To ask for another week of furlough?

[Fasttrack321]

I was furloughed at the start of lockdown and have not been working since end of March. I have been looking after my 2 young children full time as my DP has been working full time. Luckily DP's job is secure and their employer is flexible with WFH.

My furlough pay is capped at the limit of £2,500 and has not been topped up so my income has been about half of my normal pay. I am very grateful to have been furloughed rather than lose my job.

My employer wrote to me on Friday and informed me my furlough was ending and I was expected back to work on Monday. I discussed this with my DP (who is classed as a key worker, not front line) as the kids are only in part time childcare. DS is 5 and in Reception, DD is 3 and in nursery 3 days per week.

My DP is working full time 9-5 and cannot change working hours this week at such short notice. So cannot do drop off and pick up for the children (nursery and school are about 15 minutes drive apart). DP also cannot WFH and look after DD who is 3 and needs constant supervision.

This week will be impossible to juggle, but from the following week we can manage with flexible working hours and the help of a grandparent.

AIBU in asking my employer to extend my furlough by one more week? I checked the government guidance and there is a specific provision for this which allows furlough for those with caring responsibilities. I would only want this for 1 additional week.

I am incredibly grateful my employer has asked me to return and I do want to return. I have been there years and have a good reputation for being one of their top employers and managers.

My only other option would be to use a weeks annual leave, but then I'd have none left for the rest of the year and summer holidays when I would need to take leave to cover childcare again.

Most of the company were furloughed and now being brought back bit by bit.

YABU - get back to work immediately.
YANBU - take an extra week furlough to sort your childcare out.

*, there are some very hard of thinking posters who can't comprehend that because they've had to work from home everyone else can, surely anyone could name 10 jobs of the top of their head that can't be done from home even if you have no children.
*
But that's not relevant here as DP can work from home. It says so clearly in the OP. He just can't work from home with a toddler, which quite frankly neither can most people but thousands and more have HAD to regardless. I'm sure the DP's job is no more important than many of the others that have been doing it for months.

The sex of your DP is irrelevant and focyssing on that is just your way of deflecting drom the real point that many of us have had to juggle wfh with intense, demanding, high powered jobs at the same time as homeschooling and childcare for the past 3 months. Your DP is no different and as someone who has put full teams on furlough (some for their benefit to help with childcare), I would be very annoyed if one of them said they wanted an extra week, even as annual leave, due to childcare issues.

I love the way some posters think you can just ask for another weeks furlough! The scheme (taxpayer funded) doesn’t work like that. The scheme is short term and so that an employer who is unable to operate, can retain the workforce. However a recent poll of employers said that 40% of employers with furloughed employees now anticipated making redundancies.

Since March you will have accrued approx 1 week of leave while being off work. It is completely unreasonable to ask for more furlough in this situation

It seems unfair to give you short notice to return to work but I don’t think asking for more furlough is fair either. It would be reasonable to ask to take annual leave or unpaid leave as previous posters have said.

OP I assumed your partner is male as they are acting like one and failing to flex for childcare.

Either way 'they' need to step up, the government has been enabling them up to this point via your furlough.

I'm afraid I have zero sympathy, full time working lone parent. I have worked full time throughout and my kids have been raised via Netflix. Whilst my childless colleagues were on furlough I might add.

Your partner needs to deal with having to do a little childcare.

I think it’s one of those situations where you should be taking the hit not the furlough scheme. The financial support provided by the taxpayers has to be repaid. Please minimise your contribution to National debt where you can. You say you’ve never received benefits until claiming under the furlough scheme, but that has already totted up 4x£2500, and to be frank it sounds like you’ve birthed two children and expect them to be safe and educated as presumably you and your partner were.

I would definitely ask for a further week of furlough in your situation. It benefits your employer to have you furloughed rather than taking annual leave. It's also possible to have flexible furlough from July so you could perhaps work part time this week?

You’ve had some vary unsympathetic responses on here OP, I thought other working mums would be more supportive! I would ask for another week of furlough, and make sure you explain that you have childcare worked out for the following week. Alternatively, ask if you can do half days of work (using your hours of childcare and plus an hour or two early morning/evening), half days furlough for the first week (the new rules permit this) and you will be able to work more effectively this way. The furlough scheme can be used this way, as you rightly say, and don’t let the furlough rage on here imply otherwise.

Ask for another week to give you time to sort childcare OR find an older teenager to do the after school hours in the interim.

Your employer has been a bit unreasonable I think. You can't tell someone on Friday they want you back Monday, why didn't they give you more notice?
You can ask your employer but what will you do if they say no? Personally if they do I'd take a week unpaid leave and save my holiday for the summer.

I thought other working mums would be more supportive!
Why are you assuming people commenting are mums?

One further option would be to request parental leave - this is usually unpaid but is usually a contractual right. Employees are entitled to use up to 4 weeks every year. It usually needs 21 days notice to request but your employer may waive this.
www.gov.uk/parental-leave/entitlement

I thought other working mums would be more supportive!

One of the most supportive things to a working parent is a supportive partner.

@daisypond

I thought other working mums would be more supportive! Why are you assuming people commenting are mums?

errrm I didn’t. I assume most people commenting are parents, as this is a parents forum. Some comments are probably from non-working parents. But I expected working MUMS to be more sympathetic as tend to be well versed in the difficulties juggling childcare and work.

I thought other working mums would be more supportive!

The OP has made it very clear that we are not to assume their sex on this thread. However, I do hate this cliche that women should support other women come what may. In this situation, where there is a parent WFH, what most people are saying is that that parent can do what hundreds of thousands of other parents have done over lockdown and look after the children whilst WFH. The OP can then return to work as required - their place of employment is ready for them to return and therefore there is no longer any need for the tax-payer to prop up that business by subsidising a furlough scheme.

I think some people seem to think that furlough is there in case things are a bit awkward to work out, rather than an emergency scheme in a time of crisis which is costing our country billions of pounds.

Why are you assuming people commenting are mums?

Because it's mumsnet and a parenting forum? I know there are "non-mums" but it's pretty safe to assume that a website for "mums" will have a fair percentage of "mums"

Because it's mumsnet and a parenting forum? I know there are "non-mums" but it's pretty safe to assume that a website for "mums" will have a fair percentage of "mums"

It's a website for parents

And there are plenty people who aren't parents also. Don't assume.

OP, ask for an extra week of furlough and explain that this will enable you, as a family, to sort out childcare. Don’t just take annual leave because other posters have said this is what you should do.

If you were one of the top managers you would have known when re opening was starting. If top managers don’t know then no staff would know when to return. You have been on furlough for three months and plenty of time for preparing even with little notice. If your staff asked you for more time of when your back at work after they have been at home for three months I think you would be a littlei

Me and my husband have had to work from home throughout lockdown with a two and three year old at home, no furlough, no childcare and no family help at all for us and we both had to take pay cuts whilst still working as hard as ever. I think you have been incredibly lucky to be honest and can't believe you begrudge using some annual leave.

The government guidance to employers on the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (referred to as furlough) is clear:

“Employees who are unable to work because they have caring responsibilities resulting from Coronavirus (covid-19) can be furloughed. For example, employees that need to look after children can be furloughed”.

Except in your case the other parent is already at home full time but just doesn't want the responsibility of caring for their own kids. You're both taking the piss.

PP’s suggestion of paying a teenager to help with pick up and drop offs and a bit of childcare is a good one. As officially I think that would now be allowed. Or presumably DCs have friends whose parents could help out just a bit this week?

Either you or your husband needs to take annual leave.