aprn employment contract critique
scope of services to be performed and population (pediatrics, geriatrics, family, etc.)
Compensation
Travel compensation
Gas/mileage
Cancellations
On call time
Bonuses
Duration of employment
How the agreement can be altered or updated
Responsibility for maintaining and paying for credentials
Benefits
Time off and expenses for continuing education
Vacation time
Paid conferences or CME
Restriction on competition
Reasons for termination
Extent of support service to be offered to the NP
Expectations regarding the number of patients seen per day
Expectations regarding non-clinical work to be done by NP
Release to the NP of the NPs quality performance as measured by health plan auditors
This should be an APA formatted paper, and the above items should be listed as section headings where the student or group will give a brief critique under each section of the contract, using the weekly readings as guidance for the critique. As with any scholarly paper, there should be an introduction and conclusion. There should be evidence of analysis (not simply reporting the facts about the contract) by means of comparing some items (i.e. salary) to national or regional norms. Some of the sections may be combined. If the contract is missing a section, note this in the critique. Include the sample contract in the Appendix, and please remove all identifiers if using a real contract from a colleague or preceptor.
please include conclusion
additional materials included are articles that can be referenced
ANSWER
Employment Contract Critique
Introduction
Employer contract is an agreement between the employee and employer which sets out the employer responsibilities duties and rights. Once the employer has given the employee the job and the two sign the contract they are bound to its terms. The employment contract offers protection and security for both the employee and the employee (Lechniak, 2021). Therefore, this paper is a critique for an advanced nurse practitioner contract for Sound Family Medicine. The employment contract serves as an acceptance for employment and shows an understanding between the employee and Sound Family Medicine. It’s recommended that one has an employment contract after getting employed. The employment contract offers more details about the position, duties, benefits compensations and other details regarding employment arrangement.
Scope of Service
The scope of service in the contract helps the employee to define the services that are expected and offers clear direction before any duties and responsibilities begin. The scope of service is expected to define the tasks or services and the conditions for payment (Elias, 2018). Kassandra’s contract begins with the date of hire, the employer, the description of relationship between the parties and the performance standards. The contract details of her duty have been included to ensure that they perform within their scope of practice. The nurse practitioner is expected to conduct themselves in a professional way as set out in the employer’s manual. However in the contract there lacks the type of population that the advanced nurse practitioner will be handling. The responsibilities and duties as well as the type of population to be served should be outlined in the job description to ensure that the nurse practitioner aligns with the scope of practice.
Compensation
Compensation is a vital component of the employee contract. Compensation is the monetary imbursement given to a person in exchange for the services they offer (Joshi, 2016). It includes the wages, incentives and commission or perks that come along with the position of the employee. An advanced nurse practitioner should receive an annual average salary of $100,134 without inclusion of bonuses or overtime. However, the salary can vary depending on the years of experience. The base compensation that Kassandra will reactive at Sound Family medicine will be $126,750 annually which is payable in 26 bi-weekly payments as they are earned. The employee will also be eligible for extra coverage compensation for extra hours beyond the normal schedule and the regular rotation. Sound Family Medicine also has a production based compensation which will be based on individual work RVU above threshold. However, the compensation lacks additional benefits such as retirement plans, health insurance and performance bonuses. Proper compensation of employees shows the workers that you value their work as human beings. When people feel valued, they are committed to work more. One of the positive aspects of the compensation in the employment contract is that the nurse practitioners will be paid biweekly.
Travel Compensation
The travel compensation will include all travel and incident related expenses while rendering services on behalf of the company. Advanced nurse practitioner travelling in homes to take care of the families need meal stipends and housing. The travel allowance is considered an overtime payment that the Advanced Nurse Practitioner has to fill to ensure that they are captured to prevent issues on disbursements. Sound Family Medicine has failed specifically include the travel compensation terms but has included the CME allowance. The CME allowance will include all the business related expenses and costs that will be incurred by the Advanced Nurse practitioners in association with attending in person, online or remote meetings seminars post graduate courses and meetings to improve and maintain the ARNP’s professional knowledge and skills by the company. However, they have not included the travel expenses in case of house call since they also play a major role in treating and diagnosing diseases. There is need to ensure that the ARNP’s receive travel allowances when visiting nursing homes, family home, hospice house or assisted living centers.
Gas/Mileage
In the employment contract, the element of mileage reimbursement is linked to travel compensation but specifically focuses on use of personal automobiles. For instance, when the Advanced Nurse Practitioners use their automobiles while on duty, the employer is expected to compensate through mileage or gas reimbursement. Therefore, the employer will reimburse in accordance to the written mileage reimbursement policy. The policy may include reimbursement of $3.1 cents per mile. However the employment contract lacks the mileage reimbursement despite the fact the Advanced Nurse Practitioner may be forced to use their personal automobiles when need arises.
Cancellations
Considerably, the employer or the employee may cancel the contract for an extremely substantial reason. During cancellation, there is no grace or notice period; the employment connection ends immediately. The employment contract can be cancelled regardless of the period. The contract has a termination of non-performance which allows the contract to terminate immediately if the Advanced Nurse practitioners fails to abide by the performance expectation of the company per the corrective action processes. This include coaching, verbal warning, a written warning and final written warning before the termination along with the coaching to help in the achievement of the performance expectations.
On Call time
On call time is considered as the time an employee spends while out of work. On call means being ready stand by and available to work if called upon. It means that even though they are not engaged at work related activities at the moment, they are expected to respond accordingly. They will be on call for a certain period of time and depending on the job, it may not be at the work site. This may include even responding to phone calls that are work related. Some of the terms and conditions of on call time is having genuine reasons based on reasonable grounds on why an employee should be available. The company should set out how employees will be compensated such as the allowance they will receive for being on call and the hourly rates for the call outs. Sound Family Medicine has not set out on call time allowance in the employment contract which may lead to inconveniences in case of on call duties for the ARNP.
Bonuses
Bonus is the amount of compensation that is received by employees after an agreement with the employer to pay a certain sum of money usually calculated by the revenue generated (Nosenzo, 2016). Bonuses are aimed at promoting employee performance and increasing their morale. Sound Family Medicine Employment contract does not include bonuses. However, the employment contract needs to offer a clear view of the amount of money or bonuses that ARNPs will receive with regards to certain performance.
Duration of Employment
Duration of employment is considered as the period of time that the employee will work with the company. The duration of employment should state after how long the employment contract expires and how the contract is renewed (Shabannia and Hassan, 2019). However, Kassandora scheduled to work 33.5 patient hours each week and the rest 6.5 hours are scheduled for charting and meeting attendance. Any extra hours past the state hours will be considered as extra working hours that need to be compensated.
How the agreement can be altered or updated
There is no section of the contract that states how the agreement can be altered or updated. This is important to add in the contract since it states instances when the agreement can be altered. For instance, the advanced nurse practitioner can alter the agreement if they are unwell and cannot attend to patients. They can be given the maximum number of sick leave days.
Responsibility of maintaining and paying for credentials
Credentialing ensures that the advanced nurse practitioner complies with regulations in terms of employee certification, licensing and renewal dates. The ARPNs are required to renew their license to avoid being terminated from work. The company is required to obtain and renew any professional credentialing that is vital for the ARNP during the employment term. In the employment contract, Sound Family Medicine states that they shall pay all the license and national certification necessary for the ARNP to practice medicine within Washington and as applicable nationally and pay license fees and dues for the Pierce County Medical Society.
Benefits and Vacation Time
The employee contract has benefits such as insurance and vacation. The employee will be eligible for the company’s standard benefit package which include medical, vision, dental coverage, life and disability insurance from the hire date and also participation in the company’s 401 (K) retirement plan. The company agrees to purchase and maintain professional liability insurance covering the ARNP malpractice claims made during the agreement term in amounts reasonably determined by the company. The employee will be eligible for Paid Time Off in accordance to the Sound Family Medicine’s policy. The employee will be awarded 160 hours annually for PTO after 90 days of continued employment with SFM.
Time off and expenses for continuing education
The Advanced Nurse Practitioner is expected to have time off depending on their emergencies and shifts at Sound Family Medicine. According to the employment contract, they will be awarded 160 hours annually for Paid Time Off. The expenses of continuing education will be covered by the company which will pay up to $1,500 for continued education as part of the CME allowance.
Restriction on Competition
The employee contract has a non-compete clause which restricts the Advanced Nurse Practitioner from practicing jointly employment within a specified distance for a specified duration of time. During the term of agreement, the ARNP shall not indirectly or directly render services of any professional nature to any other firm or person for compensation whether individual or as a partner, shareholder, director or employee of an entity in any other capacity that competes or interferes with Sound Family Medicine operations and which is within 10 mile radius of ARNP’s primary location.
Reason for Termination
The employment contract allows the ARNP to terminate the contract for their personal reasons. Relatively, the agreement shall terminate if the ARNP does not abide by the performance expectations of the Corporation per the corrective action processes.
Extent of support services to be offered to the NP
Support services includes supervision and provision of job training to assist the ARNP who requires intensive ongoing support. The employment contract has support services since the ARNP is required attend professional seminars, conventions and professional meetings that are reasonable desirable and necessary to maintain their licensure and professional skill.
Expectations regarding non clinical work to be done by NP
Sound Family Medicine requires that the new hired ARNP employee to be free from the use of controlled substances and illegal drugs that may interfere with job performance. The ARNP is required to perform all medical services offered by the agreement in an ethical, competent and efficient manner and in accordance to the accepted standards and methods of ARNP professional association.
References
Elias, P. (2018). Changes and Challenges to the Contract of Employment. Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, 38(4), 869-887.
Joshi, P. (2016). Relational rewards: Creating a fulfilling workplace environment. International Journal of Engineering and Management Research (IJEMR), 6(4), 1-5.
Lechniak, I. (2021). Contract of employment and the employment contract (Doctoral dissertation, Zakład Prawa Administracyjnego i Nauki o Politykach Publicznych).
Nosenzo, D. (2016). Employee incentives: Bonuses or penalties?. IZA World of Labor.
Shabannia Mansour, M., & Hassan, K. H. (2019). Job security and temporary employment contracts: a theoretical analysis. Job Security and Temporary Employment Contracts, 1-26.
