Qwest To Workers: Pee In A Urinal Bag

[Ichingcarpenter]

Union representatives are pissed that Qwest ordered field workers to pee in urinal bags so they wouldn't waste time trying to find public bathrooms. The disposable urinal bags were distributed by a manager to 25 male field techs in Colorado.

A company spokeswoman told the Rocky Mountain News there's no policy that requires field technicians to use urinal bags while they're out on a job.

The Communications Workers of America local hasn't filed a grievance.

One local administrative director said that while the union deals with a "a lot of silliness in corporate America," this one takes the urinal cake.




http://consumerist.com/371011/qwest-to-workers-pee-in-a-urinal-bag
http://www.wdsu.com/money/15664343/detail.html?rss=no&psp=money#

[babylonsister]

1. Time is money, nevermind treating employees with respect.

This should be fought.

[panader0]

2. "Cake"? I thought it was a mint.

These bags are also called "stadium buddies", invented so you can swill beer at a game and not have to wait in those long lines at the restroom.

[notadmblnd]

3. Couldn't using a urinal bag in public or even in the privacy of your own vehicle

get one on a sexual predator list? Getting caught pissing in public is against the law last time I checked.

[nashville_brook]

8. my thought exactly. does Qwest thinks it's good to have undressed employees in public in co trucks

so now, everytime i see a Qwest truck i'm going to imagine someone inside whipping it out to relieve themselves wishing they worked for a civilized company in a civilized country.

if i were a parent, i sure wouldn't want to see a Qwest truck in my neighborhood -- at the very least, this policy could serve to cover-up offending behavior. "officer, i was just using my company-issued urine bag. no, i didn't even notice this is a playground..."

this is wrong in so many ways...

[HockeyMom]

4. Like WalMart telling cashiers

to wear Depends.

[proud2BlibKansan]

5. And what about the women?

Or do they not hire women?

[ikojo]

6. A book has been written about bathroom breaks on

company time....It was published in 1998 (hmm...during the Hillary and Bill administration) but I'm sure it's as prescient now as then. I've worked places where the customer service supervisor would come to the bathroom looking for employees who were supposed to be on the phone but were instead using the rest room.

http://www.amazon.com/Void-Where-Prohibited-Urinate-Company/dp/0801433908/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1206290804&sr=8-2

Void Where Prohibited

Book Description
"I read this informative book with disbelief and mounting rage. Being denied the biologic right to urinate not only injures the kidneys but is probably a potent risk factor for heart problems. It has been amply demonstrated that work pressure, no-exit situations, and psychologic stressors predispose to progressions of coronary vascular disease. I can think of few stresses more intolerable than the pressures of a full bladder. Not even criminals in solitary confinement confront such torment. This is a vitally important book. It merits the widest dissemination. Without public pressure, such demeaning of human beings will not be halted."--Bernard Lown, M.D., Harvard School of Public Health

Although federal and state regulations require employers to provide toilets, government agencies, incredibly, do not require employers to permit workers to use them. Marc Linder, a labor lawyer and political economist, and Ingrid Nygaard, a physician specializing in urogynecology, place this regulatory breakdown in the wider context of the history of labor-management struggles over rest periods. They emphasize the physiological consequences that workers suffer when they are not allowed to interrupt work to rest or urinate.

[blondie58]

7. I am a postal employee and I sure hope that management doesn't hear about this

although I have heard of fellow carriers using a bottle in their trucks for the same purpose. It wouldn't be too bad for a guy, but for us women, it would never work. I always thought that it was kinda strange, but if that is what they want to do....

For some of my routes, it is a major deviation to find a restroom.

[Rage for Order]

9. They couldn't find a tree or bush to pee behind? n/t

[BlooInBloo]

10. Classy.

[Lars39]

11. I know what I'd do with my full bag.

[timtom]

12. Ever see Chaplin's "Modern Times"?

Where the factory boss is being pitched a lunch-feeding machine for workers so they can continue to eat while working?

Quite a funny scene as they try it out on Charlie Chaplin.