AIBU to dock this employees pay

[Fruitsaladjelly]

I have an employee who is employed 5 days per week but one of these days is spent at University studying for a professional qualification, the company also funds the course fees as this will be a benefit to us in the long term. This employee works in another office and therefore I don’t have direct daily contact. Today would normally be a university day but they are now on Easter holidays so I called to speak to her only to find she hadn’t come into work because Tuesdays are her uni day! Next week the same person has booked Wednesday, Thursday and Friday off as annual leave, no mention of Tuesday although she clearly is away for the entire week despite being paid to work Tuesdays. This is is more of a wwyd I suppose. I expect her in work if not pursuing the professional qualification, I expect extra study time to be completed in her own time as I personally feel being paid to study and having her course fees covered is perk enough so I don’t think calling the days ‘study days’ is good enough should that excuse be given. In any case I very much doubt she intends to take ‘study’ away on holiday despite it being a paid work day. It feels a bit CF

You seem quite over invested in wanting everyone to hire and HR person for some reason.

Some reason aka basic employer responsibilities to their employees.

Have you decided yet whether or not you are the employer (owner or shareholder)? You seem very shy on that question.

After reading your reply, in your situation I would concur that your employee is unfortunately taking advantage-which is clarified by the deliberate concealment of Uni closure days.
I would allow send a email tomorrow, once the employee does not turn up for work. Stating that they were due in, request a explanation for absence and let them respond back to you.

I don't think you should dock the pay on the basis there was no unilateral consensus between both parties, previously stated-clearly going forward I would clarify your future expectations. Please do so in writing and just pay a employment solicitor to draw up a contract for you for you-on this one occasions.

On a different note for you, as difficult as it is-try not to sweat the small stuff too much. I used to have one employee, who was constantly late by about 15mins each day, he worked like a demon throughout his shift and yielded great results-one day a newer member of staff asked him why he was late, he responded that he dropped his mum off to a day centre each day hence being late. She had dementia and he was taking care of her-this one of the reasons I always allowed some flexibility.

We never really know what is going on with others and I know I was a employer-maybe it didn't fall into my remit but I always like to treat people the way I wanted to be treated(sounds like your company philosophy too)

I think you are doing a great job of running a business. But the lesson to be learned is to put things in writing. And that's a lesson for all sorts of things in life. (I'm finding it particularly helpful with my teenagers who try very hard to gaslight me when a condition of doing something has been stated by me and promptly reinterpreted by them.) For both this employee and in the future, you should sit down and put in to writing the what you expect from them and what they can expect from you. It's not too late to do this with this current employee, just make sure you remember that their understanding of the arrangement might not have been the same as yours and not just them taking the piss.

If you have not explicitly stated that tuesdays when not in university should be spent in the office and therefore any holiday wanted which includes a Tuesday when uni isn’t open requires annual leave then you haven’t got a leg to stand on. Most employer supported courses have an element of study hours on top of the actual lecture hours.
It isn’t your employees fault that this hasn’t been discussed and agreed.
It isn’t your employees fault that you don’t actually need this person to be qualified but agreed to fund the training anyway.
It isn’t your employees fault that you are now feeling pissed off because they haven’t acted in the way that you personally would behave.
Uni presumably started in sept? 8 months later you have an issue. Again not your employees fault.
Prior to the course starting a written agreement should have been signed by both parties. Not a handshake

I don't think anyone's suggesting hiring a FT HR person, but procuring the services of a consultancy as and when you need it. Presumably like you do your accountant.

I think in this situation YABU. Do not dock pay. She could claim constructive or unfair dismissal! You are the employer, the onus is on you to make expectations clear. I’d be under the impression that Tuesday was a study day too. There’s still loads of work to do and she could be in the university library. Unfortunately your lack of communication and organisation are at fault here. Chalk it up to experience. Now you need to write an email and state clearly that from 1st May 2019 she will be expected to come into work when university is not open. Best do this now so it’s sorted before the summer holidays! They have months off!

It's a steep learning curve for you, OP, but i think you can salvage something if you now codify the agreement in writing and can make it clear when your employee should be in the office.

Too late for this one I suspect (but you could give it a try) is to make a condition of you paying for this course that they have to stay at the company for X years after completion - otherwise they should reimburse the full cost of the course (or reduce on a pro rata basis for every month under X years they give their notice, IYSWIM?)

I'd als be pointing out to them that their colleagues have zero benefit from what she's doing outside of extra work and that a little appreciation and quid pro quo might have been more diplomatic in hindsight (otherwise one of them wouldn't have ratted them out)

Haven’t read the full thread but surely everyone is aware lectures are all finished by Easter holidays anyway?

Especially if you’re paying someone to achieve a degree during work time.

I worked for a big blue chip type company, massive HR department. A colleague did a masters - course paid for, plus paid leave, revision leave, exam leave, dissertation leave etc etc. Day she got her degree she resigned. Nothing was in writing, no required working period afterwards. So it’s not just workplaces without HR that make this mistake.

company dh worked for had done the same. not degrees, but professional qualifications. four employees, nothing in writing about expectations. they only got one of them to sign the contract to say they would have to work x amount of time once completed. two others have left on completion and had nothing to pay. i dont begrudge them doing that as the company have been underhand financially in other ways. they had a dedicated HR person too. he was shit.

OP after reading more of your responses it sounds like you are a coworker upset with her contract as you feel it is unfair to your team as you are presumably taking on extra work whilst this employee has been given an extra day off. You’ve probably done a bit of research and realised there is no contract in place, so would like to know where you legally stand.

I’m struggling to believe you own a business as you seem to know too little. I am far from a business owner but I would be more clued up than to employ someone for 4 days but pay them 5 just to look supportive. It’s just common sense. Even if that was an oversight there should be absolutely no oversight in the event that she doesn’t pass and that she remain with you for x amount of time after completing the course.

If you are her employer then I’m not sure you can change the verbal contract now.

Her contract states that she works 5 days a week, so you are not unreasonable to expect her to come into work on days she isn't at college. I think you need to have a talk with her and explain this.

Setting up your own business can be a bit of a trial by fire. I'm sure you will be more careful if this kind of situation arises again.

We tried to put 'repayment of training costs if you leave before X date' into contracts after we effectively became a training agency, at our cost, for a very niche qualification where a lot of people left to employers that paid more, but were advised that it probably wasn't legally enforceable.

Shocked that so many people assume that the non university Tuesdays are study days. It's called day release - they let you off work to go to university as required. If there's no university, you need to be at work, unless you have booked leave.

I do think you need to have a meeting with her and discuss what you expect, it will also give you the opportunity to gauge what her thoughts are after she finishes the course.

If it is for more than a year you could formalise it going on with what you expect from her too.

@BarbaraofSevillle you might have a point. My ex employer funded my course, which would have benefitted them. It was a night course so done in my own time but I did have a contract to say I had to work 2 years after completion. I witnessed something at work which I was not happy about, went to my boss who laughed at me so I left. They withheld my last payslip but after claiming constructive dismissal they were ordered to pay back my wage and I did not owe them a penny. On the condition I did not discuss what I had seen.

@Witchtower but that's not really the same thing - but good for you for getting them to pay up.

I'm not in the UK but here it's common practice to include clauses like that in employment contracts. I've never come across anyone who's challenged it, though.

You’re right there were other circumstances in my situation.

Sam- they get tons of flexibility, some days can be really slow and your desk can be clear by lunch, other days something will kick off and no one’s feet touch the ground, you don’t even have a chance to look at your to do list until 4pm, it requires inbuilt discipline and flexibility. it’s not remotely unusual for people to finish up early and head to the gym or go out for extra long lunches. We also let go extra annual leave entitlement being taken by a few days, someone went over by a couple of weeks once and we had to have a word but normally we just let it go. We don’t work to rule as we think flexibility at work keeps employees happy.
In this instance, she was very grateful and happy we were prepared to accommodate her study but has obviously got comfy and started taking advantage and abusing the perk.
This type of flexibility is really hard to have if everything is in writing and strictly adhered to which is why we haven’t worked like that in the past. Had she had lots of study work to do we would be ok with her asking to do it when we were quiet. Another member of the team has been pursuing an accreditation that is really really beneficial to the business and they just do it at work as and when the work load allows, they wouldn’t dream of sitting down to a study session if everything had erupted into a hive of activity. . It’s about everyone pulling their weight when the business need them to, if they can’t be trusted to make these judgements then we will need to become much stricter and have everything defined in contract form. We are talking about pretty highly paid professionals who I would expect to be able to self regulate and not need micro managing. Thanks for your advice, I think we share quite a few principles.

Have you decided yet whether or not you are the employer (owner or shareholder)? You seem very shy on that question- I don’t need to ‘decide’, I don’t really see the relevance in this particular scenario. The principle remains the same if this is a sole trader, partnership or limited company. Whatever answer I gave I’m sure you’d be ready to tell me how wrong I am and how you run your business so much better, and that I don’t care about my employees unless I do things the way you do. Your post have actually been fairly light on examples though. Far more helpful would be ‘this is how we do things in my business it works for us because of XYZ’ You seem far more keen to just generally put me down because I haven’t done things as you would do. I’m sure there are lots of things you are not getting right in your business, no one is perfect.

She's taking the piss. Massively.

OP is certainly!

I would in future not fund a course without something more clear in writing. I’m not desperate for the person to have the qualification and wouldn’t need to fund someone else so it wouldn’t be the end of the world if she left after qualifying and I’d just chalk it up to experience. The cost of the course is not something that would break the bank. I’m far more interested in the work ethic displayed. As I said we actually allow the odd extra day annual leave but I think it’s the way this has been taken that has upset me, it’s sneaky and underhand. Generally people just say something like I’m out of holidays but really want to go to New York for a long weekend any chance?’ And then we can decide if that can be worked around. In almost all instances the answer is ‘ yes go enjoy yourself’. This arose because we really needed her on the day in question and she wasn’t in, and she also wasn’t attending her course despite making out she was to her office companions. She might of being studying but when her line manager called she we was out and about, and if she was why not just be open and honest about that or come in and bring work with her to do as and when. I was never really going to dock pay as I said in a pp, I just wanted a cross section of experiences.

OP, I'm surprised at the snarky responses you've got on this thread. (Same old names 🙄 )

I've known companies which run like yours and which run well. I think it sounds a great company to work for and it's a real shame this person has put you (the company) in this position.
I think I'd not dock her pay but I would make it very clear that it's not on and that you think she should offer to take the days she has skivved off as leave even if it's sorted out retrospectively.

I'd then write up some guidelines for people doing courses spelling out what is and isn't acceptable

I think it's tricky to run things too casually. It always ends up with people taking advantage and other people feeling things are unfair. I think it's better to stick to written procedures if possible then everyone knows what's what.

I think the fact that no contract has been drawn up regarding her university works in your favour as she is on a five day week so if she is not in college she should be in work. No question.

You need to have words and make sure that this doesn't happen again. Maybe let it go as a misunderstanding for now but then she will have been warned and there will be no further excuses. You will need to keep a closer eye on her attendance and she will be more aware now that she has been found out.

Your still blaming her for your mistake. You haven’t listened to anyone’s advice, most people saying that your employee is in the right.

Just because your other employee has decided to work on ‘holiday days’ surely if this is the case you would have realised that back in October when the first half term/reading week started.

I think it’s perfectly reasonable to study or complete coursework on those Tuesdays. It all depends on how it was worded initially. If your employee has asked to have Tuesdays off to complete a course, then you give her ALL Tuesdays.

Your responses just don’t make any sense.

It's called day release - they let you off work to go to university as required. If there's no university, you need to be at work, unless you have booked leave.

This is what was sold to me, I took it at face value. We have never had anyone studying outside of the office before (except the odd one or two day training courses) so didn’t know what was normal. Advisors will give the legal perspective but I wanted to know what the lay persons take was.