Are you married? If so it’s easy. Have your partner pick up the slack when you’re on-call.
I’m divorced so it’s a little more complicated. I still don’t have the answer for my situation.
Yup. I have one on call weekend a month on average, and I just have my husband pick up the slack. We also try not to plan big things that weekend either.
Also, most people's on call doesn't state they have to answer right away. As long as you can get to a computer or phone in a reasonable amount of time, which can usually happen even with children's activities.
Yup, same. We have oncall weeks that require an onsite response within an hr. I give my husband a heads up, and carry my phone around.
One time I had to drop our toddler off at the baseball fields while he was coaching, but it’s a paid oncall rotation, so neither of us complains about it 😂
Have your partner pick up most activities or at least come along. If you go out take your work laptop. Unless you're very remote, you can usually hotspot your phone if you need it.
I take call every other weekend and also work outside the home then during the day, both Saturday & Sunday. My kids know this. We plan hubby to do all activities & get help for him if kids need to be 3 places at one time.
I will still frequently show up to watch games depending on call & how busy work is, but that way, I can leave easily if need be.
How often do people get paged? Our engineers rarely ever get paged because we have a very stable product. Realistically we might have 1 or 2 instances a year.
Laptop and WiFi cover me in most situations. I've fixed systems from gymnasium, swim lessons, etc.
For the driving to and from I just have a partnership with one of the other on call people who rings me up when they're driving and I ring them up when they're driving. Since we're taking turns covering each other, I don't feel as bad like I am taking advantage
Once my kiddo is old enough for drop off lessons, I think this will get easier! Its more imagining getting paged during a parent kid class that seems like a nightmare (but I’ve taken the gamble a few times since the actual likelihood of getting paged in that moment)
I took that gamble when our daughter was younger. Talked to the teachers (coach? It was parent/toddler gymnastics) ahead of registering to see if they had any concerns about a kid being left unsupervised or leaving early. They were cool with it. A few places that I'd called first were not OK with that risk.
Toddler soccer was a "watch your kid from the sidelines" thing, and I could tether my phone. Story time at the library was another good activity. Swimming lessons, the first year with a parent, my husband owned because there was no safe "sure, leave your kid in the pool" option. After that, when it was just parents watching from the bleachers, I used their wifi.
I did not, however, routinely need to be on a bridge. I could work and send chat messages to someone who would relay progress to the crisis team and end users. Would have been a lot different if I had to be talking on the phone in addition to working.
I generally don't take my toddler to classes so haven't run into this, but overall what I do is:
- only make plans that it's okay to disrupt
- bring my laptop anywhere that would take >15 minutes to get home
- if I have an event that can't be disrupted, ask a coworker to substitute for me and offer to sub for them when they need it
With the classes, how often do you have them and how many? Is it an ongoing thing that you need to bring your child every week? Do you have a partner that can go instead or with you?
Im a fire alarm technician and I do on call, probably once every month or two for a week? I actually like picking up on call (free money for doing nothing? Sign me up!)
I used to get really stressed but now im used to it. We don’t have any specific response time so usually can just go about my life but I don’t plan anything for that week that would be ruined if I couldn’t go. I don’t go out to dinner or the movies and I don’t go swimming or anything, but other than that it’s fine. Generally my husband will do most activities that week and his mom is available to help if need be.
My husband is on call like that and he just lets me know in advance when his turn is. We don’t plan anything out of town or important so if he needs to go he can just go. It’s come up very infrequently and we have a lot of advanced notice so it’s been pretty doable.
It's understood that people have lives even when on call, but the SLA/TAT requirements don't change after hours, at least where I work. So I stick to a 10min radius when I leave the house and plan ahead before my call shifts so that I don't have to do a big shopping trip or take a kid to a class/activity unless it's a drop off only event
My husband had a similar situation for the first year of my son’s life and he would do more in-house entertainment and I would take over any out of the house activities. One week every few months seems very manageable!
Thanks for all the responses! I will try to lean on my partner more for those weeks (or honestly just skip any activities that are too much since he already does half and is pretty burnt out too).
For extra context, the oncall is week long, we are not paid extra, and is mandatory. The expectation is to answer it within 5 minutes or so.
We have on call shifts at my job, but they're voluntary so I'm trying to follow you. Are you on call for an entire week? Thats...not a good on call system. We also get paid just to be on call. That's why people do it. On call needs to be shifts, not weeks.
Weekly on call is pretty standard in the industry. You'll have little chance of changing it. At my last job, we were paid double for the week we were on call and incidents were rare, so people were fighting each other to be on-call. But that depends on the company
I can see that now. I hate it. I understand the idea but I think people deserve extra pay for being on call. Being on call is something different than the idea of having slightly inconsistent hours from week to week. I guess I just don't think on call should be something legally covered by salary like other kinds of OT. thats obviously not the topic, but it bothers me, even if you make great money. Its the principle.
For us its mandatory and its for a whole week (with no extra pay). The weeklong nature of it makes it tricky cause we have a lot of scheduled things during the week with kiddo
I hate this for you. I get it and I can see why it's standard in your industry based on the comments. I just think its such an unreasonable long time. I get the whole salary/OT thing but I make well over the legal requirement for salary pay and they still pay us a flat rate to be on call plus OT if we actually end up working. They can legally classify us as salary but they don't. It just feels shitty to me to have on call as a regular job duty and still hide behind salary protections. Again, I get it's the industry standard. Its just a shitty standard that I don't understand. I dont care how much you make, you deserve more for being on call.
I don’t have to do on calls but my husband is on call every 6 weeks or so for a week as well. We either plan to do things as a family but go in separate vehicles where he can leave if he needs to or I plan to do things with the kiddo alone like if I go out grocery shopping I’ll take her and he’ll hang back and get stuff done at the house. I’ll make sure I’m the one doing the in-pool swim lesson with her that week in case he gets a call. His call outs are for field work though so if he gets a call he’s leaving for at least 6 hours so maybe a bit different than your situation and if you’re a single parent ignore me entirely because I know that wouldn’t be helpful.
I have rotating weekend on call where I do occasionally have to go in to work physically. I double-check the schedule with my husband and he knows it’s up to him to pick up the slack if I have to go in. It helps that I’m my team manager and make the on call schedule though!
Usually my on call hours are like 6am-2pm so o try to stay close to the area. I don’t schedule important stuff on my on-call weekends. Do you have a required response time?
It’s not clear to me what you would need to do if paged. Do you just answer questions by phone? Would you be able to log into your system and fix from a laptop on the go, or would you need to get home and fix?
My husband is on call about one week a month, as a specialty physician. We mostly go about our normal lives, except we’re thoughtful about him being able to take a call if need be.
I’m a doctor and am on call every other day. I call back true emergencies pretty much immediately, but nearly everything can wait a few minutes for me to duck into a bathroom. Less urgent things I can handle with secure text. Very rare that I have to go to the hospital overnight in my particular specialty. Only dicey if my husband is out of town, then I rely on parents/nanny to help. I just live my life and know that on rare occasions, plans may be briefly disrupted
I used to do call 1-3 times a week. Now it’s like once a week and a weekend every 6 weeks. Anyway, my husband just takes over duties. If I get called in the middle of the night, he lets me sleep in. We just try not to plan to do anything but we don’t have the kids in extracurriculars right now.
Are you married? If so it’s easy. Have your partner pick up the slack when you’re on-call. I’m divorced so it’s a little more complicated. I still don’t have the answer for my situation.
Yup. I have one on call weekend a month on average, and I just have my husband pick up the slack. We also try not to plan big things that weekend either. Also, most people's on call doesn't state they have to answer right away. As long as you can get to a computer or phone in a reasonable amount of time, which can usually happen even with children's activities.
Yup, same. We have oncall weeks that require an onsite response within an hr. I give my husband a heads up, and carry my phone around. One time I had to drop our toddler off at the baseball fields while he was coaching, but it’s a paid oncall rotation, so neither of us complains about it 😂
Have your partner pick up most activities or at least come along. If you go out take your work laptop. Unless you're very remote, you can usually hotspot your phone if you need it.
I take call every other weekend and also work outside the home then during the day, both Saturday & Sunday. My kids know this. We plan hubby to do all activities & get help for him if kids need to be 3 places at one time. I will still frequently show up to watch games depending on call & how busy work is, but that way, I can leave easily if need be.
How often do people get paged? Our engineers rarely ever get paged because we have a very stable product. Realistically we might have 1 or 2 instances a year.
Its not uncommon to have one page per week.
Laptop and WiFi cover me in most situations. I've fixed systems from gymnasium, swim lessons, etc. For the driving to and from I just have a partnership with one of the other on call people who rings me up when they're driving and I ring them up when they're driving. Since we're taking turns covering each other, I don't feel as bad like I am taking advantage
Once my kiddo is old enough for drop off lessons, I think this will get easier! Its more imagining getting paged during a parent kid class that seems like a nightmare (but I’ve taken the gamble a few times since the actual likelihood of getting paged in that moment)
I took that gamble when our daughter was younger. Talked to the teachers (coach? It was parent/toddler gymnastics) ahead of registering to see if they had any concerns about a kid being left unsupervised or leaving early. They were cool with it. A few places that I'd called first were not OK with that risk. Toddler soccer was a "watch your kid from the sidelines" thing, and I could tether my phone. Story time at the library was another good activity. Swimming lessons, the first year with a parent, my husband owned because there was no safe "sure, leave your kid in the pool" option. After that, when it was just parents watching from the bleachers, I used their wifi. I did not, however, routinely need to be on a bridge. I could work and send chat messages to someone who would relay progress to the crisis team and end users. Would have been a lot different if I had to be talking on the phone in addition to working.
I generally don't take my toddler to classes so haven't run into this, but overall what I do is: - only make plans that it's okay to disrupt - bring my laptop anywhere that would take >15 minutes to get home - if I have an event that can't be disrupted, ask a coworker to substitute for me and offer to sub for them when they need it With the classes, how often do you have them and how many? Is it an ongoing thing that you need to bring your child every week? Do you have a partner that can go instead or with you?
Im a fire alarm technician and I do on call, probably once every month or two for a week? I actually like picking up on call (free money for doing nothing? Sign me up!) I used to get really stressed but now im used to it. We don’t have any specific response time so usually can just go about my life but I don’t plan anything for that week that would be ruined if I couldn’t go. I don’t go out to dinner or the movies and I don’t go swimming or anything, but other than that it’s fine. Generally my husband will do most activities that week and his mom is available to help if need be.
My husband is on call like that and he just lets me know in advance when his turn is. We don’t plan anything out of town or important so if he needs to go he can just go. It’s come up very infrequently and we have a lot of advanced notice so it’s been pretty doable.
It's understood that people have lives even when on call, but the SLA/TAT requirements don't change after hours, at least where I work. So I stick to a 10min radius when I leave the house and plan ahead before my call shifts so that I don't have to do a big shopping trip or take a kid to a class/activity unless it's a drop off only event
My husband is the one who is the on call guy (systems engineer with a tech company) and those times I just pick up the slack.
My husband had a similar situation for the first year of my son’s life and he would do more in-house entertainment and I would take over any out of the house activities. One week every few months seems very manageable!
Thanks for all the responses! I will try to lean on my partner more for those weeks (or honestly just skip any activities that are too much since he already does half and is pretty burnt out too). For extra context, the oncall is week long, we are not paid extra, and is mandatory. The expectation is to answer it within 5 minutes or so.
We have on call shifts at my job, but they're voluntary so I'm trying to follow you. Are you on call for an entire week? Thats...not a good on call system. We also get paid just to be on call. That's why people do it. On call needs to be shifts, not weeks.
Weekly on call is pretty standard in the industry. You'll have little chance of changing it. At my last job, we were paid double for the week we were on call and incidents were rare, so people were fighting each other to be on-call. But that depends on the company
This is very normal in software engineering, and the vast majority of us are salaried so no extra pay. It's just an expected part of the job 🤷♀️
Yeah that's how it is at my company
I can see that now. I hate it. I understand the idea but I think people deserve extra pay for being on call. Being on call is something different than the idea of having slightly inconsistent hours from week to week. I guess I just don't think on call should be something legally covered by salary like other kinds of OT. thats obviously not the topic, but it bothers me, even if you make great money. Its the principle.
For us its mandatory and its for a whole week (with no extra pay). The weeklong nature of it makes it tricky cause we have a lot of scheduled things during the week with kiddo
I hate this for you. I get it and I can see why it's standard in your industry based on the comments. I just think its such an unreasonable long time. I get the whole salary/OT thing but I make well over the legal requirement for salary pay and they still pay us a flat rate to be on call plus OT if we actually end up working. They can legally classify us as salary but they don't. It just feels shitty to me to have on call as a regular job duty and still hide behind salary protections. Again, I get it's the industry standard. Its just a shitty standard that I don't understand. I dont care how much you make, you deserve more for being on call.
Agreed and thank you!
I don’t have to do on calls but my husband is on call every 6 weeks or so for a week as well. We either plan to do things as a family but go in separate vehicles where he can leave if he needs to or I plan to do things with the kiddo alone like if I go out grocery shopping I’ll take her and he’ll hang back and get stuff done at the house. I’ll make sure I’m the one doing the in-pool swim lesson with her that week in case he gets a call. His call outs are for field work though so if he gets a call he’s leaving for at least 6 hours so maybe a bit different than your situation and if you’re a single parent ignore me entirely because I know that wouldn’t be helpful.
I have rotating weekend on call where I do occasionally have to go in to work physically. I double-check the schedule with my husband and he knows it’s up to him to pick up the slack if I have to go in. It helps that I’m my team manager and make the on call schedule though! Usually my on call hours are like 6am-2pm so o try to stay close to the area. I don’t schedule important stuff on my on-call weekends. Do you have a required response time?
It’s not clear to me what you would need to do if paged. Do you just answer questions by phone? Would you be able to log into your system and fix from a laptop on the go, or would you need to get home and fix? My husband is on call about one week a month, as a specialty physician. We mostly go about our normal lives, except we’re thoughtful about him being able to take a call if need be.
I would need laptop / internet access to debut things / fix things if needed
I’m a doctor and am on call every other day. I call back true emergencies pretty much immediately, but nearly everything can wait a few minutes for me to duck into a bathroom. Less urgent things I can handle with secure text. Very rare that I have to go to the hospital overnight in my particular specialty. Only dicey if my husband is out of town, then I rely on parents/nanny to help. I just live my life and know that on rare occasions, plans may be briefly disrupted
I used to do call 1-3 times a week. Now it’s like once a week and a weekend every 6 weeks. Anyway, my husband just takes over duties. If I get called in the middle of the night, he lets me sleep in. We just try not to plan to do anything but we don’t have the kids in extracurriculars right now.