I work in gov. healthcare in the US as a med lab tech. Last year, since we were all (all feds) denied hazard pay for physically coming into the hospital through the entire pandemic, they gave us retention bonuses when people started leaving. Nurses, us lab rats, etc all got 10%, and we were happy. Nice bump. About a month ago, I was talking to one of the nurses who was dropping off specimens in my lab and he said that without warning, their retention bonus was just GONE, and that their union rep/president claimed to be “working on it”. I asked him today if they ever got it back and he said “Nope. But what can you expect when your union president has breakfast with the hospital director every day?”
So today I found out from a lab colleague that the HR department GAVE THEMSELVES 15-20% retention bonuses, dependent on whether they worked remote or came into the office. (Remote 15%, in-house 20%). So nurses who came in ever damn day during the pandemic, who were dealing directly with patients, were afraid to go home to their families, got sick and lost wages or vacation time, they got 10%. Myself and my colleagues, who were here every single day, running Covid tests on samples, being exposed to patients and visitors in the hallways, exposing our families or not seeing them for weeks-months, we got 10%.
But these asswipes who are the biggest bunch of useless, ineffective, disorganized, head-up-their-ass simpletons got 15-20% to be unreachable at best, and uncooperative at worst.
So I told my immediate coworkers as well as my nurse buddy. We’ll see how fast this gets around. Because our bonus is up for renewal in December, and we get treated way worse than the nurses, so if they didn’t get theirs, no way am I holding my breath for ours.