[me_dennis]

Originally Posted by core_upt

To the P.Eng portion of the CP Brain Trust
re: consulting in civil engineering - land development, water design, that sort of thing.

I don't work in engineering, but know someone who does and the pay structure doesn't make sense to me. This person is a full-time salaried employee (not contract).

From my understanding, the company bids on a project based on it taking X amount of hours, Once the project is awarded, each task is given Y amount of hours to complete. As a person works on each task, they bill their hours to the task number.

Here is what I don't get: If the company requires a task to be done in 5 hours, but it actually takes 15 hours, does the employee just 'suck up' the 10 extra hours they worked on it; overtime on their own time?

Further, if there isn't a project for a salaried employee to work on, they don't have a number to charge their time to, so they don't get paid.... does this seem normal? If they come into the office, check their email, do no project specific work, shouldn't they be able to charge their time to something instead of using vacation hours???

Just trying to get a feel for the normal practices out there and experiences of others. I can try and provide more info it further clarification is needed.

Thanks!

This depends on what the situation is. What was the reason for the work taking 15 hours rather than 5? Was additional scope added? If so, then a Trend or Change order can be issued to charge back to the client. If the work took longer because of productivity issues (ie the employee took their sweet ass time) then that employee should be eating their time. If it was an issue with the Project Manager or whoever preparing the proposal underestimated the work, then the extra time should be taken out of overhead.