qaClocks9000

retrogusto said:

MplsP said:

If a company requires an employee to spend their time on something as a condition of employment then the employee should be compensated for that time. That’s not that radical of an idea.

It’s not as simple as that. It’s not a condition of employment at all, since they encourage you to avoid it entirely by not bringing stuff. From Apple’s perspective, if you choose to bring things to the workplace that you won’t/shouldn’t be using at the workplace on Apple’s dime, they’re not going to pay you for the extra time that you and they have to spend to make sure nobody is stealing anything. It’s not productive work time, it’s not a huge percentage of your work day, and it’s not like Apple is charging for the additional labor involved in monitoring this stuff on their end. It’s still better than just saying you can’t bring stuff, which would be lousy but certainly within their rights. To me a better analogy would be a company that requires you to wear a uniform, and gives you the option of changing into your uniform when you arrive since that would be more convenient for many people, but they aren’t going to pay you for the time it takes for you to get changed in and out of your uniform, if you do it at work, and not compensate those who put on their uniforms at home.

if you’re getting paid for it, you could presumably make a little extra cash or work a little less if you always brought a whole bunch of stuff that was onerous to search. 

That said, I’m all for workers getting paid fairly. If I were in Apple’s position, I would have tried to get the workers to agree to a slight across-the-board raise that would account for the average time that a worker typically spends getting searched and might not have initially realized they would be responsible for when they signed their contracts, which seems like it would be the fairest for all workers because it doesn’t disproportionately benefit those who bring stuff to work over those who don’t.