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.

Idiots. They will lose you altogether at this rate and then be even worse off.

Wonder if there's any possibility that the manager is overly cautious about the fact that the colleague needs to go off for pregnancy-related reasons, and is mistakenly thinking that any accusations of breach of employment law/T&C's will come from her, rather than the OP. So she's trying to keep the pregnant employee happy (because no one wants to be accused of sex discrimination), at great cost to the worker that is actually being screwed over. It sounds like she hasn't taken/been given any HR advice surrounding leave because she's tried to sort out the issue quietly, and now it's about to blow up in her face. Her discussions with you, trotting out lines about "loyalty" and other shite sound like bluffing. If her position was correct and confirmed then she'd be quoting your contract and T's & C's, not making vague statements like that.

OP, if you cancel this holiday you'll regret it. Please tell them to do one after seeking specialist legal advice. Really, really hope you get this sorted.

It sounds like the boss has been told by the US management to sort it and she is trotting out phrases that she has been told to, without anyone checking if they stand up in UK employment law.

God I'm so angry for you just reading this. They are totally out of order. Yanbu. Sorry not to have better advice apart from echoing what others have said.

This is clearly stressing you out.

Doctors.

Sick line

4 weeks on sick

Bombproof

Hi WM, hope you're managing to have some sort of a decent weekend.
My advice would be not to get involved in any discussion that can be twisted and used against you later. Keep all discussion about it by email & save them to a stick so they don't get lost in an unexplained IT glitch.
Also, I would join a union, maybe Unison or TGWU & have a good talk to the rep. They will have dealt with exactly this type of situation before.
Best wishes

Whilst you shouldn't have to, is it worth asking your colleague about her need to go on leave early? Naturally there's not much that you can do about it if she is going early due to medical reasons, but if she's just going early because she is choosing to, then she may not realise what impact her choice is having on you. Does she know (and care) that work is trying to force you to cancel your holiday? Is there anyway she would be able to return to work for those weeks, even part time, or could the two of you both work from home part time (and you doing some work on your holiday via laptop) to keep things ticking over while you are away?

You and her absolutely should not have to do this, quite frankly I'd be telling them to go jump, but it might be worth having a chat together and see if there is some sort of solution that may be developed. However, even if it does work out, my own faith in my company would be permanently damaged and I'd be looking for a new job anyway. Any company with such little respect for their employees doesn't deserve any loyalty.

I can just see this employer getting very nasty about someone going abroad while on sick leave.

Poor advice from glasgowstevenagain imo.

glasgow is she meant to lie to her GP? Or do yoy think that we GPs just dish out sock notes on demand? FFS.

Sick notes I mean, not sure what a sock note is!

thank you everyone I am having a better weekend with everyones advice but sadly their isnt any updates office is closed but I have contancted the UK based HR i have also fowarded the email converstion as well.

In my bosses slight defence I think she is being presured into doing this by her bosses who are now Americans but this does not excuse how she is treating me.

I will carry out all communitcation via email and I have backed up the emails to my personal penstick.

I sorry I dont feel confortable in wasting my GPs time with this problem as I dont think the stress is unhealthy levels and i dont like lying

but thank you for your support and futher advice I will update tomorrow evening once I have rung people etc and heard from HR

sorry again about spelling I do not have a spell checker on my ipad

Good luck.

Good luck with it worridmum. You sound lovely and your spelling is absolutely fine. For what it's worth, you sound like a model employee and they'd be a fool to lose you - I just hope they realise that.

Good luck, hopefully they will panic when they realise you've done your research

I hope you get this sorted op! I'm really angry on your behalf and really really intrigued as to what it is that you do I know I know!

Just another one saying good luck.
Sorry that your dad is ill. For that reason I wouldn't postpone the holiday, considering that your colleague will be off for some time and it looks like you'd have difficulty getting time off then.
Also be wary about approaching her about why she is taking maternity leave early, in case it is seen as 'badgering her'.

Good thing you are not pg too, isn't it!

Start job-hunting but in the meantime just tell them that they have not given you enough notice and you are going.

Good luck from me too

Their treatment of you is disgusting.

I've employed hundreds of people and can tell you they're almost certainly taking the piss - quite apart from it being appalling personnel management

Others have dealt with advice agencies, but I think you have to prepare yourself for the possibility of them "creating" a misconduct scenario as an excuse to get rid of you, just out of spite. It would be a stupid thing to do, especially as they've been foolish enough to threaten you in writing, but hardly surprising after the way they've behaved

If that happens it wouldn't be pleasant, but whatever you do don't just walk Go straight to tribunal instead, where you could very easily make a great deal of money out of them - which they'd richly deserve

Do you think she is not stressed out.

So she goes sick...

Just caught up with it all.

Apologies no need for sick leave,

Just stand firm employment law is on your side

They are wankers - hope you have this sorted today.

One thing that occurs to me, (and I am sorry if this is in poor taste) is what would happen if your Dad got worse or suddenly passes away? You said he won't get any better.

You may need time off without warning and your colleague may not be there to cover. Your company needs a plan in place.

Disregarding my terrible advice about a sick note.

What would happen if the OP broke a leg or had a family emergency!

OP this is all kinds of nonsense on your employer's part. Any contractual terms which give the slightest hint of permitting this have to be exercised reasonably, and this is not. I would also say its a breach of the employer's common law duty of respect owed towards their employees.

What is the point of being employed if it going to lose you so much money?

GlasgowSteven you were beginning to scare me!

I don't think it matters if they've introduced new policies, especially if those policies aren't in line with European employment law and also you would have to have signed a new contract surely?