Is being late to work because of Traffic reasons a good excuse? (credit, pay)
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A benefit to always being on time or even a little early, is that no one doubts you on that one day you really were impacted by a traffic concern. It's all in planning.
If you live somewhere where it's known that commute times "spike", then yeah, you need to allow for that.
Maybe on Mars. But here on Earth in a major metro, no.
In a professional job, no one would care. The conversation would basically go “I’m running late because of an accident”. “Ok, great. Be safe”.
If you think you’d keep a single employee with an ounce of talent with some hardline “leave 2 hours early everyday in case there’s a random car fire and major highway closure”, you’re living in a dreamworld.
Just curious has anyone ever been late to work due to traffic reasons? is it a good excuse?
What if an accident happens on the road, you forgot something at home, or maybe you need to go to the DMV real quick?
I was late to work twice in the first month of my new government job. They would not let me make up the time, so my pay was docked.
The first time I was late, the main street leading to the government facility flooded (water main break), causing a disruption in traffic.
The second time i was late, soon after the first late charge, I tried to avoid the above-mentioned main street, and took the Beltway instead. As I exited the underpass, I heard a loud boom, and the window to my car shattered in my lap. It turns out that someone had shot my car window with a BB gun. I had to take it to the dealer for repairs. I never knew it was a BB gun until much later, since someone would take pot shots at cars every now and then at that same location.
They treated me like a deadbeat at work from that point on, so in return, I never gave them a fraction of a second more than they deserved of my time.
This was before cell phones, in case you were wondering....
One has to wonder if you've ever held a "professional job" in your life. You really believe you can make an appointment with a (prospective) customer, not make it, tell them that "traffic was really bad", and think they won't care?
In a professional job, timeliness is EVERYTHING. If you can't respect someone else's time enough to show up when you're supposed to be there, why would they want to work with you? Every minute you're late, you're stealing their time. You're showing that they aren't valued or respected. If you ever want to make it in the professional world, you be where you're supposed to be when you're supposed to be there, period. Once in a great while, a truly unforeseen catastrophe can happen. But when bad traffic is a known issue, and you fail to plan for that, you are not being professional. And anyone telling you otherwise is not doing you any favors.
One has to wonder if you've ever held a "professional job" in your life. You really believe you can make an appointment with a (prospective) customer, not make it, tell them that "traffic was really bad", and think they won't care?
In a professional job, timeliness is EVERYTHING. If you can't respect someone else's time enough to show up when you're supposed to be there, why would they want to work with you? Every minute you're late, you're stealing their time. You're showing that they aren't valued or respected. If you ever want to make it in the professional world, you be where you're supposed to be when you're supposed to be there, period. Once in a great while, a truly unforeseen catastrophe can happen. But when bad traffic is a known issue, and you fail to plan for that, you are not being professional. And anyone telling you otherwise is not doing you any favors.
This perspective is underrepresented on this forum.
Punctuality is important. 3 minutes may not be a big deal in some jobs, but it is in others. If meetings are scheduled, that 3 minutes could be quite costly.
It also depends on the structure of the job, events during the day, etc. I set my own hours, and I am at work at 8am approximately. I might be 10-15 minutes early, or a bit late, and it doesn’t matter too much. The important factor is that most things at my workplace are in full swing by 9:00. If I were to arrive at 9:03, that would be problematic.
One has to wonder if you've ever held a "professional job" in your life. You really believe you can make an appointment with a (prospective) customer, not make it, tell them that "traffic was really bad", and think they won't care?
In a professional job, timeliness is EVERYTHING. If you can't respect someone else's time enough to show up when you're supposed to be there, why would they want to work with you? Every minute you're late, you're stealing their time. You're showing that they aren't valued or respected. If you ever want to make it in the professional world, you be where you're supposed to be when you're supposed to be there, period. Once in a great while, a truly unforeseen catastrophe can happen. But when bad traffic is a known issue, and you fail to plan for that, you are not being professional. And anyone telling you otherwise is not doing you any favors.
I’ve worked in some of the largest CPA firms in the world and Fortune 500 companies. Last time I checked, those are considered professional positions and one of the professional occupations.
You’re making a ridiculous argument that I’m saying you can just be late all the time. That’s not what I said. I said in major metros in this country, there will be totally unexpected delays. That’s part of life. If you think professionals in major cities show up 2 hours early every day because their might be 5 to 10 times a year of total chaos, one must wonder if you ever worked in a large metro.
Then you make the even more ridiculous comment to suggest I’m being coddled and not being done favors. No. I actually worked for modern companies not stuck in the 1980s. I don’t need to be micromanaged. In fact, I might just work from home if the weather is a joke or if I get an alert that the highway is closed.
I don’t need to be there in my “cube” (those are often gone nowadays) at a particular moment in time. Chances are this early morning meeting you keep bringing up would have been with a client halfway across the country on skype. Nowadays, I work with regions across the globe. I can still join the meeting from home or the car. Not many meetings (from what I see) are conducted in the old conference room with the boss checkin’ his or her watch beforehand to make sure old Johnny was at his desk as the clock struck 8 am.
I’m not going to bother getting into the argument about “stealing time” because professionals work is never done. There’s no such thing as “their time” and “my time”. Both are in constant motion. They think nothing of calling or emailing me on a weekend, night, or vacation and I think nothing of making a personal call during the day or showing up 30 minutes later because there was a six car pileup on the interstate. And the next time they expect me to work until 9 pm to meet a deadline? I’ll be there.
I know this isn’t uniform across the board but it’s also not uniform to think flexibility means you don’t respect the business or other people. Not every job needs to be at a location at a particular second.
Last edited by Thatsright19; 04-29-2018 at 05:32 PM..
Sometimes you can leave on time and still run into traffic problems. The road my job is on runs parallel to an Interstate that runs into Albany, NY (aka the state capital), and sometimes when the traffic gets backed up on I-787, people come down off of the highway and bottle up the local streets, which ends up making my drive longer, and I only live 2.5 miles from work.
Fortunately, most of us approach the business from the same direction (north heading south), crossing the same intersection just north of the location, including some of the managers; plus, the traffic jam runs right in front of where we work, so I don't get into any trouble when this happens, because I'm not the only person affected by it.
At my old job, for those that clocked in, if you were late 5 times in a rolling 12 month period, you could be terminated. I was never so grateful to become an exempt employee as I was the day I was finally promoted into an exempt position, loss of overtime pay notwithstanding.
Back in the day (my 20s) I was late all the time. I was also seen as a less-than-stellar/reliable employee for much of those years. It was only in my 30s that I got serious and realized I was only punishing myself by showing up late all the time. And then in my last job, which I had for most of my 40s, it was drilled into me. Don't.be.late.
In my current job, I'm exempt, but I work for people who are VERY much clockwatchers because the person I replaced was fired for, among other things, always being late. As such, I get here 20 minutes early just about every day. It's not a big hassle because I leave the same time as I did for my old job, but my new office is 5 miles closer to home.
The fact is, a responsible person will get to work on time, and if they find themselves habitually 10 minutes late, will leave 10 minutes earlier to stop that from happening. Am I late on occasion? Yes. In fact, I was 15 minutes late just last week because I had to turn my car into the shop and it didn't open until 7:30 a.m. But I knew I'd be late the night before and texted my boss and co-workers to alert them to the fact. Had no issues whatsoever.
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