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Mens and womans whirlpool/hottub water temperature complaint:
I've been working at lifetime fitness - moore lake in fridley, minnesota for 2 years now. I love working there but I have a couple complaints i'll share with you. About a year ago I contacted the minnesota state attorney, district attorney, meshbesher & spence attorney, minnesota department of health, hennepin county, consumeraction.gov, minnesota department of labor and industry, anoka county, and the city of fridley because all 3 of my managers were consistantly keeping the womans and mens hot tub water temperature above 105 degrees... Usually mid 105's it would be. They had sheets in their pump room stating the law says no higher than 104 degrees for whirlpool hot tub temperature. The managers each gave me many reasons why it was 'ok' for the water temp. To be over 104 degrees. We had 1 old man fall and hit his head after getting out of the hottub on my shift and while the ambulance was there with him... I tested the water... And it was 105.7 degrees fahrenheit. A few months later an older woman fell after getting out of the womans hottub and felt dizzy and layed on our couch downstairs by the tv area that use to be there. I told my 3 managers many times to fix the water temp. And none of them felt it was a big deal. I felt forced to contact authorities to stand up and protect our members since my managers wouldn't... So I spent a weeks time contacting the companies above and finally the city of fridley went out twice but was not much help either. Turns out it's the same inspector from the city of fridley that inspects their pools when the club opens the outdoor pools. It appears that the hottub water is usually between 104-105 these days... But the law clearly states that the water temp. Must never go 'over' 104 degrees.
Working extremely hard for this company did not give me a raise:
My 2nd complaint is that even though i've worked way above and beyond the call of duty for my job position... I was not given a fair raise. Our department is facility operations, maintenance and we are in charge of cleaning the health club and locker rooms maily. Here is a list of things I did to the lifetime fitness - moore lake club in fridley, minnesota:
1. Cut almost all their trees. Their trees were touching the ground around the pond... Could barely see the pond... All 90% of their trees were in need of trimming. It took me 5 months of running around inside cleaning, taking care of mens locker room... Then running outside cutting tree branches with 'not' a chain-saw... But a loop-saw... Manually cutting each tree branch. I cut at least 100 trees and over a thousand branches I am sure. This is a huge club and property! I cut trees in the parking lot, around their pond,
Along the north side of their building, back of the building, south sides, along the service road and main road areas. Many members said it now looks like a country club here.
2. Painted all their exterior doors which were faded and had red berries splattered on them. And I bought some of the paint with my own money.
3. I'm really good with computer website and graphic design... So I spent many hours at home making things for the club for free on my time. This club has a sprinkler system... I read the sprinkler manual... And would turn on a sprinkler station... Run outside and try to find it... And then write down the location on a topical google earth map I printed out. This took at least 3 days to find all the sprinkler heads and write down their locations. I then made a professional computer graphics printout showing where their sprinkler heads and locations are all color coded nice. I then went to officemax and bought a clear sheet holder to protect the printout and screwed it to the sprinkler machine nice.
4. Did lots and lots of painting. Painted their front entrance... Which has been remodeled since. Painted their elevator room floor, back area floor, water softener tanks, walls in our back area, door way entrances inside the building... Making this old building look nicer to the members. To do this I had to work extra fast in the club so I could quick come paint. I went through 4 uniforms getting paint on them... I couldn't take them off because I had to run and work.
5. With a 4"wide vacume end I vacumed their whole swimming pool/whirlpool pump room area... A huge project... This room has long tunnels that go around their aerobic and lap pool and act as a ventalation system. All the floors I vacumed around their black round filters and pumps, I vacumed up on the ledge around the sides and back of the swimming pools and there were piles of sand in some areas. Imagine vacuming 1500sq with a 4" wide vacume end. I got inbetween all their pvc gray swimming pool water pipes as well. This room was in much need of cleaning... Lots of sand and debres from repairs to the swimming pools.
6. The first week I worked at lifetime I noticed that when they setup the badmitten nets... They were tying 6 knots (2 knots for each of the 3 nets) and when taking 'down' badmitten... Slowing trying to untie the 6 knots. Well... I realized this was a problem immediately... And ended up tying the string around 's' hooks... So now all the employees have to do is hook the 6 's' hooks quickly on the badmitten posts. This saves lots of time.
7. I also noticed when they were setting up badmitten... That when raising/lowering the basketball hoops... They were holding 2 light switches for 2 basketball hoops at a time to make them go up when setting up badmitten/down when taking down badmitten. There are 6 basketball hoops that need to be raised/lowered... And they would hold 2 light switches at a time waiting 2 minutes for the hoops to raise/lower completely before raising the next 2 hoops. This was very time consuming... So I invented something that allowed all 6 basketball hoops to go up at the 'same time' without holding the light switches... Which allows a person to setup badmitten while the basketball hoops are going up/vise-versa. I basically bent an 's' hook in such a way that one side loops around the light switch... And the other side latches on the top/bottom of the light switch box holding the light switch in an up/down position. Every time badmitten is setup/taken down... I saved this club time and money from my ideas.
8. I've spent time at home helping my manager re-design our worksheets, pool sheets. I've made custom labels that show product images that I put on our shelves in our supply room so we are more organized when stacking our shelves. I've printed signs we put on the wall above supplies using ink from my computer... Full page signs with big letters.
9. I bought spray paint and painted all their 5 exterior cement garbage cans that had a brown metal turn lid. They are gone now since the remodel... But I made them look new from their faded condition. Members appreciated it... As did my manager said great job they look nice.
10. On the north-east corner of the building... They have 4 heavy cement bollards that form a square around the water shut offs for the building. One of the cement bollards was laying in the grass (A man from the building next door said it's been laying there for 5+ years). I ran up and bought anchors for cement, a big masonary bit for a drill... And drilled 4 big holes in the cement and re-attached the very heavy bollard. Then I bought paint and painted them yellow, spray painted the water shut offs red, and other water pipes gold. Keeping them their original color but painting them so they look new. I also cut and installed 'new' chain going from bollard to bollard enclosing the water shut offs. Looks really nice now.
11. And regarding all the ‘men’ in our department… only the men have been shoveling show, lifting heavy chlorine buckets and washing machine detergent, moving/lifting heavy posts when setting up badmitten/volleyball. The ‘men’ in our dept. Should be paid a little bit more than the women for this extra work. But that’s not so at this club. I don’t mind doing the extra work… but pay me a little more than the people who don’t do it.
No raise:
After all my hard work above… a month ago my pay went back down to almost where it was when I started 2 years ago as a new lifetime employee! I did get a $0.24 cent raise about a year ago... Hardly a raise for all the hard work i've done for this club and it's members. I asked the general manger for a raise a week ago, and he said no. The general manager is nice... But I don't agree that I don't deserve more money per hour than a new employee. Not to mention i've learned a lot working at the club for 2 years. I also have hurt feelings some because I don't feel much appreciated there after all i've done.
Employee complaints:
A. I should also mention that they recently made one of the slowest workers in my department a 'manager' and are paying him much more money than me. I feel like i'm taking 'crazy pills'... That makes no sense. This guy they made manager digs through the trash and dumpster outside looking for plastic to recycle... That is a big waste of the companies time and money. The club has 2 trash cans for people... 1 for trash and 1 for plastic. He'll dig through the trash for plastic... And literally will go through the garbage in the outside dumpster for cans and plastic. The new assistant manager is upset because this worker is slow... As am i… it’s because he’s busy finding plastic. When I brand new working at this club… this employee took advantage of me… my job was what they call a ‘roamer’… meaning roaming the club cleaning. This employee was assigned ‘mens locker room’ and responsible for cleaning it. Well… one day he asked me if I saw the mens locker room… i’m thinking to myself… why? I’m roamer. I said no… but went to look… and it was a complete mess. He expected ‘me’ to clean it… which I did… and while ‘i’ was cleaning it he went out and sat and watched tv. He did this with another ‘new’ employee as well. I also had an african american boy come up to me and tell me that this employee told him, “why don’t you go back to your own country.” this employee also swore out loud regarding members making a mess, make a terrible comment as to what he’d want to do to the person who broke into the mens lockers… they caught a person who was breaking into lockers. And I will add that this person got mad at me one day because I through out an empty mcdonalds cup that was sitting on the lunch room table that I am suppose to keep clean… so one day he takes my big coffee thermos and shirt and throws them in the garbage can sitting next to the table they were on. Anyways… not the best employee… and he’s getting paid more than me. Lifetime rewards this man by making him manager and paying him more than me.
B. One day I was mod (Manager on duty) and was verbally threatened by a new employee. The assistant manager witnessed the threats, an incident report was made with the club, and with the police. This person is now managing in the club as well. I emailed the head office asking if they do criminal background checks… I got no response.
Harrassment:
Because the company does not have enough employees working in the operations department I am consistantly getting harrassed by fellow employees and managers. I love the long list of things lifetime fitness wants our department to keep clean/do... It's great. But the problem is we don't have enough employees to get the work done 'consistantly'. I am a very fast and efficient worker... And no matter how fast I run and clean... I can't keep up. None of us can. We all work hard. And what ends up happening is... The night crew will complain that the day crew isn't working hard... And the day crew will complain about the night crew. Many times i've had employees and managers get mad at me for not doing something else! I have tried to explain to everyone that when you don't have enough employees to do everything nice... That means that something is always going to sacrifice. The reason this turns into a complaint is because I work very hard to try and keep my managers happy...in hopes to someday get paid more... And after a hard days work... The managers will sometimes come to me and be mad and ask me why I didn't do something else better. They have no idea how hard I worked doing what I did do. So this is starting to wear on me... And it's feeling like harrassment as well. If I work hard constantly... I should not be yelled at about something I did not do. Even the managers feel the stress of the situation of not being able to get things the way the club says they want.
I will say again... I love working at the club... Great people... Fun working environment it can be... But I am very unhappy with some of the things I see going on at this club. I want ‘this’ lifetime club to make sense… I like things in general to make sense. It makes sense to pay people who work very hard better than people who don’t work quite as hard/efficient. I risked my job for the safety of the lifetime fitness members when I reported the club for keeping the whirlpool/hot-tub water temperature over 105 degrees consistently. I’d think lifetime would want to keep good employees like me around… putting my paycheck back to start pay after being with the company 2 years isn’t very nice of the company. There’s nothing I can do about it… except voice my words about this… that is why I typed this.
James limborg
[protected]@jameslimborg.com
http://www.musicdownloadinstrumentalsongs.com/
The complaint has been investigated and resolved to the customer’s satisfaction.
First of all – I respect what you’ve got to say and I will respond to your legitimate concerns latter, but PLEASE get over all the minor “chicken ###” complaints you go into detail about – we’ve all got them, from Doctors to Lawyers to ambulance drivers. I am confused as to what you are trying to accomplish with this web log since you say you love working there? It sounds like you have been exploited, marginalized and unappreciated, to say the least.
Your description of the work environment makes it clear that it is very hostile and exploitative towards you. My suggestion is to find a new job – stop being a victim. I know this may be impossible or difficult in the current job environment but with the description of your good work you may be able to find a much more rewarding opportunity somewhere else. Try another Health club, YMCA, Hotel, Water-park or public pool where your efforts might be better appreciated.
I want to assure you that I am very familiar with the challenges you describe in pool operations and I am very experienced in the matter. However, I am skeptical that if the water temperature of the spas were above the legal limit that it was of “no concern" to the club management or the Health Department. State of Minnesota Health Department requirements clearly state that, “The maximum allowed temperature in a pool is 104-degrees (F)." There is no exception to this even if it is 104.1 - this is not typically dismissed as a minor issue and usually monitored closely during inspections. Pools routinely set their temperatures a good few degrees below this limit to avoid violations and legal/liability consequences.
I would assume that when they inspected the spas after your complaint, the temperature was in compliance or the inspector was either brand-new or did not measure it accurately (very unlikely) - otherwise they would have issued a violation. In any case the Certified Pool Operator should have reviewed this issue thoroughly with the inspector and reviewed the pool logs - what was their role in all this?
There should be a record - any inspection results in a paper record. In any case, I have never witnessed a Public Health Department inspector overlook this type of issue - ever. However, if you are truly concerned over the safety of the Spas, then an another potential problem you should check into is the accuracy of the SPA timers - 15 minutes is the maximum for shut-off but in my experience this is rarely accurate and is also a serious violation. It is also of immediate health concern, especially if the Spa temperature is over the allowable limits.
If you are serious about following through with your complaint, then I would recommend you condense your weblog into a compact, well written letter to the Corporate HR department - not your managers. I have seen many, many stupid decisions made in terms of safety, sanitation, and maintenance which ultimately have cost a lot of money ignored by on-site management. For further information or to file a an additional complaint with the Minnesota Health Department, I suggest you contact directly, Steve Klemm, swimming pool program, Minnesota Department of Health (steve.klemm@health.state.mn.us)
In regard to your company, respond directly to the Human Resources Department informing them of a potential harmful liability situation at the club in which you have tried to address repeatedly with management without adequate response:
1. You made a valid complaint to the Health department regarding Public Safety on the allowable temperature of the Spas, after informing management and receiving no action. The fact is that if the temperature was above 104 F and something did happen to a member, then your company could be sued - most likely successfully. In any case where a temperature above 104F and was measured during a routine inspection, it would most likely result in the SPA's being shut down by local Health Department until corrected. Provide current data to Spa temperatures to support this and if possible copy of Pool log.
2. Provide EXACT dates, time and description of the incidents involving the health club members you described requiring medical assistance. If possible provide the Spa temperature and response by management, yourself and authorities. Furthermore, any additional incidents since this time.
3. Also (very important) Inform HR department of your rights under Minnesota Whistle blower statue, 181.931, et seq. In which, “. . . an employer cannot discipline, threaten, discriminate or otherwise penalize an employee it they report a violation of federal state law or rule.” State your right to apply this law to your situation in terms of failure to receive a pay raise, equal consideration for promotion etc. You will need to provide documentation to support circumstances, dates, times; actions etc. or else don't bother. The operative word is "report" not prove - you were doing what you thought was best by reporting a violation – the burden of proof relies on the employer to account for any detrimental action toward you as a consequence of your reporting any perceived violations on your part.
4. If you can determine who the insurance company is for general liability on Life Time Fitness, then I would suggest a copy of all this be sent to them – but only if you have valid evidence. They will be most interested and in resolving the potential liability quickly.
I wish you the best of luck and hope you make the right decisions for yourself and the public. Thanks for making these issues known.
Management is not good at lifetime, I agree, they seem to have a secrete click.
Just because a company has rules to follow, doesn't mean that they do. Records kept on a paper trail are just that, written in, that doesn't mean that the test were performed. Records can be written in without performing an actual test, as done regularly at LifeTime Fitness wirlpools.
Management is exceptionally poor: it appears as though they have no qualms about barely maintaining health and safety standards; at times, clear violations are ignored. They seem to not appreciate the gravity of the situation(s); it's "just a fine" if they get caught - no sense of the possible hazard(s) to the members.
The minimal staff coverage for Operations adds to these hazards; both to the members and the employees. Areas are either ignored or barely cleaned due to limited staffing; there's no one accountable to maintain proper standards; members aren't reminded of proper hygiene standards . Employee safety is often ignored in an effort to keep a tight budget. Often, jobs are accomplished by unsafe means by too few employees.
Managerial "back up" is virtually unheard of. Acknowledging any issue of health or safety is usually ignored - it's almost impossible to get any manager to stand up with an employee, to try and help resolve the issue.
As for the work: the more you do, the more they expect - and the less respect and acknowledgment you'll receive. If you put in extra effort, you're perceived as a sap - someone they'll dump on the next time. I've lost track of the money I've spent for LifeTime ... just not worth it - unless you focus on the fact that you're doing it for the members.
The members are worth it ... but the managers make it difficult.