12 Hour Work Schedule and Training

[jweidig]

I have a question for departments that are on a 12 hour work schedule. How do you handle training days?

Is it a day for a day or does the officer have to return to finish out his 12 hour work day?

What happens when it is a two or three day training class?
and what happens on 3 and 4 day classes?

and does your department have a policy on this.

Thanks
Jweidig

[PhilipCal]

12 Hour Schedule

Alabama DPS normally works eight hour shifts, but twelve hours is not all that uncommon at times. The department addresses training issues with two to three days of annual in-service training at the Academy at Selma. This also includes annual pistol and shotgun qualification. Specialized units such as Tactical Teams, EOD, etc conduct more frequent training with days or a block of days dedicated to training purposes. Does that sometimes pose scheduling problems for supervisors? Oh yah!! Might be why I have so little hair now. Now that I'm retired, it's nice to kick back and say I don't have to worry about that any more.

[billtex213]

We would love for it to be a day for a day, but unfortunately we have to use vacation time if we dont return and finish out the day. If the training falls on your scheduled work day/night, you are automatically scheduled for day shift. We work 6A to 6P, so most guys will come in at the beginning of the shift and keep busy until 08:30, then head for the academy. At the end of the training, they either call it a day and use vacation tim for the remainder of the tour, or come back and finish out the day. Training on your scheduled day off is all for comp time (or overtime if it's a re-cert or required training) at the time + 1/2 rate. The theory is if it were day for a day and the training is over at 16:00, you're still on the clock until 18:00, and probably in a bar somewhere getting into trouble!

[LA Copper]

All of our patrol guys work a 3/12. When we have training, the majority of it is 8 hour days. We have two options, either deduct out the remaining hours from our comp time, or return and work the remaining hours. The drive back to the station is included in the remaining hours.

In the six or so years that we've had the 3/12, doing it this way has seemed to work out pretty well.