Work trying to bully me into cancelling holiday

[worridmum]

Sorry if this is the wrong place but this section has the most traffic and hoping for someone to help me.

Long story short is a booked my annaul leave in january in line with company policy and it was approved. After the approval I booked an expesive holiday to the USA for 3 weeks to see my parents as my father is in poor health and would like to see him before he deterates futher (long term problem with no possiblity of a cure sadly).

Now the crux of the problem last week my work colleuge is now wanting to start her metinity leave 2 months early than planned and now because our department is small one of us must be in the building for the department to run (I dont want to give too much details here as its very specislt field of work and dont want to out myself) and the meritity cover cannot start 2 months early than planned so my boss is putting large amounts of pressure to cancel my holiday and treating gross misconduct when I refused to cancel it as my manager blunty said when I asked is the company going to compestate for my finacel loss (non-refundable flights / hotel deposits etc) and she basically said tough luck the company WILL NOT pay for the loss of this money (roughly £3000) and I should just absorb this loss and consider it one of those things, which I replied no I am not willing to lose not only my last possible chance of seeing my Father before he passes away but also that amount of money which is a large amount for me.

Which is the reason she is quoting gross misconduct as I am refusing to cancel my holiday with only 2 weeks notice and that I am expected to eat the fiancal loss as well as prescous time with my father and my question is twofold

I am unreasonable to refuse to NOT cancel my holiday no matter that it will causes massive problems for the company and the second are they legally allowed to breech their own policies relating to booked holidays to be able to say my holiday will be treated as unauthrised absance and thus a gross misconduct offence even though I have all the documents saying it was authorised etc and finally if they are allowed to cancel my holiday at such short notice can force them to pay for my lost money so I am not out of pocket (travel insurnce will not pay out as it is not covered by their terms)

I am sorry for the long post and if it is in the wrong area and for any spelling or grammer mistakes as I have dylexia and no spell checker on this device.

Me too. I hope she had a good hol

I'm sure she did - it'll be returning to work that's the issue! Assuming she still has a job.
Welcome home/good luck, OP!

Oh I was thinking about this one today. I hope OP and her dad are OK and had a good time!

Good luck OP, update when you can and hope you had a lovely holiday.

Just came late to this thread. What bastards they have been to you. I hope you had a great holiday and things are resolved on the work front.

Just seen this thread, can't wait for an update in a few months when you are awarded huge amounts of compensation!

Hope you've managed to put it to one side as much as you can go enjoy your holiday.

Good luck with the road ahead.

I do hope you had a lovely holiday and are well compensated by your dreadful employer.

Your boss sounds completely unreasonable. I would not give up your holiday, even if it meant the sack, you only get one Dad.

How was your holiday OP?

Hope that you have enjoyed your holiday OP and can't wait for you to kickass at the company.

.

can someone send the OP a PM?

ask them to come back -

Seconded Glasgow

Done.

I'd love to know what happened next

Hello Everyone Sorry for the massive delay with the update to my thread everything has been up in the air and massively hetic and stressful but thankfully my father is doing as well as could be expeted and the holiday was enjoyed by all espically by my father having all his grandchildren around and was alot less stressful as it was one massive village effort with everyone pitching in etc.

Now the less happy news.

Firstly there has been massive amounts of backward and forward between my lawyer and the companies lawyers. They first basically offered me nothing other the standard package of someone being fired (I think notice pay and thats it). My lawyer said no and started the negotating game where they consistally denied doing any wrong doing and that what they offered was all I was going to get.

after laywer informed finally them of all the laws they have broken and the evidence of said law breaking they furously started back tracking and basically said could have me job back and full pay up til now (Fat chance am going back to work for them so they can concoct another and more watertight excuse to fire me)

after this rejection they basically kept going back to my lawyer with better and better offers until we currently stand at 2 years full pay and maxium level of bonus for my level +my legal costs paid and a glowing reference.

I am most likely going to accept this offer (if I can get them to sign a contract where if they dont give a truthful glowing reference I can get them on breach of contract under advise from lawyer and they have proven untrustworthy without ironclad documents)

The only condistion they want is that I dont go to the media and spill the details (I am thinking the unbrialla company wants to asborb another high profile company and doesnt want bad press or massive public outcry) which is fair enough I dont want to be seen as attempting to blackmail them.

So is the latest offer accpetable or amazing good like it appears to be on paper (I am not sure on the level of compensation I would be untiled to upon these level of breahes and lawyer basically saying that there isnt a set guideline to payouts and each case is dealt with on indivual cases.

Thank you everyone for your help and support in dealing with all this and for suggesting I get legal advice + for suggesting backing up emails which were one of the most damning pieces of evidence I had agaisnt them.

So thanks again everyone

ps sorry again about spelling and grammer and the sheer lenght of this post and for how long it took for me to update

Glad it's gone we'll and your dad is as well as can be expected
Please get this deleted. From what you've said about going to the media I worry they will be searching for anything to pin on you

2 years sounds good! (Disclaimer - I know nothing about this sort of area!)

Hope you can put it all behind you soon.

Glad your holiday worked out well

Re their offer - what does your solicitor say? They seem to have done a good job so far so I would be tempted to let them guide me here. Unless someone comes on here with a better story

Agree it sounds good. Do get thread deleted - you can start another with fewer details if you want?

I'd take the offer! 2 years pay plus bonus and reference?! Sounds perfect x

Take the offer and get this thread deleted. Good luck for the future!

Glad it has worked out. I think that sounds pretty amazing actually. I'd take it if I were you.

Yeah, get thread deleted.
Delighted for you, that is great outcome.