General policy: The nature of field ministry often demands that work be performed at various times throughout the week, including evenings, weekends, and sometimes holidays. Measuring a work week is not as simple as working from eight to five, Monday through Friday. Reliant recognizes that field employees ministry staff will tend to have variable schedules and spread their work out during the course of a week. In light of this, field employees should concentrate on accomplishing job objectives and responsibilities in a given week and not merely on counting the number of hours worked.

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Employees are responsible to report how their time is spent in accomplishing job responsibilities. Reporting time enables a supervisor to monitor the performance of an employee and provides accountability for the employee. An employee must submit a time card every week to their supervisor for the previous week's work. (Go to the Reliant website to obtain the time card.) Those employees assigned to full-time support raising duties should refer to the MTD section of this handbook for information on time reporting.The employee and supervisor should agree upon the categories to be used on the time card based upon the employee's job duties. This should be done at the beginning of a specific time period, like a school term or calendar year, and used consistently during that time period. Of course, as job duties change, the time card categories may change also to accurately reflect the job duties being performed. For example, a college ministry employee who leads a small group and leads worship may have such categories on their time card as MTD, evangelism, small group, discipleship, music, and administration. The important thing is that the time card categories accurately reflect an employee's agreed upon job duties.

2.3.b Defining the Work Week

The established work week for Reliant begins at 12:00 a.m. on Monday and ends at 11:59 p.m. on Sunday. Exempt employees are to measure their work in half day increments rather than hours. Since field ministry work often does not have clearly defined ending points, employees may sometimes work more than the traditional 40 hours a week to accomplish their ministry responsibilities.

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Flextime

Flextime is where an employee has flexible work hours instead of set hours. Field employees Employees have flexible work hours within the work week, to the extent approved by their supervisor, in order to accommodate the variable demands of ministry. Some Reliant employees, especially Administrative employees, may or may not have flexible work hours, depending on the work parameters determined by their supervisor.

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Absenteeism

Employees must request time off in advance for any paid time off and Paid Time Off (PTO) & Holidays and all leaves of absence. In the case of absence due to illness or accident, the employee must notify their supervisor as soon as possible. All unexcused absences are considered incidents of absenteeism. Supervisors must notify Missionary Resources when should notify their Program Team  when an employee incurs three (3) or more unexcused absences within a six (6) month period. Reliant will determine, with the help of the supervisor, the reasons behind the unexcused absences and determine the appropriate action to be taken. Employees may be subject to discipline or termination for absenteeism.

2.3.e Office or Ministry Closures

On occasion, due to unforeseen circumstances, a decision may be required as to the status of the Reliant office or a ministry location being opened or closed. These may include storms or natural disasters, power outages, national emergencies, etc. This decision will be made by the Executive Director for the Reliant office or the senior leader/pastor of a ministry location. For the Reliant office, if the Executive Director is not available, the decision will be made by the Finance Director. If the neither the Executive Director or the Finance Director is available, a management decision by the remaining managers on site will make the final decision. For a ministry location, the lead or executive pastor will make the decision for the ministry location.

The following guidelines for time off and compensation will be applied:

If the decision is made to close the office for business, all employees will receive their normal compensation and will not be required to use their Paid Time Off (PTO). The same is true for a decision to close “ministry” for a certain ministry location by it being necessary for field staff to remain home or evacuate.

If the decision is made to keep the office open, employees and managers may use their discretion regarding time off to take care of family and personal matters, however, compensation will be based on utilization of the employee’s PTO. The same will be true for field staff.

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Defining the Work Week

The established work week for Reliant begins at 12:00 a.m. on Monday and ends at 11:59 p.m. on Sunday. Since field ministry work often does not have clearly defined ending points, employees may sometimes work more than the traditional 40 hours a week to accomplish their ministry responsibilities.

Time Cards