What should I request for part time compensation?

[curlerplyr]

I recently interviewed with and was offered a part-time position with a private practice foot & ankle surgery group in Virginia. The job would be clinic only and no call. The exact schedule is to be determined at this point but I suspect somewhere close to 20 hours a week based on my availability likely to include some Saturdays. I have about 5 years of experience in general orthopedics, urgent care/occ health, and med/surg. This practice has not ever had a PA before but is very open to the idea and big on work/life balance. They essentially told me to take some time to write up my ideal hourly rate and benefits package and what I would want for a schedule. I haven't had much experience with part time compensation and benefits as I have only ever worked full time. What should I ask for? Do I need to adjust the benefits based on part time work? I want to make sure I set the bar high for any future PAs they work with but be reasonable at the same time. Here's what I'm thinking based on the 2015 AAPA regional and national salary reports (staying in the 50th-75th percentiles) and previous experience:

$55/hr
$2500 CME stipend, 40 hours CME PTO per calendar year
Malpractice covered: occurrence or claims made with tail
PTO (including vacation and sick time) 160 hours per calendar year (equivalent to 4 weeks)

Maternity leave paid 12 weeks (though not sure how to calculate this for part time work. Based on 20 hour week? 40 hour week?)

Bereavement paid 3 days

NCCPA fees, State licensing , and DEA registration

AAPA membership + 1 specialty membership

Flexible spending account for healthcare (up to $2550) and daycare (up to $5k)

Employer paid long term disability: 60% of income

Employer paid life insurance: $50,000

Retirement: 3% of salary contributed to retirement by the employer regardless of employee contribution

Crossfit gym membership (one of the partner docs owns a gym near me)
(Don't need health insurance, got it through husband)

 

Or should I just ask for a higher hourly rate with malpractice and tail and forgo the rest of the benefits? Did I miss anything important I should ask for?

 

Thanks!

[ventana]

$55/hr - - -  to low - ask for $85/hour

$2500 CME stipend, 40 hours CME PTO per calendar year

Malpractice covered: occurrence or claims made with tail

PTO (including vacation and sick time) 160 hours per calendar year (equivalent to 4 weeks) - this is low - typically if PTO lumped together (vacation, sick, personal, holidays) then would be closer to (4,1,1,2) 8 weeks - employers hate this, but in reality the 2 weeks of holidays is already there

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Crossfit gym membership (one of the partner docs owns a gym near me)

(Don't need health insurance, got it through husband) - should have them commit to paying 100% of family if you can get it. Then decline and ask for something like 50% of the insurance in cash....

 

 

 

 

 

 

[electric130]

I work right at around 20 hours for a specialty practice, 75 per hour and bonus that bumps that to 85 per hour if you figured it per hour (5% of collections).  I have 4 weeks vacation, CME and licenses covered.  I do not need health insurance which is part of why my rate is a bit higher. 

 

With your experience I would ask for 75 per hour and ask if you can see your collections data in a year and ask how they bill.

 

Even at part time you should be profitable to the practice, I see 60-70 patients per week (20 hour week) and typically collect twice or more of my salary.  Being able to see that on paper helps with your negotiations the longer you are at a practice.

 

With it being a private practice you have the advantage of being the only PA and will probably have more ability to negotiate.  I recently was offered a position that would only offer 60 per hour, there were many other PAs at that rate, so there was just no budging even though they knew that I could be offered a higher rate and be profitable and a good addition to the practice. 

I definitely would not start at 55/hour.  Ask for 75 and then if they negotiate down, even getting to 65/hour is ok.  55 per hour with 5 years experience at a private specialty practice is too low. 

[PAtoB]

taking part-time saturday work only, no benefits, $100 an hour. fwiw.

[tunafish]

taking part-time saturday work only, no benefits, $100 an hour. fwiw.

 

What specialty and location if you care to disclose?

[curlerplyr]

Wow. Ok. I actually was initially going to ask much higher than $55/hr but I looked at the AAPA salary report and got really discouraged. It was looking like even $55/hr was a stretch, which I know it isn't, especially for a specialty ortho position. Do I also ask for all the other fluff above or just keep it simple with the basic pay, CME, licenses, pto?

[electric130]

I personally think that if you just ask for basics, cme, vacation, 401k, licenses, and if you don't need health insurance you can use that argument to ask for a higher hourly rate.  That is how I negotiated and I feel like it did help my negotiations.

 

I have my own disability policy and life insurance, 

I really think the AAPA data for hourly rate is low.  When I looked through that I was very surprised, but you have to keep in mind that is average and across family medicine and specialties.  I do think that for ortho you can definately get a higher rate.  

[curlerplyr]

Just wanted to give a quick update. I requested $75/hr + 10% collections quarterly bonus, 200 hrs PTO yearly, $2500 CME + 40 hrs CME, 401k, and licenses paid for. After a few days I received an email saying they decided to look for a physician to fill their needs instead. No attempt to negotiate at all. Don't know if it was because of the high salary request or another reason, but I did find it kind of strange they didn't even attempt to bring me down. I, of course, offered to discuss it further if they changed their minds or if they wanted to discuss the benefits of hiring a PA vs another physician. I figured I might as well shoot high as I had nothing to lose (I'm a stay-at-home mom currently and we don't need me to go back for financial reasons, just sanity reasons). Ultimately, they will pay more for a physician so it's their loss but I'm still a little surprised with the quick no with them being so eager to see what I wanted. Something tells me they heard somewhere that they could get a PA for real cheap to make them lots of money. Exactly why we have to all collectively raise the standards. Thanks for the input everyone!

[loliz]

As a 20 hour/week employee (based on your first post), this request includes 10 weeks PTO and 2 weeks CME time. Of course, that would be nice, but realistically, it seems like a lot for a brand new employee. 

I don't really think it was fair of them to expect you to make the first move on coming up with an offer, they should have started so that you could know where they were coming from and come up with a counter offer. Otherwise, it feels like they are just feeling out the market without a lot of serious thought. 

Better luck next time!!

[curlerplyr]

Yeah, I definitely knew I was reaching and didn't expect to get what I was asking but figured I'd at least try and have them talk me down. Like I said, I had nothing to lose. Now that you spell it out, I guess it does come across as 10 weeks PTO/2 weeks CME for a 20 hr/wk employee. I was thinking 5 weeks PTO (including sick time)/1 week CME as if each week was 40 hours. I see how I calculated that wrong. Oh well, water under the bridge at this point. Live and learn.  

 

I agree it was a bit strange to have a blank slate with nothing to gauge where they were willing to start, hence the reason I posted here. I definitely got the impression that they were just feeling out the market and weren't necessarily going to move forward with an actual offer. I hope I at least made them realize that PAs aren't as cheap as some people think!