To refuse to do the work till Tuesday?

[Ravenclawsome]

I work part time, Tuesday-Thursday.

Part of my job requires getting data from an external source, processing it into a usable form and then entering it into our system.

On Wednesday there was a delay in the external source getting the data to us. Not a massive deal really.

I had a meeting Thursday morning so was unable to request and process it myself so I asked my colleague, whose job it is to cover me when I am unavailable (just so no one accused me of dumping my work on him) to do it and I'd then do the system input once I was available.

Except he requested the data but didn't process it for me so it was available once I was out of the meeting.

Instead he requested it, but then did his own main role. Meaning once I was out of the meeting I was twiddling my thumbs. (The nature of the data means it's in a physical form, once it's requested and collected whoever has is, has it and no one else can get a copy).
His role wasn't time sensitive and processing the data first would have allowed us BOTH to get on.

Sorry to be vague but tThis is all for background.

He finally got the processed data to me after I finished for the night yesterday.

My boss has "kindly" said I can do it at my leisure.
AIBU to refuse to do it till I return?

It's preferable it's done sooner rather than later and will piss folk off if I don't do it before then but the company won't fall apart if I don't and I don't want to work on my bloody days off!

YANBU - leave it till Tuesday, not your fault
YABU - finish the task

Definitely leave it til Tuesday.

It's not clear whether "at your leisure" means "when you can", which is Tuesday, or "during your leisure"!

Perhaps you could ask your boss whether he would like you to do it today and have Tuesday morning off, or leave it until Tuesday. But I think you're within your rights just to leave it until Tuesday.

Do it at your leisure.
That would be Tuesday.

Yanbu however sounds like a conversation needs to be had with your colleague so it doesn't repeat

Definitely not unreasonable to leave until your normal working times, given that you took reasonable steps that would have meant you could have done it if your colleague had completed them.

If it impacted anyone else’s role to not have this data processed, then I might consider doing it outside of normal work hours, but only if I could get the time back when I chose.

It’s quite hard to understand tbh, but how long will it take to do? If you are not going to do it, which is fair enough, you must tell you boss that and explain why you won’t do it until Tuesday.

"at your leisure" could mean so many things.
When you want
When you're back in
I've been waiting for it already for 2 days because of miscommunication between you and the bloke so I expect it today

Hard to say.

I'd ask if it's OK when I'm back in, or given that the person I asked to do it didn't do it, should it, as a one-off due to poor communication be done immediately.

Yes you can leave. Personally I’d do it.

It depends on lots of things.

I process our payroll. On occasion people miss the deadline for a variety of reasons. I could ignore, say it came in on my day off and it will go in next month and they’d be fine with that.

But it’s no real skin off my nose to add it so I do.

If it were regular I wouldn’t. A one off? Probably would.

Absolutely Tuesday. You don't get paid for your days off, so you don't need to work.

You would be going down potentially a slippery slope if you agreed to do it sooner than Tuesday. Other people would take advantage and allege something is an 'emergency' aka bad planning.

If by 'at your leisure' you mean when you're actually paid to do it, then yes, wait until Tuesday.

Well I suppose it depends on What your problem solving and Prioritising skills are like. You now have a problem. How would you expect, say, a colleague Or your staff member to deal with this?

@Enko

Yanbu however sounds like a conversation needs to be had with your colleague so it doesn't repeat

Id do it before Tuesday and use it as an example of why we need to have that conversation.

Unless you want to negotiate some time in lieu then Tuesday.

Can you do it and take the time back/go in late Tuesday?

YANBU. Leave it til Tuesday and if pulled up on it, just say you were waiting on it but didn't get in time to complete it while at work. You don't work Fridays/Mondays so don't even think about doing it. It sets a precedence if you start obliging them by working on your non working days.

This sounds like a massively inefficient system that should be automated as soon as possible!

Your colleague prioritised his work, that makes sense. What time was your meeting? Was there a reason you couldn't request it prior and then process once you were free?

Just musing, did they feel you could have requested it yourself and were making a point by prioritising their workload?

@Seainasive

This sounds like a massively inefficient system that should be automated as soon as possible!

I'm being vague by calling it data as it's VERY outing (ie I am one of the few specialists in this role and one of only a handful who are female).

It is data in the legal sense as in there is some personal information but it's not data in the Excell/ numbers sense and it's not held in digital format.

@HunterHearstHelmsley in short geography. He was in the right building to collect it, I wasn't.

I'd do it first thing on Tuesday.

YANBU – leave it till Tuesday, not your fault
and if the boss huffs and puffs, have a word with them about how, 'unfortunately', it wasn't made ready for you in time as you requested.

Boss saying 'at your leisure' is a bit ; very unclear but I assume they mean during what is meant to be your leisure time, which is taking the piss.

Tuesday. It wasn't sent to you till you'd finished work. Don't start down the road of always interrupting your time off for work tasks.

“At your leisure” means no rush, do it at your convenience. Certainly not that you should do it in your leisure time. I’d do it Tuesday but I think Wednesday would be fine too as I imagine Tuesday usually involves catching up on emails from when you aren’t in.

If they misused the phrase then they should be more specific. I hate it when people ask for ASAP because some mean within the next day or so and others mean in the time you’d expect fire engines to arrive to a mass disaster event in a major city. And neither type specify in their email!

How long will it take?

Could you do it as a one off but make it categorically clear it was done due to someone else not fulfilling their duties (that sounds a bit snippy so you may not want to go down that route)

I work 3 days per week and don't even have access to my work emails on a non work day (IE I don't have them linked to my phone and I don't log on for the days I don't work!)