If I remember correctly we got the weekends we where on call payed like normal work days, adding 2 days a month per dev (4 or 5 of us doing the work and rotated through) if something happened or not. After work incidences during the week where not compensated.
Things didn’t usually escalate, the type of people that called during that time would call during that time anyway. One Project manager abused the system to force us to work on the weekend to get her project done quicker.
I honestly don’t think I would do on call again. It bit into my private time and not even for the type of things I should have been on call for. Some project managers looked at it as “if we pay him anyway, might as well make him work” that in combination with “we pay you only two days more because you are probably not going to work on those days anyway” was a bad deal.
To do something like on call again I would want:
1) Payment for the time if they use it or not (because I can’t plan that time freely)
2) Double payment for the time they do use (this is mainly to prevent them from abusing the system)
3) Extra days off (to compensate for the time I can’t fully relax)
4) Make sure they have a pool of people on call so that I can switch for personal emergencies (death in the family and so on)
