In an attempt to sustain Jackson and ensure safe quality care for patients, our union has agreed to assist management in the evaluation of the $1.5 million spent each pay period on overtime with the help of our operational experts, The Sibery Group.
Our goal is to ensure that management is hiring enough nurses, doctors and healthcare professionals so that we can staff our units safely for the sake of our patients. Filling vacancies on a regular basis with overtime is definitely the most expensive way to staff Jackson.
We believe that most of our units are staffed “to the bone” and we are urging management to analyze the data, unit by unit, to make sure our patient care units are staffed adequately and that PL time and other non-productive time can be utilized by all employees.
As per our contract, the 6 hours of overtime in your 4-day work week is secure, which accounts for about $640,000 of Jackson’s $1.5 million in overtime expenses per pay period.
Our union remains committed to finding efficiencies. Reducing the regular use of overtime to meet minimum staffing needs is just one more cost-saving method we can implement to save our public hospital.