To think people shouldn't come into the office when they're sick??

[Thelittleredhead]

That's it really.

It REALLY annoys me. The woman I share an office with is full of cold. Sniffing and coughing and sneezing. Not only is it gross, but I am 14 weeks pregnant and therefore more susceptible to colds and stuff, and really don't want to catch it from her. I hate when people come in sick, it's like they don't want to be seen as 'weak', or think it's impressive that they're 'struggling through'.

Would IBU to ask her to work from home for a couple of days (I'm senior to her so could probably get away with doing so) or to move to a different office? Or would that be over reacting and offensive? I normally wouldn't be so sensitive to this stuff but...while pregnant I feel like I should take better care.

WWYD?

Sadly it is not uncommon to face a disciplinary for sickness absence now Elinor. I used to work for a large national company where any more than 3% absence in a rolling 26 week period or three periods of separate absences would trigger a review meeting. If everyone with a cold didn't come in this would have been never ending. Some staff who joined the company later also didn't get sick pay. I can certainly see why someone would be reluctant to take time off sick and for that reason OP, you ABVU.

Thanks milk - just find it incredible that you be disciplined for something outside of your control

Obviously there is sickness and sickness and it is utterly abhorrent that people will be disciplined when they are genuinely too ill to go into work.

I've yet to meet a cold that fits that bill.

I currently have a cold and I am pregnant...Life goes on.

In my last job we had no sick pay or holiday pay. If we had more than three separate instances of absence it was disciplinary and any sickness longer than 2 weeks was a warning- with or without a Dr. note.

The only way around it was to go in regardless and get sent home. When I broke my foot I had to go in everyday and then get sent home. Sometimes that didn't happen. 12 hours on a broken foot is no fun...

why penalise the majority for the sins of the minority?

Unfortunately I think it comes under "Men are not hanged for stealing horses but so that horses are not stolen"

Particularly where people are in jobs (i.e. no progression) rather than careers, the incentive to come in vs. not come in when they dont feel like it and they're getting paid anyway is somewhat lacking. Plus there's the blurring of "sick", "child sick" and "other admin crisis" (i.e. time off but no pay and time off with pay).

YABVU. It's just a cold if everyone took time off everytime they had a cold you would have a very poor work force.
You should not ask her to go home even if you say she can work from home.

She might not have the facilities to work from home.

I hate it when colleagues come in with a fever or d&v, especially as we hot desk so the bugs spread like wildfire.

But, I would never expect anyone to take time off for a cold alone. With a toddler I have a continual cold!

Our workplace sickness absence is really strict though, so that influences how ill people are before taking time off. It's G
got to the stage now where people will struggle in and do just over a half day, or book annual leave. Which is counterproductive.

YABU. Many places have 3 strikes so you just have to plough through sometimes. It's shit and shouldn't be like that... but the choice these days is either to infect a few people or lose your job.

Yanbu actually. It's a shit situation and I'm sick of catching colds and bugs from people at work!

I'd love to work from home when "moderately" ill if that would be possible. Staying warm, wrapped up etc - it would help a lot. You could offer it?

Oh and no sick pay so another reason to force ourselves in. Very common nowadays.. Employers have all the power.

My manager didn't like us coming to work sick because he knew that in a week's time everybody will be sniffing and sneezing and coughing. He always suggested either a day or two off or working from home.
IMHO it's much better than spreading germs. I'm not talking an odd sneeze but a proper cold here. That was very much frowned upon and I don't get people who believe they are heroes because they come to work with a severe cold or a flu.

YABU
Being pregnant doesn't give you the right to tell others to go home just for a cold.

If it bothers you, you need to go home.

Yup another company with 3 strikes (that could be 3 separate days) over a rolling 52 weeks and it triggers a review.

People joining now do not get sick pay
Times have changed Elinor

The world can't stop because someone has a cold.

That said, if I had a job that could be done from home and my employer said I could work from home for a few days (whilst feeling like a walking snot factory) I would love them forever. To not have to get dressed, get to work and try and look moderately interested all day would be wonderful.

Dies pregnancy equal lower immunity?

*Does

OP you need to get over this I'm afraid. Pregnant or not. I'm a teacher in Year 1. They don't wash their hands, they pick their noses, they sneeze all over their clothes, they don't cover their mouths when they cough... I worked until about 36 weeks of my pregnancy and we lived to tell the tale .

My work place is very strict on sickness. It is incredibly easy to invoke disciplinary proceedings for sickness. I was full of cold last week but had to come to work. Believe me I would rather have stayed at home but as I was sick one other time within the last year I would have invoked formal unsatisfactory sickness proceedings so had to go in. It certainly wasn't about looking brave!

We get disciplined if off work for every sniffle. Suck it up.
I have a compromised immune system. If I can accept the attendence choices colleagues make, then so can you. Sometimes they drag themselves in to avoid the discipline triggers. I'm more annoyed at the malingerers whose piss taking resulted in my boss imposing stricter rules.

You are looked upon badly if you take time off for being sick, even if it's genuine. Either your colleagues who have to pick up the workload will think it, or your boss will think it, whether they should of not.

Wow. Talk about a roasting! I was asking a question, surely that's what AIBU is for? Or is it for the more sanctimonious among us to come and rain judgement down on someone for asking a question?

For the record;

a) I work for a company (and in a country) where if you are sick, you are sick. You email in the morning and say 'I am sick, I need x days off' and it is accepted. If you're off for more than 4 days in a row, you need a Drs note, but it is easy to get an appointment, they are more than happy to provide them (in fact they offer to do so in most cases) and no further questions are asked. There is no limit to the number of sick days you can take in a year (unless it's long term sick in which case pay is eventually affected) and there are no 'sanctions or punishments'. This does not make for an environment in which people take the piss and the 'economy grinds to a halt' - I work in Germany, the strongest economy in Europe - but it does make for an environment in which people normally understand that going into the office while sick just a) prolongs the illness and b) spreads it, and feel comfortable and safe not doing so.

b) I wasn't ever going to 'tell her to take time off', I was going to suggest that she can WORK from home if she wants to. She's new and quite young and maybe doesn't understand that this is an option. She might be feeling really bloody miserable sat at her desk with a cold. I would be.

c) How TF is it 'precious' not to want to get sick? I have a really, really full plate at the moment, between a really difficult situation at home, a ridiculously full-on job, constant travel and trying to cope with a totally unplanned pregnancy which is leading to a LOT of sleepness nights. Surely it's ok for me not to want to get sick as well. I'm not talking 'the sniffles' here, this girl is really quite ill. It's not that I think it will affect my pregnancy or damage my 'PFB' in any way, I know it won't. But I also know it'll make me damn miserable for a few days, and surely no-one wants that if it's avoidable?

d) To answer the question about immunity and pregnancy...apparently so, yes! I discovered this recently. Apparently your immune system has to function at a lower level because otherwise it'd recognise the baby as a 'foreign body' and attack it. Who knew?!

I shall know better than to ask AIBU in the future...

If you aren't prepared for people to disagree with you its best not to ask for opinions, full stop. If the culture is so different in Germany I'm not sure what you'd gain from posting on a (mainly) British site.

Oh I'm fully prepared for people to disagree with me. But there's 'yeah, yabu. But don't worry, a cold won't harm your pregnancy.' and then there's 'get over yourself', 'suck it up', 'stop being precious', 'I'd have you at a tribunal if you did that to me' (seriously?!).

I guess I just don't really understand the need to be so vicious in response to a genuine question. But then, I'm generally of the opinion that I should give people the benefit of the doubt and assume intentions are good.

As to what I expected to gain...well, when I worked in the UK I also worked for a company which discouraged people coming in when sick and had no 'limit' for sickness days. So I guess I just didn't realise that the general culture is so different.

It's a real shame, don't you think? I mean, the sniffles and a bit of sneezing is one thing. But a full-blown cold, while not dangerous, can be a thoroughly, utterly miserable thing. I think it's really sad that people can't have a day or two off to recover without being seen as 'shirking'. Mind, I never take time off either (I do wfh when I need to) and always get told off for it, so I guess I'm just as bad

As it happens, the girl in question has now asked if she can go home because she feels so rotton, so I suppose it's a moot point!

So people disagreed with you? Oh dear.
I'm with others on this. There is generally no earthly reason why someone should take time off with a cold.
I work for a pretty decent company but three episodes over six months would trigger a stage one sickness review and all absences are subject to a return to work interview.