Refused Part time working request

[Tavaress]

Hello all

I have worked in an office for ten years which belongs to a large factory, when I started there was five of us including our manager but now there are two of us and a lady who comes in for three hours a day but mostly spends her time walking around the factory from one department to another stock taking and she clocks up quite a few miles and steps over the week.

I also do stock taking around the site and need a knee replacement and I have asked if it was possible to share my workload with someone new and could they advertise for someone to do afternoons which would entail that person doing the stocktaking and walking around and I would do the office work in the mornings because of my sore and aching knee.

I have said I will put off my operation and stay in work if I can be office based and get my op done in a few years when I retire. I work eight hours and by the time I walk home which takes only ten minutes I am in quite bad pain with my knee and like everyone I would miss the money but four hours and less walking would be better for my health.

I have had a few meeting with HR and they have offered me the three hours a day mostly walking job which wouldn't suit, the HR lady doesn't seem to understand and is acting quite surprised I haven't snapped her hand off for this job.

They don't think the job share will work and won't even try to advertise it and have used the excuse " What happens if someone is off" which we have to cope with now and I don't see where they are coming from so the way I feel now with my knee up on the couch and co-codamol by my side I will go home half way through my day tomorrow and take the three months full pay and six months half pay and hope my operation comes through and I am on my way to a near recovery..
Any thoughts..

Go off sick OP - it's a no-brainer. You have asked for adjustments, they have been refused. Not entirely sure what HR are thinking here ... they will need to take it a lot more seriously when you go off sick

Have you actually got a date for the knee replacement?
Its 1-2 years waiting list where we are in UK just now , my step father is currently waiting and still going to work full time.

Surely if you go off on the sick now without a date for op , you will run out of sick pay and eventually be let go due to long term sickness / non attendance at work anyway ?

Hello all and thank you very much for all your replies, I was referred by my doctor to a private hospital last November and when I rang up this morning and explained that I might need to go part time they said it will actually be late June or early July so I will wait now and get it done.
Ironically in the late afternoon my manager said to to call into HR and the lady in HR said would I like to have a trial part time with the other lady who wouldn't mind working afternoons.
I think they found out I will going off in the near future and are looking to save paying me full pay..

Wow is it so quick because you are paying , that’s excellent

Hello, I am not paying. My doctor referred me to a private hospital but through the NH. My friend got her shoulder fixed in the same place a few years ago.

Hello, I posted on a new thread but will give an update here if it's ok. I am now waiting for possible ill health retirement and my work pay completely ends next month due to a change in company policy. I have worked since I was sixteen and I can claim my Government pension in just over three years.

For the first time in my life I have had to claim sick ( ESA ) and at first they said it was £77 which I didn't think was much. I then got a letter saying because I have a pension of £650 a month before tax my ESA has been lowered to £46.
The lady in The Job Centre said I would be on this type of ESA for nine months and because I am waiting for three operations she said I would continue on another ESA.

My health has really deteriorated in the past year along with my joints because of High Iron (Haemochromatosis) and I have had blood removed weekly at first and still monthly even after six years.

The good news is that I am getting my NI credits towards my pension while I am waiting for the operations but having worked for the best part of fifty years I really thought I would of received more than £46 after all those years of paying in.

I also believe I can't get help with Council tax and the dentist etc because this is The New Style contribution based benefit and I know some people will say I am lucky to have a pension which I am but I did pay into it for all those years.

Have you thought about applying for pip

You have to wait nine months from joining ESA to apply for PIP I believe but nobody has really told me anything. I will live on my savings and pension and if I receive the ill health retirement I will be fine.

PIP and ESA aren't linked. You can apply for PIP now, although the process can take some time.

Thanks cuju and Woolandwonder, I will think about it. I have never claimed so it is all new. I will be ok but you hear about un-claimed benefits and some will really need it.

Can I ask if anyone has had experience of ill health retirement, I know there are different types of grades you can be awarded. All my pay runs out next month and I spoke to an independent doctor last Friday.

The talk to the doctor went well but he didn't indicate anything either way, I have now been off work seven months and won't be going back. I know it has to be that I won't improve in the next three years to return to some type of work and with the operations to my ankles and other knee which have now been approved by the consultants and this High Iron which knocks you for six with tiredness and an overall feeling of being unwell with aching joints.

I have just over three years to my OAP so it could be touch and go but I was thinking is there a cut off point because even if I get all my ops done and dusted in the next two years they wouldn't expect me to start looking for work at the age of sixty five, or would they..