Comment on Overemployed.com And Subreddit: Working Multiple Remote Jobs To Maximize Gains
sj_zero@lotide.fbxl.net 3 years agoYou're getting paid to have your time directly owned and controlled by the company that hires you. If you're being paid on a piecemeal basis, then fine, but if you're getting paid to dedicate 8 hours a day to your employer, then if you also promise another employer to dedicate 8 hours a day to them then I don't see how that's fraud. If you have two employers paying you on a piecemeal basis then it's not fraud, but if you're paid hourly then I don't see how it isn't.
iamtanmay@wolfballs.com 3 years ago
Yes if you are on a monthly contract, you get paid for 40 hours of weekly work, that's true. However, there are a lot of interdependencies in team work, and speed is determined by the slowest task. Generally a team member's job is to finish their pieces before the slowest parts. That gives you extra time which you can use if there is some unexpected trouble, otherwise its yours for free. Aside from meetings, its not unusual to have half the day free after your work, with the caveat of an emergency etc.
Most remote work is also flexible, only meetings have set times. That means you can sleep during the day and work into the night if that's your thing (that's how I do it). A day has 24 hours and you need a max of 8 hours for 1 job, and 8 hours for sleep, you still have 8 hours for the second job.
These two factors combined make it possible to fulfill your contract with both clients, delivering what they pay you for. Its not fraud if client A pays you for 8 hours but can only give 4 hours of work, its practical reality. If you used that extra time to watch the news or cook something or chit chat with colleagues, you wouldn't call it fraud, right ?
sj_zero@lotide.fbxl.net 3 years ago
Double billing clients like that... You just won't get me to budge on. The client is paying for your time. If you're charging them then that's their time whether you're waiting or working. If you're charging another client for the same time, that's fraud unless you specifically are going to work 16 hours a day, dedicating an 8 hour block to one employer and another 8 hour block to another employer.
Hypothetically speaking, let's say you're committing this fraud with employer A and employer B. Both employers are under the impression that they're paying you for hours say between 7 and 3 from monday to friday. You're billing two employers for that time. Now, let's say that employer A and B both want you to attend meetings taking a full week (say it's training or something). You're charging for that time. They need you. Are you going to tell one of the clients you're charging that you're not available despite the fact that they're paying you to be available? You still expect to get paid despite the fact that you won't be available for the block of time they're paying for.
Grossly unethical, likely illegal. If you're held to any sort of professional code of ethics, I expect you'd be censured under that code of ethics if discovered. I think contact a lawyer if you are thinking of doing it, and I don't think that lawyer is going to tell you any different.
iamtanmay@wolfballs.com 3 years ago
It would be unethical if you charge by the hour. If you are paid a fixed monthly salary and have to turn in a list of deliverables every two weeks, then the employer gets what they paid for.
Regarding your scenario, you would have to schedule the meetings at different times, otherwise it would not be ethical. If you sit in two meetings at the same time, where your feedback is required, naturally that's wrong. Unless its one of those mandatory "speech" meetings where the CTO or someone makes an hour long speech that has nothing to do with your actual work. I just ignore those and do my work during the speech anyway.
You could work 16 hours per day, 0700 to 1500 and 1500 to 2300. That would fall in line with your "ethical code". Europe and US are 8 hours apart. A job on each continent.
sj_zero@lotide.fbxl.net 3 years ago
Yes, if you are getting paid for 16 hours a day and you actually work 16 hours a day, that's fine (although you might want to adjust your life priorities). The problems spring up if you're working 8 hours a day (or less) and billing for 16 hours a day. I said that in my last post.
Salary I think would be a grey area, it depends on the situation.
If you're just getting paid X to to the equivalent of churning out Y widgets a week and that's in your contract and you meet the contract, then as long as you're not charging anyone else for the time you spend churning out widgets, that's fine. You could have three salaries to churn out Y1, Y2, and Y3 widgets and do so and you'd be charging solely for the output you're contractually obligated to provide.
OTOH, if I was a boss dynamically setting requirements for the week and I'm setting those priorities based on your previous work performance and I found out your previous work performance was being reduced by your doing salaried work for a second company during the time I expected you to be working for my company, I know what my next 2 phone calls would be.
I don't know why you put "ethical code" in quotes, double billing is a clear violation of many official professional codes of ethics for different professions in different countries around the world.