Lateness.

[JimmyConwayNW]

Currently run a car sales business.

We have a few employees who seem to be turning up late regularly. A few minutes here and a few minutes there. It's starting to really grate on me and puts me in a bad mood first thing getting annoyed by it.

I'm not sure how to best sort out this issue my business partner does not feel to bothered by it and says its just a couple of minutes. I feel differently that it is not acceptable and we are paying them to start work at that time not turn up beyond that time then face further delays before they are actually ready to work.

I don't even get so much as a sorry I'm late.

One of them is a fairly new member of staff been here three weeks. The rest of the workforce are young.

Can anyone offer advice ?

Blood pressure on the boil.

[hornetrider]

Are they salesmen? How late are we talking - literally two minutes?

When do they leave? Closing time on the dot?

There's bigger things to be worrying about imo.

[Simpo Two]

If they do their work well I'd be inclined to leave it, assuming it doesn't get worse. If they show other signs of disinterest then something should be said.

[JimmyConwayNW]

Ten mins here and there.

Valeter and mechanic to be fair.

Mechanic is a good employee but has very very bad attitude and instantly mega defensive whenever questioned on anything.
Not sure if it's a younger generation thing.

[hman]

when I worked in the motor trade I was late, very often because of traffic..

The bds put me on a clocking in and out system, so I after a month I asked for the records. They were surprised to see that I had accrued 8 hours overtime for the month and I duly asked for it to be paid. They begrudgingly paid up and said "we wont be doing the clocking in and out thing anymore".

I left about a month after that.

[Frimley111R]

I worked for British gas when they did that. In the end it meant everyone got 12 days holiday a year from the time accrued! Greta in theory but in practice it was worse for the company...I loved it though

OP - I'd have a quiet word, that might be all it needs. If someone has only been there 3 weeks their lateness says a lot about their motivation!

[Charlie1986]

OP I see your pain,

But if you start to be a knob over it when the time comes and you need them to work late or wait for a customer will they do it for you.i very much doubt that. Maybe have a quick chat and see why there a bit late as people have said there's a bigger picture to look at

[Simpo Two]

Charlie1986 said:

But if you start to be a knob over it when the time comes and you need them to work late or wait for a customer will they do it for you.

It's a good idea - 'always have a favour in the bank'. If you keep schtum now, then when you really do need them to stay on half an hour for Mr Angry Customer, and they whine, you can remind them that they've been 10 minutes late every day for three weeks so shut up and get on with it. Or words to that effect

[JimmyConwayNW]

If they ever stay late I will always pay then overtime or buy them a mcdonalds, pizza something like that.

Maybe I am just being a bit of a knob about it. I think the response from people who are late should be sorry I'm late. Nothing more would be said about it after that again unless it's daily.

[nyt]

Not sure if it's applicable in your situation but when we had lateness, I moved the morning meeting to start of day and it did the trick

[Turkish91]

Worth a word but not a bking. As said, if they stay over here and there then it's not really worth sweating about.

I'd be pissed if someone was 5-10mins late each day, then clockwatched at the end of the shift and left bang on their finish time.

[Hoofy]

When I was an employee, my attitude was that if you were a clockwatcher, I'll be a clockwatcher. Otherwise, you'll find me wandering in 20 minutes late but leaving 45 minutes late, having 10 minute lunches at my desk, never taken smoke breaks, only stopping for a quick toilet break once or twice a day and even coming in on the weekends FOC. I also tried my best to meet or beat deadlines with quality work. Do they have the same attitude?

If they come in late and leave early, refusing to stay on if needed, then I'd have a problem with that.

[andburg]

Don't know how you are fixed contractually but if its an issue you need to set the employee a target for compliance.

The alternative to the stick is the carrot, you could look to link an existing bonus scheme to attendance and punctuality.

[GT03ROB]

If the work is getting done as you require...forget it.

With people that work for me I always tell they can work with me 1 of 2 ways.....

...by the book...which is fine by me but it's everything by the book to the letter

or the adult way which means you're in late sometimes, no problems, you want to knock off early to go see the kids sports day, no problems don't use your leave, I need you to work late or a weekend to meet a deadline, also no problem & no overtime.

[wiggy001]

The question I would ask myself is: "Does it actually matter?"

If they're meant to be accepting customer calls and could therefore miss a call - have a word
If they're there to do a job and the job is getting done, ignore it.

In the latter scenario they might not actually consider it a problem (as the job gets done regardless) hence the lack of apology.

I've never worked anywhere with a strict start/end time, which probably influences my response.

[fido]

Depends. As a graduate/trainee, I would rarely be late or apologise / give a reason for lateness. If it's an office of mixed experience and different people working to different routines - then as long as the team as a whole is performing (some arrive late, some arrive early, some cover holidays etc.) then cut a little slack. You don't want to loose good workers by being too picky.

[HTP99]

I am often late, the traffic is so hard to predict and there is always an accident somewhere; I leave earlier and I'm late, I leave later and I can be on time, I hate being late but recently the traffic just seems to be getting worse, unfortunately living in Surrey and working within the M25 has that effect on traffic.

My immediate manager is fine with it as I get my work done, I stay later if needed, I don't take lunch and I'm flexible with moving around days off if needed; plus he comes the same way as me, but from further away and is late fairly often too.

If work started to get funny about it; I know the MD would, then I would make sure I had lunch and I would make it difficult to help out by staying late or moving days off, a happy medium is needed and currently we have it.

[AyBee]

I'm always late and never apologise but I wouldn't expect my boss to say anything on the basis that I don't get paid overtime, always exceed my contracted hours(have done well over double my contracted hours this week). As long as the work gets done, I'd hope that nobody minded me being late the odd 15 minutes here or there. If you're paying overtime, just take it into account, if it hits them in the pocket, I'm sure they'll get out of bed earlier. If the work is getting done and you aren't missing customers because they're not on time then just suck it up IMO.

[JimmyConwayNW]

Good old pistonheads. Probably fair to say I should just let it slide unless it impacts upon productivity.

Thanks for the input folks.

[andy-xr]

I think if you measure time as the value of how good your employees are, you miss out on what they do when they're there.

If the mechanic breezes in at 9:10 and his first job is at 9:15, he's alright. If he's late for the start time of the activity then there's a problem.

But if all you're bothered about is that they're there for their hours, then all you'll get from them is their actual hours when you pull them up on it. No staying late, no coming in early every so often, bang to the minute breaks and lunches.

If however you can look at the week and think 'we fixed 25 cars in the time we had, and we were ahead of schedule with more than half of them' then they're productive.