To feel my employer are suddenly discriminating because I have a young child?

[Tayo23]

I work for a government dpt where it is not usually commonplace to be able to work from home. On 19th/20th March when the schools closed, I was asked in work if this would impact me in regards to childcare - it does, and I was offered a laptop to work from home which I gratefully took.

At this point all my colleagues (except for a minority shielding or in similar positions) remained in the office every day as there were a lack of laptops for them - it was BAU. I worked remotely from home, with colleagues in the office uploading my (and other remote workers) work. A week later my office closed (a non-critical govt dpt) however I have continued to work from home since then although my colleagues without laptops were not working at all. My partner was furloughed a week or so after my office closed so has been a great help keeping 4yo entertained.

At the end of April my office advised those without laptops must return to the office one day a week on a rota basis to upload, (to maintain social distancing). I was not asked because it was understood I was working from home. Last week they provided everyone in my office (around 80 people) with laptops. I have now been told that because everyone else now has a laptop, I am now too required to work one day a week in the office, and spend the rest of the week working from home.

My partner returns to work next week. I now am in same position as end of March before lockdown re childcare. They are allowing me to take special leave for the one day a week I can’t come into the office, for 4 weeks. After then I have to use annual leave. I have repeatedly stressed I am willing to continue working each day from home. I just simply cannot leave my child at home alone. My partner is unable to get paid leave off and we would struggle without his pay.

AIBU to feel this way, they understood initially and accommodated me which I was extremely grateful for. I have worked each day whilst my colleagues barely have done until now, but now they too have the facilities to work from home, the goalposts have been moved.

I am not happy being told when to take AL when I have not asked for any time off. Do I have a leg to stand on here if I take this higher than my own line manager (who robotically regurgitates things without much compassion or consideration for people’s individual circumstances)

@bobbiester
Curious - how are you going to enforce this?
It's much easier to tell than you'd think, whether someone is doing the two simultaneously. But in the first instance yes, we do rely on people being honest. But enforcement is easy. There is no right to work from home, and it can be rescinded in a second. Without any requirement to give a reason. So if anyone were thought to be taking the proverbial, they will find themselves working in the office, just as would someone we believed was fiddling their timesheet or a number of other transgressions. Working from home has to be a matter of trust.

I'll be honest - not one of my staff has ever played fast and loose with the rules, whatever they are. I work hard to find solutions to any problems, but that has to also take account of the rules (because there have to be rules) and they understand that. They know that I give as much support as I can in many, many ways, so they don't try to push back on what must happen.

If I were in this situation - and for different reasons I soon will be - I would offer the same solution. If you don't want to leave home for ANY reason (except for shielding, which comes under different categories of rules) then you must take leave. Annual leave or unpaid leave. I've had to do it before, and I will have to do it again when this is all a dim memory.

Moondust001 - really?

In my area schools aren’t opening on 1 June. The LA has made this decision. They may open later but that’ll only be for YsR, 1 and 6.

Me and DH have been “juggling” for weeks. It’s definitely not been easy and life will be better when they can go back but there is categorically no evidence that this has impacted on our abilities to do our jobs.

I’ve worked since my eldest was born nearly 13 years ago. We’ve worked to ensure our (mostly paid for) childcare options are available. At the moment, many of these options simply aren’t available. You must realise that, surely?

I work for a government department which has a had a policy for parents of "just do as much as you can" and it's just unsustainable.

It's not even that helpful for parents, as there's a huge variation in how people interpret that statement and because it's such a unclear statement some parents are still trying to do more than is reasonable and worrying that they're not doing enough and others are taking the piss.

That's before you even get onto the fact that the rest of us are trying to deliver projects which will cost millions of pounds if they overrun but have no knowledge of how many hours or when half of our colleagues are working.

Vampyress thank you! This is exactly how I feel. It’s seems the majority think I am BU but grateful for any input and perspective on this.

Although it’s only 30 minutes of work in the office, we are still required to do our contracted hours. They won’t let you go home just because you’ve finished your work, so it’s a whole day in the office. Bringing my child in is not an option at all.

Asking a colleague to swap could possibly work. It’s something I may suggest.

I am fully aware ‘others have it worse’ but that still doesn’t change my situation. I have felt extremely lucky and grateful thus far but feel the rig has suddenly been pulled from under me when none of this is my fault or within my control. I disagree that I have had it better than others I work with who have been off doing nothing 4 days a week on full pay, when I’ve worked a stressful job with a 4yo at home 5 days for months. Again, I’m grateful they accommodated me, but were my colleagues asked to take their annual leave before now? No, not the only parent in the office. But I’m the only one I know of who was been working this whole time, and the only one who works throughout the summer holidays so is left in this position when the special leave is over.

Ofc I knew I would have to return to work at some point. However, if I was given a solution to work from home for the sole reason I had no childcare, it feels unreasonable to me to then remove that provision when the situation regarding childcare is still exactly the same.

I do not want to use my annual leave yes, because I am not asking for any time off - I am willing to work.

DP is my DS’s father yes.

Thanks for all the helpful suggestions.

If you are WFH 4 days a week with a 4 year old at home too, I think it would be great for the child to have you one day a week not working. He won’t be getting much attention at all otherwise....

Wow, the people on this thread saying that parents should just give up their leave, their work, their careers....and on a parenting site. I'm frankly appalled at the lack of empathy, and of understanding. @Moondust001 is it really better that NO work gets done, than some work gets done not so well? Is it really better to penalise the parents on your team for being parents (you would not get away with that where I live, BTW, it is illegal) and possibly force them out of work, homes, etc, than it is to accept that fuck me, we're in the middle of a pandemic, and nothing is quite normal? Also, are your non-parent team members working to standard? It would astonish me if they were, because, you know, pandemic.

I can't believe some of the responses here. Yes in normal times childcare is the parents responsibility
, but in normal times OP has a nursery and a GM

The OP also has a partner who is not expected to share any of the childcare because he's working. Well so is she! Yes it is the parents responsibility to manage childcare, at any time. Both of them.

Just as a side note - for everyone quoting 'reasonable adjustments', under the Equality Act the duty to make reasonable adjustments only applies to the protected characteristic of disability. You can't cite it for wanting flexibility around your childcare needs.

OP, yanbu.

OK @Moondust, so what are you going to do about the other 50% of time for parents? 20 hours a week, whatever it is that you do that is SO important it is worth destroying folks' livelihoods over in the middle of a pandemic can be done without interruption because the other parent can handle it. 20 hours a week it can't. What then? The parents will just have to adjust? Why is it on the parents to adjust, and not wherever it is you work? Why is it all give and no take? I kind of wish you would name where you work, BTW. I would never want to work somewhere so inhumane.

@CallItLoneliness
It is not illegal and nor is it unfair. And yes, my non-parent employees are not only working to standard but they are mopping up the extra work left undone by parents. Nobody is saying that out loud and nobody is complaining (yet) but I know it is true. If we do not maintain our workload on a huge anti-poverty programme then poor people literally go without money and food and work.

I love it when, in normal times, so many people love to bash the public sector for cushy jobs and too much flexibility, but the minute we expect our employees to work like everyone elses, someone comes along screaming what bastards we are!

feel the rig has suddenly been pulled from under me

It's not suddenly been pulled from under you, they are giving you 4 weeks notice (and with one day off per week during those 4). That is not sudden.

This isn't fair on anyone unfortunately and lots of people have had to do things they don't want to do when none of this is their fault. People have lost 20% of their income even though none of this is their fault, people will be being made redundant shortly even though none of this is their fault. You're only being asked to use some AL and to be honest I believe a lot of companies are asking employees to use AL now so they don't have huge numbers of people off later in the year.

Moondust001 Have you thought of offering parents the opportunity to catch up at other parts of the day? Or at weekends? That’s what we do. We accept the 9-5 may not be possible.

@Tayo23 - "I’m willing to do the much more complicated, stressful job at home 5 days instead of 4, as I have been for weeks. But hey ho."

You do realise that's what they pay you for right, a 5 day week irrespective of where you do it?

There are 80 in your office, some of them must have kids so what's make you any different to them?

They're letting you take special leave and want you to take some holiday and are trying to work with you to accommodate your needs. It's not their fault your husband and his company cannot be flexible.

What are your usual childcare arrangements when DS is not at nursery eg. over Christmas Easter and Summer holidays and half terms? Surely you use that same child care for these days? I assume you and DP take annual leave but that doesn't cover the entire holiday period. Also who collects DS from nursery?

Nurseries can open from 1 June.

Childminders are able to take children again too.

So what is the normal childcare when DS is not in nursery. If a private nursery all year they open on 1 June too

Just for the people who keep saying my colleagues were furloughed whilst I’ve been working. They were not furloughed. Our department simply did not yet have enough provisions for them to work from home, they have been on full pay the whole time. The work still needed to be done, and the people working from home have been doing this. It’s been a massive oversight that the ‘uploading’ system cannot be accessed from home and I believe the department has received a bollocking for not having a contingency plan in place before now.

@mrsbyers err it is true. I'm living it, but thank you so much for trying to correct me!

I actually wouldn't even worry about this for now.

In 4 weeks' time there will most probably be some different guidelines about childcare providers or people working from workplaces that make whatever is decided now entirely irrelevant. If there isn't then alternating weeks off with your DP seems perfectly acceptable - what exactly are you keeping your AL for anyway?

YANBU. Not in the slightest.

Put it all in writing, escalate above line manager. Indicate other staff gave saud they'd be happy to do the extra day in the office rather then WFH.

They're being utterly fucking ridiculous.

Airbags - of course I realise that’s what they pay me for! I’m not complaining that I’ve been working 5 days, I came to them with a problem and they accommodated it. My point is I am still willing to work 5 days and I have not asked for any AL.

Im really surprised the majority of people seem to think the Op is in the wrong here and should be take annual leave etc.

I think any reasonable employer would understand the childcare issue and allow the Op to stay at home as before. Its not about treating everyone the same, its about treating people fairly.

I hope you get it sorted Op.

How is it utterly fucking ridiculous for an employer, who's been accommodating so far and will continue to do for another few weeks (even OP says she's been grateful), to ask that they now just use some AL?

People up and down the country are being asked to use annual leave right now so that they don't have huge amounts of people off later in the year.

None of this is anyone's fault but most of us are having to make sacrifices in some way. I don't see why a few days AL is such a huge, utterly fucking ridiculous request.

I said it earlier but why is it so unreasonable to take some annual leave to cover this situation? Not all, but some. Some employers are ‘forcing’ leave to be taken now anyway as if everyone saves it up to take later in the year then that won’t work!

What are the other workers with kids doing?

A child has two parents.

The idea that it should always be the woman's employer who is flexible around childcare doesn't do women as a class any favours. It's amazing how many men can't look after their children because they're working at home, can't ask for flexible working because they're working as if the man's job comes first.

We aren't in normal times. But unless DP is working away then he needs to request some flexibility to look after his children as it is a shared task. If that isn't convenient to the OP and her DP then she needs to work alongside her employers, who have already been flexible, to come to an arrangement and accept that is unlikely to be preferential treatment to WFH whilst she is sole carer for he children.