Sign Oregon Travel Agency Agreement Safe

Document type sign travel agency agreement oregon safe

welcome to your video guide for travel healthcare my name is kate from travel nursing newbies comm and today we're going to learn all you need to know about your contracts so come on and join this travel healthcare just got easier [Music] but the culture and the brand around here it's that's all about people want everyone here to be successful we're one big family here at one staff alright in this video we're going to learn all about travel contracts this is going to be one of the most important videos that you watch we're going to go through your contract and explain to you what is in there and what should be in there and how to protect yourself in a contract general information whenever you get your contract now the used to whatever I got my first contract it was seven pages long and came by FedEx now you're gonna get a DocuSign that is maybe one to two pages long the thing you need to realize is that and part of that you're gonna liable to see a section that says I agree to the terms in the employee handbook so we're gonna go over some of the things that you're going to see in the employee handbook also your contract on the first page should have your staffing agency your recruiter in it the hospital name that you're going to the shift that you're working the location of the hospital the unit that you are working and you're starting to end dates you might also have your contracted hours per week one thing that you need to make sure that you have in there is any time off that you are like requesting so and because unfortunately if your if your vacation time is not in your contract then chances are you know you might not get it and you don't have a leg to stand on against the hospital to try to get that time off because you didn't put it in your contract so please make sure that any approved time off is in your contract your contract should also have your salary and your benefits are you taking insurance are you taking company housing you know what is your meals and incidentals your well term is the MI and eat what is that per diem great what is your housing pretty and rate what is your regular rate your regular rate for an RM should be 18 to 22 dollars an hour is the lowest that that is acceptable your $18 would be in the mostly the southeast and some of the other southern Midwest states they tend to pay a little bit lower but Midwest and Northeast you should at least have $20 an hour if you're near California Washington Oregon or on the coast on the East Coast up in the New England areas you would expect at least 20 to an hour you know in California the CMAs that work at the hospital are making $25 an hour so if you see on there a contract for San Diego California that is $15 an hour you know that doesn't make sense because you're CNAs are making $25 an hour so you know as I mentioned before instead of having that the 7 to 10 page contract now they have a 20-page handbook there's so much to travel healthcare now that you have to to know because of the Joint Commission standards for travel companies for staffing you need to know your yearly patient safety goals they also will put in there in the handbook your blood-borne pathogens education your medication safety and documentation your mandatory reporting for instance for suspected abuse and also you might have safety management which is your environmental safety is your electrical State the chemical safety or even the race what is it rescue alarm contain and evaluate or evacuate you you have to know that for for every hospital that's and that's just one of the main safety things and yes even though it is in in every hospital every contract we have to sign off that we know that every contract we have to sign off we know what the HIPAA laws are and now we cannot share anybody's medical record information in the handbook they will also have administrative basics which is just a bunch of legal mumbo and jumbo on where they at and which you know if you get into a court then which jurisdiction you will be in where the travel company is you might also seen nowadays an arbitration agreement to where they want you to instead of going going right to court they want you to sit down with a middleman and see if you guys can come to an agreement without going to court you also have your your code of business ethics is in there how are you supposed to act you know what is the proper way to conduct your business at the at the hospital as a professional we also have standards of conduct which you know is your everyday actions and how you're supposed to react to patients how you supposed to react to different situations and you know the harassment there's all kinds of lateral violence and harassment that goes on in hospitals you know what what is your responsibilities in preventing that from happening in your contract you also have your benefits and a cancellation policy most contracts will have a have a clause in it that you can cancel with two weeks notice because you are an at-will employee some people have a three weeks some people have a month where you have to inform the travel hospital the travel company and the travel hospital that you would like to cancel the contract unfortunately that doesn't always pertain to the hospital they can they can cancel you the very next day there's really nothing that we can do about it we that's just one of the facts of travel health care that you have to accept as a traveling healthcare professional some of the frequently asked questions is on a contract if you do you sign a different document than the agency okay in the when we talked about the company there is there's your recruiter and then also we talked about account managers well the account managers are going to go to the hospital and they are going to obtain a contract from the hospital saying that their company can can provide staffing for that hospital this is also done through a vendor management systems now so you got that contract and then the account manager will go back with a specific contract or a commitment letter saying that you are coming to work for that hospital and this is all the details your shift and your pay rate and all that with the hospital the hospital pays the company what we call a bill rate and let's talk about it a little bit later so there are going to be four players in your contract between you and the hospital it's the hospital staffing office your account manager their recruiter and of course you you're gonna play a part in this the thing I want you to understand about contracts is this is a two-way street this is an agreement between a company and you and make sure that you agree to everything that is written in that contract and actually read your contracts hey don't just scan over them and say oh yeah this is good two weeks down the look two weeks down the road you're gonna like oh well that wasn't in my contract okay take your time read your contracts the travel company is going to tell you you probably are going to have about 24 hours to to come back with anything that you need to add to that contract but it's very important that you take that day and that you read over what you are signing next you're gonna ask me what is the bill rate the bill rate is the amount that the hospital is going to pay the travel company now out of this comes the company expenses they have expenses for insurance that is one of their biggest expenses they have to have insurance on every employee that they send out not only medical malpractice type of insurance but they also have to have workmen's comp insurance on you they also have their their office overhead they have to pay their staff they have to pay payroll they have to pay the the secretaries their recruiters the it's the recruiter assistants you know there's a lot of people who gets paid and the only way that companies have any income is through this bill rate you have your recruiter salaries also another thing that has come up recently is vendor fees we have managed provider services or MPs and we also have vendor management services which are VMs VMs and NPS will take on an average four to five percent of that bill rate so you have that you also have federal and state taxes that have to come out of that for both you and the company and then of course if you're with a larger if you're with a larger company you may even have profit shares that come out of that bill rate travel healthcare professional will get the rest of what's left a good standard is the traveler should be making anywhere from oh I would say sixty to seventy-five percent because a travel company should be able to cover all these cost at seventy five by taking twenty five percent of the bill rate some because of the credentialing costs that have increased recently sometimes it does take thirty to thirty five percent of that bill rate to cover your cost so how do we figure out if we're going to an assignment what it what is fair how do we know that the company is not is giving us our fair share I've got this salary comparison chart and it's on travel nursing newbies our Facebook group and there we also have a video to explain that one but with that chart we take the salary rate we get the location and then we do the average what the average are in one makes just your beginning graduate a nurse water they make and then we go to GSA which is the government standard a site and get what your premiums should be now if you look at the military per diems the military gives their people seventy-five percent of that GSA rate then the GSA is the maximum rate that you can take four-year or housing stipends and for your in my knees meals and incidentals the military will give their people on a three-month assignment a long term assignment seventy-five percent a military contract that is six months they will give fifty percent of the GSA so that's what I use as a standard whenever I figure out how much a travel nurse or travel healthcare professionals should be making and an assignment so what we take is we take the the RN rate for a beginning nurse at that location and then we add it to how much is going to cover your expenses while you're there because you're duplicating expenses if you have a tax home so that's how I determine what you should be making at a at a facility if a contract you know last year two years ago we used to hit 75 percent easy right now it's it's tough to find a fifty percent this last month I've probably done ten salary comparison charts and only one out of the ten was at the 75% level the others were 50% I would say out of the remaining nine probably had six that were right at the 50% level an old and the you know the others were even below the 50% level so rates are down right now you're not gonna make as much in the different locations man that's why you know we talked earlier about you need to find out how much you need for a certain location and you know deal with that also but that's another little helpful guide to see what you should be making in a location another thing that is often asked in my newbies group is I have verbally accepted a contract is it legally binding okay yes and no yes there is a contract you have signed or not you haven't signed but you do have a verbal commitment to your company that and that you're going to take that assignment okay and you can do this after after the interview call your recruiter say hey interviewing great let's take the assignment when you get your contract if that contract is not what you discussed with the manager are not what you just discuss with the recruiter then no you do not have to take that contract unless you can mediate and and you know the contract is an agreement between two different parties if you guys can agree on on a contract and that's great otherwise legally yes you have verbally accepted that contract but if it's not as you guys verbally agreed then you do not have to sign the written contract now how often does that happen no I personally in 15 years I have never had a contract that I verbally agreed to that I did not end up signing even though I've had to correct a few things you know the the the problem comes along whenever we have we okay so we've interviewed on Monday and then Wednesday we'd get an offer that is five dollars more an hour okay the question is I've verbally agreed to the one that I interviewed for on Monday can I take the one that is presented to me on Wednesday now in hindsight we should have told the Monday person that you know I have another interview on Monday let me get back to you after the interview on I mean the the interview on Wednesday tell the Monday person that you have a contract that you have an interview on Wednesday and then you can you can postpone that decision that that verbal agreement if you agree to the first one can you drop can you can you drop it for the second one ethically no because it's your word you have verbally agreed to that first contract legally can you do it yes because you know you don't have a written contract there there's nothing in writing and as especially nurses as we nurses know it's not documented it's not done so one of those same lines yes you know you're you are legally bound to to a written contract okay once that once it's in in writing then the only the only way I would ever break a contract is if my license was in danger okay between the verbal and their written you know you really need to weigh out the consequences on why you are not going to accept that after you've accepted the verbal because your verbal is your word and if you do that two or three times to a recruiter that recruiter is not going to trust what you are saying so we go back to the trust of the recruiter you need to trust your recruiter if the recruiter needs to trust you and if you keep on declining accepting verbal contracts and then declining them then that just tearing apart to trust one of the next questions I'm asked is the hospital pump postpone my contract well I still get my freedom legally I believe that yes you should still get your per diem especially for your housing because you are on assignment you are paying for housing and you should be reimbursed for that extra expense the reality of the truth is is that if the company is not getting paid then it's really hard for them to pay you so you know in in the meals the way I look at the meals is that you're gonna eat either way whether you're home or on assignment so that's not really duplicating so I don't feel like the company should do the meals aren't as important as the lodging because you're still paying for two different lodgings so anyway the truth of the matter is is that yes it would be nice to get paid but the hospital's not give the companies not getting paid so if your contract is cancelled for a week you're not gonna be paid for that week unless your company has saved up money to cover that expense what else do I need to make sure is in my contract that may not be standard of course we've talked about any time off if you have a wedding if you have a conference if you have a vacation you must have that time off in your contract also as a condition of employment you can add what areas you are competent to float in let's talk before don't put me on a renal floor or oncology for because I am not competent to to do anything on those two floors except for take care of telemetry patients if it's in your contract then you have a leg to stand on when you get to the hospital if it's not in your contract then you're gonna have a tougher time getting out of floating to that to that area any scheduling things that you need alike block scheduling if you're doing a fairly local contract like you know two hours three hours away from and you're going to spend anyone spend seven days at the hospital and then seven days at home make sure that that is in your contract again it's not documented then chances are you're not going to get that done anything else that is important to you that is discussed with the manager okay very important to put in your terms of the contract or terms of employment is that as discussed with nurse Nancy manager of ICU I will have the weekend of whatever offer I will have every other weekends off in some places I've heard that you can do talk to the man when you talk to the ma ager and they have patient ratios I have been known to put patient and ratios in my contracts because if the manager tells you that you're gonna have five and six and you get there and you have seven and eight you know we need to be reasonable about this make sure you touch to the cut to the nurse manager but make sure that you're reasonable in your amount of patients you don't want to say I'm only going to take two patients on a med-surg floor you know that's not reasonable you're only going to take two patients in an ICU that's reasonable you're only going to take five patients on a telemetry floor you know that's reasonable California law states that you know telemetry is for patients to one nurse so tragic to the mandatory California laws is what I do in my contracts and I may go one more like for telemetry I won't take any more than five which I have taken seven to eight on telemetry so to me having a five or six limit is is still a reasonable amount and and a safe amount to take when you finish one contract how far in advance do you need to sign your next I have had a hospital's asked me to stay within two weeks of being there to me that's a little early I start planning my my extensions about six to four weeks of from the end by that time your bite time you're halfway through a contract of a month month and a half you know pretty much if you're going to to want to stay at that Hospital it's going to depend also on what the hospital needs if you're taking the place of somebody for maternity leave they may come back before then and you aren't going to be needed so you need to find out if the hospital still going to need you and when you can come back now on your pay rate the travel company isn't doing your credentialing over again so it is a good idea to approach your recruiter and say hey I know that you guys don't have to do all your credentialing so can I get a two to four dollar raise an hour that's not that's not unreasonable to ask for another question that I'm often asked is what happens if I miss the shift your wages can be deducted from your miss shift and it will be because you're not you're not at the hospital the hospital can't is not going to pay the company for any time that you are not there the only way that they would pay is if you have guaranteed hours and with the guaranteed hours they would have to call you off some companies will take part of your housing and your freedom site stipend what's that it's very debatable on they they can penalize your wages but penalizing your freedoms it's really questionable and debatable on whether that is a definition of wage for characterization because they're penalizing your stipends which is really supposed to be reimbursements the companies that you've worked for make sure that you that you know how much they're going to charge you for a miss shift there's and maybe I know some companies do a four-hour eight hour or 12 hour shift if you miss that many hours then they're going to dock you so much so much money look you know it's just very important that you find out how much it is going to actually cost you to miss a shift I had a migraine headache and it cost me two hundred and eighty two dollars or something like that and I didn't have any more migraines for the next fifteen years so it's it's something that that you need to learn and learn we learn by this video instead of figuring it out to yourself can I change the recruiters in the middle of the contract yes you can't can you change companies in the middle of a contract that's a little bit more difficult but to change recruiters you know don't be afraid to go to that account but tune up to the Account Manager to the recruiting manager and say hey you know I'm really not getting along with Joe can I change recruiters and as I said before the managers would much rather have you changed recruiters than to change companies you know another question is can I cancel a contract at any time yes although you are an at-will employee it's preferred that you give a two to four weeks notice this stipulation will usually be in your contract to me operating through integrity and ethics the only good reason to cancel a contract is if your nursing license is in danger if I understand family emergencies do happen and that that usually can be worked out between you and the hospital and your travel agency can you is it something that you can take off a week or two weeks put those weeks at the end of the contract and not cancel the the complete contract now I understand that in dire situations yes you may need to come to in a contract early because of a family emergency just please you know talk to the hospital talk to the agency and see what you can get worked out contracts you know they're they're not as scary anymore because you're not having to deal with this 7 to 20 page you know book to read but be sure to read your contract and read every read all the fine print that you can because that piece of paper dictates what your next 13 weeks is going to be all right guys that's all in contracts but if you have any more questions for me I'm on travel nursing newbies on the Facebook group so ask me more questions okay and Co [Music]