Boss makes overworked employee sign new contract to work 50-55 hours per week: 'I have to work 10 [...] hours a day for no additional pay'

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Ben Weiss • Writer and Editor
Jan 15, 2025 2:00 PM EST

It's not easy to stand up to your boss when you are being overworked. Burnout is real and it's not beneficial for anyone involved. Of course, the most aggrieved party is always the employee, who has been taking on too much, but the output of their work will inevitably be affected as well. It's best to normalize conversations about burnout in the workplace and to never use those honest conversations against the employee down the road. 

One would think that most decent employers would never dare to be so manipulative, but then again, not every employer is decent. Take a look at this story about an overworked employee who was asked to sign a new contract agreeing to work 50-55 hours per week while doing the equivalent of two jobs with no additional pay.

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    Cheezburger Image 10454689024
    via Annika Wischnewsky

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • Here, we have an overworked employee who was already working two jobs for the salary of one when she tried to have a reasonable conversation with her employer about burnout and the need for a change. Her boss granted her the ability to shift her work hours a bit to temporarily help the situation, though, of course, that change was never going to be more than a bandaid on the problem. 

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    "Boss Gives Me a Written Reprimand for Not Working 50-55 Hours Per Week"

    A lot to get into here. But I'll start with the basics. I am the office manager at a company. The rest of the office staff reports to me. My boss fired
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    one of them in August, so I had to do her job on top of mine, with no additional pay, until another office staff member returned from leave.
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    Needless to say, working two jobs for two months, was incredibly taxing on me. I was exhausted, and burnt out, and my mental health started to deteriorate in result. I went to my
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    boss and was honest with him about how I was feeling. That I was burnt out, not okay mentally, and needed a break. He asked if I wanted a couple days off, and I
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    said the biggest thing that would help is a little bit of flexibility in my start time. I usually work 7:30-4:30, on salary. He agreed to this.
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  • This is when the boss started to get particularly shady. He manipulated his employee by using the agreement they made about her new work hours as well as the knowledge he obtained that she was overworked against her.

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    About two weeks later, he came to me and said that he knew he said yes, but that he was now going to take it back because I was coming in too late, and stated that I came in at 9:30. I
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    was regularly coming in at 8:45- 9, but there was one day that I got there at 9:30 due to heavy traffic from an accident. It's an office job, so I didn't find it
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    necessary to communicate the one time I came in later than usual, as we're all adults here and this isn't daycare.
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    Cheezburger Image 10454691584
    via Unsplash+ (Getty Images)

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

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    Fast forward a few weeks, and he has a sit down talk with me about how things are going in the office, and straight up asks me "how many hours are you working a day?" To which I answered,
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    definitely not less than 8, it is usually around 8-9 hours per day. He then said that all "leaders" are required to work 50-55 hours per week per company policy and that he "thought I knew that". I
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    was taken aback because I had never heard this before. So long story short, I had to sign a document labeled a "written warning" that basically wrote me up for making a mistake on a procedure, for coming in "way too late", as well as stating that I will work 50-55 hours per week.
    via truthtortoisesl**

  • Imagine being asked to work between 10-16 hours MORE per week with no discussion of a raise. In fact, imagine that your boss was framing this change as if it was already a part of the employment agreement and that it was the employee's mistake for not adhering to this nonexistent policy.

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    My boss had never watched my start or end time before. I came to him vulnerable when I was struggling with my mental health and he said I could come in later,
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    took it back, and then wrote me up for it. And Keep in mind that my salary is based off a 40 hour work week. I never signed anything upon hire stating that I would work that many hours per day, and I wouldn't have accepted the position had I known I had to work that much.
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    Plus my pay rate goes down drastically when I work that much, actually bringing me right to where one of my office. assistant's pay rate is at. So it begs the (rhetorical) question, why would I accept all this additional responsibility without sufficient additional pay???
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    I am the only woman manager here, and I decided to ask my colleagues whether or not they were ever told they had to work that many hours or had to sign something saying they would. They are all men, and they all said no, they had never heard that.
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    Then, I find a written document I had received from corporate HR months back, stating that my regular hours were 7:30-4:30. So it was clear to me that my suspicions were right, I was being gas lit because I knew I had never heard 50-55 hours and if that was the case, my set hours would be 10-11 hours per day, not 9.
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    Anyways, it's clear I am being pushed out for several reasons, but this place is insane and I can't believe I have to work 10 hours a day for no additional pay AND i was written up after I was honest with him about needing some help after I did TWO JOBS for them.
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  • Several members of the community weighed in with their responses to this shady employer. Here's what they had to say! 

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    MelkorUngoliant Your boss sks. If in the US, find a new job and quit with zero notice. When you no show, be as difficult as possible and blame traffic / emergency.
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    String it on as much as possible and f him over as much as possible. Don't handover anything at all
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workplace-stories employee work stories toxic-workplace job work overworked-employees Horrible Bosses company toxic-work-environment
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