffin in late.
A lot of people are like this; it's a very bad habit, very, very rude.
My wife's family is notorious for being late, and I'm not talking 20-30 minutes like the OP suggested but 2-3 hours. We've hosted family get togethers before, dinner at 5:30 two people show up at about 6, the rest don't stroll in until about 7:00-7:30 and don't leave until 10:00. The other end of the spectrum my family everyone is there 15-20 minutes early, start at noon and everyone is gone before 3:00.
Jumping back in to add one more thing. I am a mental health professional, and I run a tight ship as far as my time goes. If a patient shows up 10 minutes late for an appointment, they receive the remainder of the time allotted to them and no more. I will not push the next person back 10 min. because the first person was late. I feel that such an expectation would be disrespectful to both me and to the people with later appointment times. If every person I see in a day is 10 min. late and I add that 10 min. to the end of his/her time, that means I finish up for the day about an hour behind. I have children who have to be picked up and my sitter certainly doesn't want to leave an hour late.
My patients can be late as often as they wish, but the fee is the same and they don't get "make-up time" (barring a major emergency situation, which is very rare). I respect the time commitments of all my patients equally. No one gets "extra" due to chronic tardiness.
I respect that position. I once had a dentist who, on my first visit, stated that he expected me to be ontime because his and other patients time was valuable. As a punctual individual I fully understood his point and told him so.
I also told him I was a professional and my time is valuable. I also informed him I have to leave work early for his appointment and expect to be seen no later than 15 minutes after my appointment time. He said he couldnt guarantee that. I told him I cant guarantee ever showing up again. I found a new dentist.
I wonder how many traffic accidents have been caused by the obsession that we always be on-time.
More like how many accidents are caused by people's inability to manage their time.
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