Tardiness spike for municipal employees

When a city worker is late for a reason outside their control, they can enter a code explaining their tardiness.

They must also submit proof. Riders can call or go online to request delay verification letters from the MTA.

If city workers get the late arrivals excused, they are paid for the missed time.

Still, the transit delays lead to squandered tax dollars.

The median salary for a city employee in 2015 was $67,372, or about $32.40 an hour for a 40-hour workweek. Based on that hourly rate, the 17,143 hours that were excused so far this year equals about $555,000 in pay.

That means a half-million dollars went to city workers for time they were stuck in transit.

And the problem is certainly far worse.

While the city database captures worker information for major agencies — including the NYPD, FDNY and the Sanitation Department — three large departments are not included.

The database does not provide information on employees at the Department of Education, NYCHA and city Health and Hospitals. These agencies have a combined workforce of more than 200,000 employees.

Many of these employees are likely straphangers who have also ended up late for work because of shoddy subway service.

Kenneth Wynder, president of the Law Enforcement Employee Benevolent Association, said he tells his 800 members to document delays, especially because they start their jobs at times when there might be service disruptions.

DNAinfo New York reported last year that the MTA gave out 129,000 tardy slips in 2015. The agency handed out 31,000 in 2010.

“We do encourage them to call MTA and get that slip,” said Wynder, whose members include Department of Environmental Protection police officers, Department of Transportation inspectors and sanitation enforcement agents.

“Members are utilizing them because they are saving time and saving punishment.”

The MTA and its aging subway system has come under fire from fed-up straphangers and elected officials in the past few years as delays have exploded and ridership has ballooned.

Just in the past year there has been a dramatic drop in reliable service.

In May, 67,452 weekday subway trains were delayed, according to the most recent agency data. In May 2016, the number was 50,436.

The transit system’s failures crescendoed into an all-out crisis this summer when Gov. Cuomo declared a state of emergency and picked Joe Lhota as the agency’s chairman to oversee the Subway Action Plan, an $800 million rapid repair program.

Sifuentes, of the Riders Alliance, said that the IBO data shows what kind of impact subway delays can have on anyone with a job in the city.

Many hourly workers don’t have their subway delays excused and end up with smaller paychecks, he said.

“For them the lost pay could mean choosing between, ‘I might not make rent this month or I won’t buy groceries,’” Sifuentes said.

City Controller Scott Stringer’s office conducted a survey of straphangers in July to gauge the economic impact of subway delays. The findings showed that residents of lower-income city zip codes were more likely to be reprimanded for being late to work.

Subway service problems can also be a double whammy for some families — making parents late for work and preventing them from picking up children on time from day care, the survey showed.

“We may have a new record in excused lateness because of train delays,” Stringer said in a statement to The News about the IBO analysis.

“What there is no excuse for, is the train delays themselves.”