Furious at ds work dismissal

It's possible the lateness is just an excuse to get rid of him?
Plenty of jobs where a few minutes wouldn't matter much.

Who was OK with him being late, as generally late on probation period means even later when the job is confirmed. He should have always got the earlier train and been early. Life lesson. I used to place young people into work roles, biggest reasons for firing, lateness and absence!

It’s not being “behind the times” to think that you have to get to work on time unless you have a proper discussion with your workplace.

Clearly his workplace wasn’t ok with repetitive lateness given they’ve sacked him for it.

Id bet any money you didn’t start rocking up 4 minutes late and finishing 10 minutes early every day in your first few weeks without a full discussion with your bosses about doing that…

Who cares? How has that changed your little life?

@ToKittyornottoKittyhilarious you think my view of the working world is limited. I’m very well off in my career and worked in various sectors.
on the opposite my view is less limited because I don’t believe in being so strict with timings when you can get extremely good work out of people when you put the trust in them.

I have a high functioning team who are all trusted to be flexible and provide more than required outputs. Because as a business we trust each other and value the work life balance.

the same workplaces firing for being 5 minutes late will be the same ones banging on about employee mental health and doing absolutely nothing to counter it

Depends on the workplace and their own policies. I’ve sat in a meeting with my boss today to discuss someone’s lateness that’s been going on for probably 7 months and we are only just discussing whether to give them a verbal warning or not! Some places won’t tolerate lateness at all, my MIL work expects them to be in 15 mins early and she actually got pulled into a meeting because she wasn’t turning up early!

Your punctuality is poor 🙄

Not sure why you're getting a pile-on @OneGreyBiscuit . Your son asked - which is reasonable if the scenario is arrive 55m early or 5m late sort of thing. He was told it was OK so sacking him for this is unreasonable.

If he hadn't asked, I'd understand it, but he checked.

What is it then? Plenty of places or Very few places? I'm confused?

Good advice, in this economic environment you need to be 15 minutes early every day and able to work out how to do that for yourself, valuable learning experience though.

I used to catch 2 trains to one job and it took an hour and half, i had to leave earlier so that I was never late. Your son shouldn’t have been late every day! Maybe this will teach him better time management for the next job.

The thing to also bear in mind is that when you start a new job, it’s all about first impressions. You have to prove yourself and be on your very best behaviour and show that you take it 100% seriously and being late every day really doesn’t convey that to anyone.

Of course plenty places require a specific start time but it doesn’t mean to say that this young man’s workplace did.

just because a random swimming teacher needs to be at their work at an exact time doesn’t mean all sectors all across the world should be strictly the same for goodness sake people.

if there is no OPERATIONAL need to be exact time then the workplace is being unreasonable.

However, I think the reason is very likely more than just what was told to him as that on its own doesn’t seem enough to let someone go - in my opinion.

While people are mentioning how lots of companies are flexible, we have no idea if this is true in this case. The son didn't request flexible working or even say could he start at 9.15 instead of 9, he just said about being late. Most people would therefore assume that if you are late it's because of transport delays or some kind of emergency that has happened that morning. By the sounds of it the son didn't want to get an earlier train. Maybe this would have got him in far too early, which again he could have explained and asked about a later start and finish.
As pointed out, while some jobs do allow flexibility there is still a lot that don't and also plenty that impact others if one person is frequently late.

Getting to work on time is basic. So why would you be furious?

Come on, you know that's not ok. Getting to work on time is fundamental.

Lesson learnt for your DS. I am a line manager and would not be happy with a new employee turning up late every day (even if it’s only 5 minutes), having to be told to get an earlier train shows complete lack of initiative and entitlement. It doesn’t matter to me how far away or what method of transport a hire uses to get to work, they chose to apply for a job here.

However, I am not a complete dragon. If I found out a good employee who had proved themselves to be very good and dedicated to the job in other ways and had been there for longer than a month, was getting a train in an hour early or had the option to get a later one and be 5 minutes late (presuming it was only 5 mins), I would tell them to get the later train.

But I would not be happy for a brand new employee to presume this would be a given. How early would the earlier train have gotten him in? If I knew it was the difference between 20 minutes early or 5 minutes late I would be very annoyed.

My workplace has just ended a probationary period with a young guy for similar reasons. He was scheduled to work several days over a very busy period (we are in the hospitality industry). Out of 5 shifts, he turned up for two because he didn’t have reliable transport. He even asked one of our supervisors if they could take him home because he had no other means. It was about 5 miles out of the way for the supervisor.
It may seem harsh but young adults need to learn to be responsible & reliable.

Eh? Loads of places require staff to be there on time. I work in live TV. We cannot be late, routinely, or the programmes won’t go out. It’s an office job, still.

They are not being unreasonable. He needs to get to work on time. And with one months service he has essentially no employment rights.

Some are flex but some arent a fan of persistent lateness, and thats ok. Particularly as its usually one of about nine things the employee is being a further PITA about.

He needed them to suggest he get an earlier train so he could arrive in time...seriously OP? After being late for just one day he should've started taking an earlier train.
He is unreliable and you are supporting this.

Spot on.

If we take it as correct that he was told being a few minutes late every day was fine so he didn't have to catch a train that would get him in too early, then I suspect what actually happened was he went away on holiday and his supervisors and colleagues discussed his general work attitude while he was away, decided he was a bad fit with the company and gave him the time keeping excuse because it was easy and wouldn't result in questions needing any further explanations.

I wouldn't be shouting about this if I was him or his mother.

Wrong!

Covid changed the working conditions in some jobs and some sectors.

Teachers and nursery staff have to arrive on time

retail - especially of opening up

Blue light services

lifeguards. Swim teachers. Leisure centres. Any attraction. The arts - cinema and theatres etc.

transport providers. Ferry, train, plane, delivery drivers.

In fact very few jobs overall have flexible working except those that can be done at home and/or hybrid.

Even them if you’ve arranged a 9am meeting you’d expect to be there ready to host or be present at 9am.

My job is flexible with regards outside my core hours when I must be onsite.

DS job is flexible in tech as long as he gets the job done and attends meetings on time - and of course works his paid hours!