Angry my manager has taken away WFH perk?

This all sounds like a very woolly arrangement. You need to make this formal. Check the terms of your contract carefully, consult your union if you have one, consider taking advice from ACAS and Pregnant Then Screwed.

You don't have the automatic right to work flexibly but you do have the statutory right to put in a flexible working request (up to a max of two requests within a 12 month period), which your employer is required to consider and only reject on the grounds of business reasons.

Honestly, the people who shout "maternity discrimination" every time a pregnant woman or a woman on mat leave doesn't get special/more favourable treatment are really doing women no favours.

Maternity discrimination is a real thing. Some women are genuinely treated unfairly because of their pregnancies. Please let us not minimise what these women go through by pretending it is maternity discrimination whenever a pregnant woman isn't allowed to call all of the shots.

Sadly as it was a perk and not in your contract there is little you can do.

You can email him thst youre disappointed in him but he can choose to just ignore it and it may make things harder when you go back.

Im not an expert but since it was a perk agreed between you, you have little in the way of taking it further.

It was given at discretion and can be taken away whenever

The perk would have still been there if you hadn’t asked to reduce your hours, whether during maternity or not.
YABU.

Appeal what? They haven’t taken away WFH.

The OP requested to reduce her hours Tuesday to Thursday. They can’t give her the time off every morning so they have offered her the option to reduce hours by removing Friday. She doesn’t need to go into the office, they haven’t removed wfh. They’ve offered to reduce her hours, as she requested, during a day that works with the business needs.

She can say no and carry on doing what she does now, and continue wfh on Friday.

The OP has given this a very misleading title and everyone is misunderstanding. They have not removed wfh. They have offered her the reduced hours she asked for and she can refuse and carry on her usual working pattern if she wants.

As far as I can see working from home hasn't been stopped. The reduction in hours has been applied on the working from home day. She's not being asked to come into the office more often.

Just on the working from home day, she'll no longer be working. What exactly has she been deprived of.

But it's OP who is asking to change her working pattern. Had she not requested to work less hours they wouldn'tt have made any changes. Also, it is a perk. It's not in her contract and nobody else in the business is allowed to wfh and her manager has refused any requests to do so.

But how can she argue that pregnancy (not mat leave!) shouldn't be the time to change established working patterns when she herself is the one who initiated the change? The employer hasn't unilaterally decided to cut her wfh day just because she is pregnant. They have proposed an alternative arrangement to accommodate the reduction in hours that she requested.

If it’s been 6 years you may have grounds for appeal to HR because it has been accepted practice. But map is doing heavy lifting here

She wants to reduce her hours. They aren’t taking away wfh; she is not being forced into the office on a Friday.

She requested fewer hours, they can’t accommodate that every morning Tuesday to Thursday like she asked so they’ve offered to reduce her hours by taking the Friday away.

She can say no and carry on with her work pattern. They’re just offering the reduced hours in a way that works for the business as they can’t give her the time off every morning like she wants, but they can give her Friday off.

Sure, but that’s not the OP’s fault and surely levelling up rather than levelling down is the better response.

I mean - yes, I’d be upset if someone else had something I didn’t. But I would want to get that thing - it would be beyond petty to want the other person to lose that thing. Wouldn’t change the situation for me!

Sounds like the manager has gone about this quite badly.

OP I would write to him, copy in HR, and say you wish to retain your one day per week work from home that you currently enjoy, explain the reasons. Ask for consideration as maternity leave shouldn’t be the time to take away established working patterns and arrangements. I wish people wouldn’t call it a perk.

How did he 'corner' you? Have your hours changed?

What are your actual hours because I can't understand how dropping the Friday morning meant you also add an hour on each of the 3 other days (like compressing hours) and still end up with fewer hours.

I don’t really understand what you mean by he has “cornered” you into only doing Tuesday to Thursday. Surely your hours remain the same without your agreement to change, so Friday morning is part of your working hours, albeit with potentially some discussion about whether they are worked on-site or at home.

Sadly OP, lots of new mums take the piss and do childcare while WFH, so managers get suspicious. That then spoils it for people like you who would do things properly.

Op wants reduced hours - thats what changed

But op wanted to change the arrangement by reducing hours therefore if she wants reduced hours then she gives up working from home

But he’s agreeing to her request to reduce her hours though?! It’s just that this can clearly only be accommodated by dropping the Friday half day, rather than on Tuesday - Thursday, which is likely perfectly reasonable from a business point of view!
OP is the one asking to reduce her hours! If she wants to keep the Friday WFH she probably can if she returns to the same arrangement as before her mat leave.

I think you muddied the water by asking for reduced hours and keeping working from home. Even more so when no one else in your team has been allowed this perk.

Not quite. You have requested less hours so you will be in work less. So they decided the less hours would be o n your wfh day. It's annoying for you but they are within their rights I would say.

It is mn anything pregnancy related has people using the discrimination card i agree with you and dont see how people saying any different actually helps any op

Nor does 'well just join a union they will h help you instantly' either on this thread or any other

There is a lot of poor advice on this thread. There is no evidence to suggest that the OP's employer is discriminating against her because of her maternity. Her existing flexible working arrangement has not been revoked. However, her new flexible working request has been declined and the business has proposed an alternative.

The business is absolutely allowed to decline a flexible working request if they have clear business reasons for doing so. They are not taking anything away from the OP, they are merely saying that they can't give her the additional flexibility that she has asked for and they are suggesting a different way in which she could potentially reduce her hours. She can decline this proposal if it doesn't work for her, and stick to her current working pattern.

I would really like to know exactly how people feel that she has been "discriminated against". Pregnant women have the right to be treated fairly and they must not be disadvantaged because of their pregnancy. However, the law doesn't state that pregnant women must be given anything they want.

Sorry if I misunderstood, he is taking away the perk in the context of you asking to reduce your hours, not because you are on maternity, is that right?

I would be submitting a formal flexible working request. He'd have to have a very good reason to deny it, particularly because you can prove you've been successfully working that way already. Presumably there are no issues with your performance in the role and your arrangement hasn't significantly impacted the business?