Any HR advice please? Urgent.

[BipolarSunset]

Hiya,

I have a disciplinary at work on Friday due to sickness. 9 days for chickenpox, 5 days for a miscarriage and then 1.5 days for when my son was ill.

The only thing I want to know is whether I can be disciplined for the chickenpox? For further information I work in a GP surgery so it's detrimental that I wasn't in work when contagious.

P.S. I already know they can't include the miscarriage - planning to mention this during my meeting.

Thanks in advance!

@MissyPG thanks for your reply. Yep had a sick note from GP to cover the whole time of Chickenpox. I'm never late always 5/10 minutes early.

They have included the miscarriage in for sickness so will be mentioning that and the childcare one on Friday.

Completely baffled as this has come out of nowhere tbf.

Is it Virgin Care?

@Blanca87 No.

Its shit that they are not an nhs employer, I don’t understand how they are allowed to get away with this. The time off for your son I seriously don’t understand how they could ever think that’s the right way to deal with that.

If they have high levels of sickness, they will be hauling people in for sickness reviews now so I suspect you will not b the only one. Surely they should think about the reasons why so many people are going sick, could it be the shit pay, terms and conditions?

Sounds like it's an investigation gate on which is a pre-cursor to disciplinary. It's used to establish the facts, if they fin that your absence in the investigation is a cause for concern they can then move to disciple you. If not then it will be dropped, although it may be kept on file as a record of discussion and used to form a performance improvement plan.

If you are invited to a disciplinary it should specifically state that in the invite and include a copy of the disciplinary process or details of where you can find it

Sorry lots of typos but hopefully you get the gist

Agree with what everyone says op...talk to union.

Sorry to jump on op post here but i had a miscarriage a few months ago and continued working right through it. It was only 8 weeks so early but didnt know could i take time off. Im nhs worker...clinical so if i miss work patients get cancelled. I didnt tell any of my colleagues although they must have wondered why i kept disappearing to the toilet.

If you have any concerns about remembering what is said, I would say you would like to record the meeting, not just have notes taken..Especially if they're trying to include a pregnancy-related absence.

Urgh. How can a practice even have no sickness pay policy in this day and age, it completely baffles me.
Do you know what the Bradford trigger number is? In our trust it's 100, which I find a bit low to be honest. 3 episodes is not a lot. And they can bugger off with any maternity related episodes. Sounds like a sickness review meeting. To be honest, if you have a GP certificate it doesn't really matter what you were off for, they can't touch you for it in theory.

londonrach that is really sad, I'm sorry for your loss.

Do you know what the Bradford trigger number is? In our trust it's 100, which I find a bit low to be honest. 3 episodes is not a lot.

100? Christ!

27 isn't unusual in the private sector (and 3 absences is at least 27).

Different world, isn't it.

It'll probably be along the lines of a promoting attendance meeting. In my experience they should be meeting you informally at this stage and making you aware of your absence rate. They'll probably set a timeline (perhaps 3 months) where they'd expect your attendance to approve.

It certainly doesn't sound like there's any pattern to your being off. They shouldn't count your miscarriage or when you had to care for your son. Additionally, if you're off sick with something you may have caught at work (chickenpox) them potentially that could be dismissed too. Difficult to prove with chickenpox tho.

The organisation I work for would ask for an informal meeting as there is a policy to follow, and three episodes of absence is the trigger for that. Definitely bring someone with you for support if you feel you need it. Hope all goes ok.

If you have been there two years and this is your first run of three sickness periods I wouldn’t worry. It’s standard to review after a set amount in a time period of sickness of specific lengths. It’s usually just a discussion to highlight sickness begin actionable and you may walk away with no further action or verbal was

Warning not was

Sorry my phone worded that all wrong! It’s meant to say it’s standard to review after a set amount of absence in a specific time period or sickness of specific lengths such as totalling 14 calendar days etc

9+1.5+5 = 15.5.
BF total no of episodes squared x total no of days
3x3=9 9x15.5 = 139.5
Without pg related 2x2 = 4 4x10.5 = 42

HR Director here. That's a reasonable trigger point for a first stage meeting if the mc leave is included. Note the m/carriage shouldn't be included and the parental leave should be noted as unpaid. Also that the cp was genuine, certificated and it would have been unwise to put vulnerable patients at risk.

My professional view is that any meeting should be consultative and discuss with you any support that can be put in place to help you.

Does your GP surgery moan about school sickness policies (according to MN most do). Rather hypocritical if so!

I wonder if they are counting incidents of sickness rather than the length of time? I was off for 2 or 3 weeks with chickenpox as an adult (worked in HR at the time) and we were just thinking of bringing in back to work interviews. I offered to have one but surprisingly, the boss declined ...

I don't think they should be counting your son's sick leave in there either (nor the miscarriage) do they not permit unpaid leave for that?

Curious how a sickness based disciplinary would go. I didn't know they were a thing. What exactly would they be disciplining you for?
"You were off for 9 days with chicken pox?"
"Yes"
"This is too many days."
"I was sick and had a doctors note."
"You need to learn a lesson from this and not do it again."
"Erm. Right."

Ridiculous. I can't think what support a workplace could put in place to prevent either chickenpox or a miscarriage.

I get it if every other Monday OP is hungover, or disappears 'sick' lunchtimes on Friday to pop up on facebook on a weekend away, but otherwise, it's barmy.

They can’t be seen to say one absence is more genuine than another so is counted.

We review the absence for all employees who meet our trigger points. It is the information from this meeting that determines what action is taken.

If you were our employee, we would exclude the mc & look to understand if there were other ways to minimise absence if DS is ill I.e. OH stay off next time.

They have to be fair to all. Could be that they are about to take action against another employee & want to show they have looked at yours.

Don’t worry!

I’m astonished at this, I worked as a Manager in a national company, who in all honesty outsourced HR stuff, so it was hardly possible to get advice, and the whole company was majority male, which may have had an unexpected bearing here.
We would never haul people in for a disciplinary matter over sickness where they had a legitimate sick note, and other reasons for absence such as this.
I am absolutely shocked at your treatment
I years earlier, worked in a doctors surgery, newly graduated, in a temporary role, majority women in the back office, excluding the Male doctors, they were horrific to work for.
Maybe I shouldn’t feel so surprised.

Definitely contact a union, they helped me a lot, in my later career. And at the very least have an impartial witness in your meeting, insist on it, or you can feel very outnumbered, they may not be able to speak, but can be there. Assuming this is allowed these days.

Ugh Doctors surgeries, I’d forgotten how loathsome it was.

Unless the chickenpox and the amount of sick leave you are allowed to take in one year is specified in your contract, they are not allowed to discipline you. It’s unlawful and discriminatory. If you were signed sick by a DR in your practice, request a reason for HR’s meeting? The only thing they can include, lawfully, outside contract terms, are unqualified sickness. Plus if they are not paying you whilst sick, you don’t have to ansa any questions as you were not paid( contracted) under any lawful means!

@hen10 I had that after a pregnancy loss and severe sciatica
"What will you do to prevent further sickness?"
"Well I'll try not to get pregnant again and pray my back doesn't give way?"

They also argued that my cauda equina wasn't an emergency op I pointed out we blue light patients in with it

Contact ACAS for advice. Or your union rep if you are a member. You’ll need to know what it says in your contract and in your staff handbook. And ignore replies here that say you can’t be disciplined if you have a doctor’s sick note (Med3) - that’s not true, unfortunately.

It's the latest half day sickness that has pushed your Bradford Factor up.
So 4 instances totally 15.5 days is a score of 248. In our company, that would lead to a conversation around if everything was ok, did the employee need any support. It may simply be a bad run of health, or an underlying condition that we need to make allowances for or support with, or they have Monday-itis. Doesn't necessarily mean a warning, it's just a conversation.

However, in your circumstances you need to clarify that the miscarriage should not be counted, and the day for your son should be recorded as dependent leave. That reduces you to 2 instances of 9.5 days so a BF of 38 which should be well under any threshold. Plus it should be a rolling 12 month so by next month your chicken pox stops being counted.