How does your employer deal with Atlanta traffic? (home, live)

[cle618]

I am just a bit curious for your responses-

If you work in the urban cores, how does your boss and/or employer handle you being late because of unexpected traffic hold-ups? Sure, everyone expects traffic to be tough, but I feel like Atlanta experiences irregular commute lengths, daily.

So, is your employer strict about tardiness, or do they expect that employees have a good chance of getting in late?

Also, have you found that employers are more willing to let you work from home in Atlanta (as compared to if you've lived in another city)?

[cqholt]

Discounted monthly MARTA passes

[waronxmas]

Originally Posted by cle618

I am just a bit curious for your responses-

If you work in the urban cores, how does your boss and/or employer handle you being late because of unexpected traffic hold-ups? Sure, everyone expects traffic to be tough, but I feel like Atlanta experiences irregular commute lengths, daily.

So, is your employer strict about tardiness, or do they expect that employees have a good chance of getting in late?

Also, have you found that employers are more willing to let you work from home in Atlanta (as compared to if you've lived in another city)?

It depends on the job and company. In my experience, most employers will expect you to be on time for work if your work involves being on shift. If you in an exempt type position, typically there is a set time however I have experienced the willingness to work on a shift that works best for that person.

I will caveat all of the above that I have spent my entire career in the tech space where things are loosey goosey. Your mileage will vary depending on the company/industry.

Generally, it's a good idea to just show up 30 minutes early at any new place of employment. This is true in any city regardless of how the traffic is.

[flamadiddle]

No matter where I've lived/worked, I've always pretty much come and gone on my own schedule. IMO, As long as you get your work done, shouldn't matter when you're in the office. I realize some positions require presence during certain hours so that policy will not apply to everyone. I've also been working from home for the last several years, both in Atlanta and Chicago.

Some companies are changing their tune on remote work though. IBM recently told their remote workers to come into the office or else! >

http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/ne...-ibm-says.html

[ATLTJL]

I've had a lot of friends burned by the promise of "flex time."

Lots of employers seem to think that being flexible as to whether you arrive at work at 7:30 or 8:45 is adequate...but that does precious little to get most employees out of traffic.

I worked for one company like this for a while. I tried arriving at work at 7am, but the problem was people would put meetings on my calendar for 4:30pm anyway. So I eventually just stopped showing up that early since I had to stay until 5:30pm or 6pm anyway. I quit that job and that was one of the major reasons why.

[brownhornet]

With the exception of Fridays I go in when I want as long as I get my hours.

[tikigod311]

I roll in about 30 mins "late" every day, traffic is not my excuse Other positions do require more timeliness, depends on what ya do. When the I-85 thing hit, they allowed for a lot more WFH for positions that normally don't get much of it. They also handed free MARTA passes out for anyone affected by the I85 collapse. Other than that, a free MARTA pass if you don't park in the garage and WFH is promoted

[Atlanta Scientist]

When I worked in the city we had 7 minutes. Three strikes and you were out. A coworker of mine got fired for the tardiness. I took the redline to work so it wasn't an issue for me at that time. Currently, my employer doesn't care what time we come in as long as deadlines are met. I did have the option to work from home but opted to be on site. Not sure if it's Atlanta or just the nature of the work I do.

[samiwas1]

With my job, you have to be on time. On a TV/film set, being late can grind production to a halt, leaving a hundred people standing there. Of course, most jobs have multiple people who can take over, but some do not. But, the bonus is that almost every TV/film production serves a full catered breakfast with numerous options starting an hour before work. Almost no one is ever late!

[flyonpa]

We had FlexStart times, You could pick a start time between 7am and 9am. (on the 30's),

Once you picked your time you were expected to stick to it, No 7am today, 9am tomorrow, ... But most of the Building was IT program level professionals, only about 20 were "Shift" who had to be "ontime" to tag team out another person.

Our bosses understood that some days traffic would cause you to be late, but it had to be due to some incident on the roads, not just normal volume.

(Also most of the "bosses" were out of state, and were flexible with work times & Locations)