Parents wfh and the furloughed for childcare

[baskininjoe]

I am childless, currently by choice because I am in my twenties but do plan to have a child in the future at some point.

AIBU to be getting annoyed with the short end of the stick that the childless are getting right now with everything regarding childcare and lockdown.

I have so many colleges who are currently wfh whilst looking after children. I completely sympathise and understand this is hard but I am really starting to get annoyed with them being less productive, and logging less hours for the same pay (no reduction), whilst the rest of us are expected to pick up the slack, and work more hours to make sure tasks still get completed, whilst not being paid anymore for our extra time and effort. I know there is no perfect solution but it really grates on me that they aren't being paid for what they complete which could therefore compensate the rest of us for the extra we are having to do because they are not fully fulfilling their role.

On top of this with the idea of school provisionally going back in June some of these parents have said they will not be sending their DC to school, despite a place being open and available to them, and therefore expect the rest of us to continue to pick up their slack because they can't work as productively whilst looking after their children.

My housemate (shared house) works in a place where many parents have been furloughed for childcare reasons, despite their being lots of work to do, just because they've asked to be. This means that my housemate has been incredibly stressed as the workload is still high but the team is now smaller, whilst many of their colleges are receiving 80% on the taxpayer, despite their actually being work for them to do, all because they complained to their employer that it was too hard working with children and thus asking to be furloughed. This is especially grating as it is taxpayer money that is being used to pay them, despite their actually being a job they could do and be payed for.

I am not at all against the furlough scheme, another of my housemates work in a restaurant and is also on furlough and this is absolutely the right thing as they can not work, despite wanting to, as their place of work is not allowed to open.

However I think:

1. Some employers and employees are taking the piss by allowing staff to be furloughed/asking to be furloughed despite their actually being a job to do. Which then negatively affects the rest of the teams as the work level remains the same but there are less people to do the work so the remaining people have to work harder with no extra pay.

1. Employers need to be understanding but also firm with parents that although some productively will be affected by having DC at home, a certain level still needs to be consistently met or they are not doing their job properly and that negatively affects the business and the rest of the team.

1. Employers need to be especially understanding and grateful to employees still working, who are picking up the slack for those not being as productive because of DC at home/furloughed for childcare reasons despite their still being work. And actually need to consider financially compensating them for the high level of extra work and overtime and/or promise to look at these people first for upcoming promotions as as they have shown serious dedication to the business.

1. Employers should not be allowing parents to choose not to send DC to school when they can if it continues to affect the parents productivity level.

I understand this is a hard time for everyone, and parents do have it hard with few childcare options for DC, however that is not the problem of their colleagues and they should not be negatively affected by being expected to work far far more for no extra gain. My housemate and I are stressed beyond belief both having to work 10-12 hours every day for what would be a 9-5 office job in order to pick up the slack for colleagues whilst not being paid anymore whilst these colleagues are only completely 4-6 hours a day yet continuing to be paid the same as us. And on top of this are expecting it to continue despite their child being able to go to school soon because they are choosing not to send them.

There’s a positive sinkfull of drip feeds on this thread.

@GeeIneverthoughtofthat

Thank you.

I was well aware Mumsnet is full of passionate, intelligent people, ready to argue for their causes and beliefs, and I did not expect to go completely unchallenged.

However the level some posters have stooped to of personal insults, attacks, patronising and belittling has shocked and saddened me. And there are one or two posters I actually feel bullied by. No human, no matter if what they are saying is corrected or not, should be treated like this.

@littlebearpad

Sorry what have I exactly dripfeeded?

My caring responsibilities and MC. They are the only drip feeds that could be considered relevant.

The information regarding my dyslexia has nothing to do with the topic of this thread but was, once again, a defence to posters gleefully belittling, patronising and calling me stupid because of a few spelling mistakes.

It is not “your role in society” to work large amounts of extra hours as unpaid - and unappreciated - overtime which is having a detrimental impact on your own health and well being in order that your colleagues can look after their own children and work part time.

I think you need to get over yourself. My MIL was the only one able to go back to her job as one of three receptionists because she's single under 50 not shielding with no dc. It was very easy for her to choose to leave furlough and go in. She'll probably be doing more than her normal job but she's willing to do this because she's grateful she hasn't lost her job.
No one knows if the other two receptionists will now be first in line for redundancy purely because they have noone available to watch their young dc.
Just get over yourself work and moan to your managers. Hardly anyone is having a good time right now and even fewer are doing well out of this situation. So sit back focus on what's good, speak to your manager if you're really feeling like you can change something and let go of what you can't.
I also don't think a predominately parent focussed social media site is the best place to moan about your issues about 'parents'.

OP - for you

I'm surprised this thread is still here - for all sorts of reasons.

Hmnnn it's taken about 700 posts for you to tell us that you've spoken to your boss before starting this, which was suggested on page 1.
And you didn't think of mentioning that you work weekends and have chosen to take on extra work for this also.
Yes, you do like to drop feed.

The company clearly isn't about to go under of you do your contracted hours given that they've tasked you with assessing others performance, task which sounds borderline relevant at the best of times and is a purely 'nice to have'. It can't possibly be a business critical function.

It sounds to me as if this is a job you've got fresh out of university and are both still quite new and young, and maybe you simply don't have enough experience working with people or life experience to understand.

I'm not someone who thinks parents have the monopoly on hard work or tiredness in life, but in these unusual circumstances, most are under impossible strain as they try to do 2 jobs at once.

I assume the reason you do your caring job at the weekend rather than a week day is because you can't do your job whilst simultaneously being a carer? That it would be bonkers to do the two at the literal same time? That's what a lot of parents are being asked to do. And you want to punish them by reducing their pay so they can't pay their mortgage or bills or feed their children. All so you can have leisure time for yoga and watching TV.

Not all your work is business critical, if you don't want to do insane hours then simply don't.

I assume the reason you do your caring job at the weekend rather than a week day is because you can't do your job whilst simultaneously being a carer? That it would be bonkers to do the two at the literal same time? That's what a lot of parents are being asked to do. And you want to punish them by reducing their pay so they can't pay their mortgage or bills or feed their children.

Yup!! And your company won’t literally fall into Receivership because you have dropped one ball. For instance this extra task of monitoring productivity. It sounds time consuming. What happens if you don’t do it? Some things are less precisely measured - ie who’s doing what. But , so what. If they have to form a view on productivity they can do that the usual way on output. If they need people specific views for redundancies they can ask their managers to put them together and get some review from others. They will probably do that anyway, and the time gone into your process would only change some outcomes and the review process would be more focussed and might accomplish the same thing.
Or, if you really really don’t like that idea. It’s the kind of activity that would be easier done while juggling children than focussing on a spreadsheet - you can call someone and take down some basic answers with a child when you can’t actually do a task that involves thinking things through. So hand two of those off to a lazy parent and take on one of their tasks that require focussing. There are options op. The first thing every working mother I know learns when going back to work after baby is dropping some balls is career and mental survival. There are always fairly unnecessary things that can be left, and you got no points for doing them anyway. Focus on the value items (good people management is always a value item by the way) and people think you’re a star.

Do you propose we just leave the under 10s to look after themselves all day ?

I have requested @MNHQ delete this thread. Anyone else feel free to start a debate on this topic because as shown here there is a debate to be had and many nuances to all the issues raised.

I would like to thank posters like @geelneverthoughtofthat @oblada and @sandybval for sympathising with me but also defending me when personal attacks have been made. There are other posters to thank to but I can't scroll back through 700 messages so I would just like to say a blanket thank you to them all.

I would also like to thank anyone who has shown sympathy for my situation, whether or not their situation is harder than mine. And I sympathise with anyone finding life tough right now, it is shit but it will get better and hopefully this better will be soon.

I have requested this thread be deleted because the personal attacks about my SEN, snide comments about being lucky to be childless, and total disregard that I am too a human with feelings have got too much and I am awake at 5 am stressed about it. It saddens me that some posters seem to take glee in knocking me down and this is the first time for a long time I have felt bullied. I don't want any poster to have this thread used as a stick to beat them with, including myself as I feel personal attacks have been made in unrelated areas, simply because I hold a different view to some posters.

I wish everyone well in this difficult time. I hope everyone is and can remain healthy and hopefully life will go back to normal soon.

She doesn’t peppa, they can be adequately minded by the tv apparently.

Life lesson - know your audience, read the room

This is why I am frustrated with the situation. Because not even my employer has a solution and has apologised to me and other employees working overtime about the extra stress on us but can't do anything about it. That why I'm here venting my frustrations, because it's horrific being in a shit situation that you can't do anything more about.

I'm sorry but extra hours is not a shit situation, it's inconvenient maybe.

Losing a family member to CV19, not being able to be with them during the last moments, not being able to attend their funeral, that's shit,

Losing your job, your home, everything because of CV19, that's shit.

Personally I would not have an issue during these unprecedented times doing extra work to keep the company going. People with children at home have additional responsibilities so it's harder for them.

I note your first few posts defending posturing on a parenting forum, where you're likely to get parents enraged by your comments. I then note your last post, saying that you want this taken down. You were warned in the first few posts, but you decided it was your right to post,

Your current situation is not horrific. You've no idea what horrific is.

My company has monitored productivity but as a way of informing a decision on the feasibility of permanently wfh, the savings are massive. They can separate out temporary loss of productivity due to having kids at home from loss of productivity due to system slowness or need to access hardware. They're too astute to use it as a measure of who should be made redundant or not get a pay rise. I'm sure your employers are too OP and you've chosen to read something into that monitoring that makes you feel better about your current workload

sinkfull of drip feeds on this thread.

Quite.

YANBU. I'm a single parent keyworker so my DC go to school 2 days a week so I can do my job properly. So many key workers aren't using the school places open to them and instead are doing their jobs badly and causing themselves and their children significantly more stress. My managers kids are constantly interrupting meetings and its unnecessary. He could send them to school. I know school isn't a perfect solution for everyone at the moment but it is frustrating.

I couldn't be bothered to read your post through- be kind work your usual work and spare a through for your those WFH with young children and home schooling and supporting teenagers who are miss their friends. This won't last forever

Parents were told not to send their children to school if they were wfh. Parents I know were turned away from school for this very reason. I don't think it's been a choice for them to have their children at home whilst working. Some areas also stipulated that both parents must be key workers to access a place.

Oh NOW you want it down OP.

When the pity party you were anticipating failed to materialise (though god knows why you thought it would. You came to the worst possible place to take a pop at working parents)

When the absolute waterfall of a drip feed didn’t convince. The less said about 11th hour second jobs and previously forgotten consultations with the boss the better.

You’ve shown no attempts to empathise with people whatsoever, so I’m not exactly sanguine about your long term prospects.

Off you pop. Take care now.

So funny to wake up to see the OP has carried on posting, this thread must have taken up more of your day than anything else. The 'I'm so busy' thing is completely null and void at this point.

22 month old, 8 months pregnant, and working anywhere between 10-15 hours a day, 7 days a week, for one of the biggest companies in the world to help major clients navigate Covid-19. No childcare, DH at home trying his best the keep toddler busy all day everyday as I attend meetings and prof read every document and publication under the sun. Toddler is, as other posters have said, finding this incredibly difficult and regressing and throwing tantrums. No extra pay here and haven’t had a day off in weeks.

DH not allowed to work so we have the financial stress of me being the bread winner also.

Not easy across the board - fact.

Hahahaha to the 11th hour second job and suddenly remembering you HAD actually talked to your boss. Give over OP. Stay safe.

At least you have a job! After this so many people will have lost theirs with and without children. It's a horrid situation for everyone and people just have to make the most of it!

So funny to wake up to see the OP has carried on posting, this thread must have taken up more of your day than anything else. The 'I'm so busy' thing is completely null and void at this point

Exactly. I suspect the OP is very young as every comment from them comes across as immature, thoughtless and petulant. I’d also advise them to look up the words sympathise & empathise because despite using them frequently, they don’t actually seem to understand what they mean.