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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think it’s grim to come into work when you have a cold?

170 replies

sunfloweryy · 26/02/2020 08:59

If you can easily work from home/take the day off sick?

I’ve been off work with a particularly nasty cold for the last couple of days. I feel better today, but still not great so I’ve logged on from home to work as I’m still coughing and sneezing.

Colleague has just sent me an IM to see how I was and told me he’s got a cold too but he’s been in office. He was trying to make me feel guilty for taking time off for sure, and it’s bothered me!

He has form for coming in to work when he’s ill, coughing and sneezing all over the place and we hot desk so it isn’t even possible to contain him to one area. I get that the world can’t stop for colds, but surely common sense dictates that if you are able to work from home or take some days off you do so? Especially with this coronavirus going around!

AIBU?

OP posts:
Jaichangecentfoisdenom · 26/02/2020 09:45

Sorry, the cold I have had for the last week would certainly warrant me taking some time off from work - it is all the nasty symptoms of flu except for the temperature. The sore throat means I can't talk and I keep having coughing and sneezing fits, as well as having a stonking headache and jelly legs. So I certainly don't think you are being unreasonable as you can work from home, @sunfloweryy - feel better soon!

Spidey66 · 26/02/2020 09:48

The amount of martyrs on MN is amazing.

No I don't go off work with the sniffles, but occasionally I get a mega cold which turns into bronchitis. Not only am I highly infectious, I feel like shit and am neither use nor ornament.

This happens rarely-say once every couple of years-but hell yeah I'll phone in sick!

goodytooshoes · 26/02/2020 09:50

My idea of grim would be coming in to work with your intestines spewing out of your butchered abdomen all over your desk.

A cold is not grim.

Bikerider2020 · 26/02/2020 09:51

Ok you say you don't want to spread germs, so not in the office today. Why couldn't you have worked from home the other two days?

It's a cold, working from home should've been fine!

hokolo · 26/02/2020 09:53

I don't know. I mean, I think it depends.

I have a crap immune system following a very serious illness a few years ago. I have recovered well but I just get sick a lot nowadays. If it's going round, I'll get it! Between colds and random infections, I am ill about once every three weeks. I just can't take time off whenever I'm sick. I'd lose my job. I only take time off when I am told to specifically by my boss or am taken out by ambulance - otherwise I go in to work even if I am delirious with fever etc. Even then I take more sick days than my colleages.

TheOrigBrave · 26/02/2020 09:53

Just because colleague CAN work from home, doesn't mean he wants to. Many people prefer to come into the office.

The main problem I see is that he is not practicing good hygiene in that you say he's coughing and sputtering all over the place. It's quite possible to go to work with a cold and keep it to yourself.

AddressLabel · 26/02/2020 09:55

The Bradford Factor is rubbish. I know people who are sick but feel better after a few days but stay off for about 5 days (however many days you can get away with not having a Drs note). As it still only counts as 1 incident, whereas other people may be off for 1 day sick and come in feeling sub par but well enough to work and still get the same “black mark”

Nearlyalmost50 · 26/02/2020 09:55

I completely agree with you OP. I get cross when students turn up to non-essential meetings in my office with a streaming cold. I would prefer them to reschedule to later in the week. There is NOTHING essential they need to do and they can work from home always, so why are they in spreading it?!

People in the UK are weird. They seem to think soldiering on is the right thing (like morally) to do, oblivious that's why everyone is so sick and run down all the time and why productivity is relatively low. If you have one person with a streaming nasty cold, then they infect 10 people at work- 2 of whom then take a day or two off as they simply can't keep going/have asthma/prone to chest infections, you are less productive as a team of 11 than if the first person at least stayed off a day or two when they are in the sneezy streaming stage. Obviously in later stages you can't stay home all the time but you can contain it all better.

I wash my hands lots and haven't had a cold all winter, not one. I wash them on using the loo, on coming in from outside/public transport, and before eating. There's basic hygiene measures that really do help, I've had far fewer colds when I started this about three years ago, almost none or 1 a year.

I have always been like that though, I hated nurseries and playgroups for the same reason, because it's full of people going 'oh, he's fine really' when the little toddler is trailing snot and crying with a temp. Horrible. I used to not go for this reason if my children had been ill recently. Why volunteer yourself for another week of sleepless nights with a sick child just to play for a couple of hours?

Immunity does build but it's easier just not to get stuff in the first place!

WorraLiberty · 26/02/2020 09:57

Spidey66 but surely in that situation you'd be calling in with bronchitis and not a cold?

JRUIN · 26/02/2020 09:58

Well if I had the option to work from home, I'd do that every day cold or no cold. You don't generally need to take time off for a cold though.

adaline · 26/02/2020 09:59

I don't see a problem with working from home if you have that as an option, but I can't imagine calling in sick with a cold.

I'm self-employed (as is DH) and neither of us ever take time off work unless we have absolutely no choice. Being off work means we don't get paid, and also means we can lose our clients. If I regularly cancelled on clients because I have a bad cold, I'd soon loose them permanently.

woodchuck99 · 26/02/2020 09:59

I totally agree with you OP. Where I work people usually stay at home if they have a bad cold and either have the day off sick or work from home. If your workplace is similar your colleague has no excuse for spreading his germs everywhere.

IntermittentParps · 26/02/2020 10:00

Why couldn't you have worked from home the other two days?

The OP says today I am genuinely working from home but I’ve been off for the last 2.

Seriously, can people not read? Or are they thick? Genuine questions.

Emmuvva · 26/02/2020 10:03

In our company we have a policy of telling people who are sick to stay at home and not come in to spread their infection to everyone else. You're doing no one any favours by passing it on.

woodchuck99 · 26/02/2020 10:04

Just because colleague CAN work from home, doesn't mean he wants to. Many people prefer to come into the office.

So what ? It's incredibly selfish to go into the office just because you like it if it means you may potentially infect other people, some of whom may not suffer from a mild version of the infection.

The main problem I see is that he is not practicing good hygiene in that you say he's coughing and sputtering all over the place. It's quite possible to go to work with a cold and keep it to yourself.

Rubbish. While you might not affect other people if you practice good hygiene there is no guarantee. Just sitting next to somebody or talking somebody with a virus can be enough to pass it on sometimes.

JustInCaseCakeHappens · 26/02/2020 10:07

I think what was confusing was mixing working from home/ being off sick.

It's one or the other, not both! It sounded like the OP was "working from home" to avoid taking a sick day but with the same results.

Devlesko · 26/02/2020 10:10

Send a message back, saying you are working from home, rather than being selfish and spreading germs, like some people do.
Answer him back, cf.

AutumnRose1 · 26/02/2020 10:11

Blimey, does anyone actually read posts?

YANBU OP.

Straycatstrut · 26/02/2020 10:15

Schools would shut for the whole winter (and beyond) the amount of colds that get passed around between kids and staff.

People just need to medicate themselves better and practice better personal hygiene. I carry hand gel and make sure I wait until the water runs hot when washing my hands in public loos. Drives me mad when only cold is available.

LolaSmiles · 26/02/2020 10:16

I think what was confusing was mixing working from home/ being off sick

I agree. The two are totally separate.

It's reasonable to suggest people work from home if they are well enough to work and it also avoida bringing bugs in.
It's not reasonable to suggest people call in sick for having a cold.

Cosmos45 · 26/02/2020 10:19

I'm a bit surprised by the responses you have had OP. I see it as the question you are asking is if you have a cold, and have the option of working from home surely this is preferable to going into the office? I work from home and go into the office when I like (maybe once a week), I would get lambasted if I turned up with a cold. The moment anyone gets a sniffle they work from home. We hot desk, people have kids and some of our work means there are times when you really don't want to be sick so my company takes every reasonable effort they can to not spread colds etc around.

tenlittlecygnets · 26/02/2020 10:19

Surely common sense dictates that if you are able to work from home or take some days off you do so? Especially with this coronavirus going around!

These are two different things. if you go in to work with a cold, you will not pass coronavirus around. You will just pass on your cold germs - unless you have just come back from an area where there is an outbreak, or have been there yourself, in which case your question should be, AIBU to think that people who have been exposed to coronavirus should stay at home, in which case YANBU.

dreamingofsun · 26/02/2020 10:22

Some people suffer with colds more than others and it also depends on what sort of job you do. If its very technical and requires high levels of concentration then you are potentially going to screw up and in some jobs the consequences can be significant and would result in written warnings. Saying....i had a cold at the time and was being brave and working through this is unlikely to get much sympathy especially if customers have been adversely affected

Original poster
sunfloweryy · 26/02/2020 10:23

@Bikerider2020 because I felt like absolute kak and just wanted a couple of days to recover? Today I feel well enough to work but would still rather be at home in the warm and solitude and luckily my boss supports that!

OP posts:
MadeleineMaxwell · 26/02/2020 10:23

We've lived in Germany the past few years and the attitude here is the complete opposite, people get upset if you come into work ill! It's very easy to get signed off for 3 days, even with a cold. Yet somehow the country doesn't fall apart every winter, it still has higher productivity levels than the UK. My family is ill so much less here.

I lived in Germany in my formative years and the attitude is indeed very different. It was quite the culture shock coming back to the UK, and still is, really. Very different attitudes to illness and self-care, very different attitudes from HCPs, too. It can be quite difficult to navigate sometimes.

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