To not answer my phone when I’m annual leave?

[Elsiebear90]

I work in the NHS am clinical, fairly senior (band 7), started a new job in September and have witnessed and heard awful things about the management since I started. There is very high staff turnover in my department and morale is very low.

I have ten days of annual leave over the Xmas period, with two days during this where I am oncall. We all received an email today from our manager stating that as we have five members of staff off sick with Covid we need to be available over the Christmas period for work including additional on calls, which means some of us will have to come in when we’re on annual leave in the “worst case scenario”. Everyone I have spoken to has told me they just won’t answer their phones if called and that this could be prevented by the manager cancelling the outpatient clinics and/or diverting our emergency oncall service to a nearby hospital, which she apparently refuses to do.

My question is firstly does anyone with NHS knowledge know if she cancel our annual leave with next to no notice (she’s citing covid as an excuse for this) and also would it be unreasonable of me to not answer my phone if called?

My feelings are that it’s not really annual leave if the entire time I have to be available for work, I’m essentially oncall and not being paid to do so. I’ve seen online that NHS policy appears to be that adequate notice periods (length of annual leave plus one day) need to be applied and all other options exhausted before cancelling annual leave and this doesn’t seem to be the case here.

Perhaps you could suggest that you divvy up the days so that you have some days when you know that you are first/second reserve if those on-call are ill/isolating, and some days when you know you're safe. And yes, cancelling outpatients (or shortening it, if it's too late notice to let everyone know not to come) before getting as far as the second reserve might be wise.

I feel that currently much of the NHS is run on good will and volunteers though, and I do work there

I’m nhs and in a major incident situation I’d expect all bands 7 and above to be called and I’d expect to work. It’s not something that happens a lot… I’ve been called once in February half term due to snow and a risk to patient safety.

I'm senior clinical NHs- my leave has been cancelled today and I've also been told I'm working Christmas Day. The whole 24 hours.
It's not great, I have very young children and elderly parents. But you know what, I chose the job I did to care for ill patients. Unlike other jobs people come to harm if there is no one to care for them.
You don't sound very caring or professional to me- are you in the right career?

@Foolsrule

Good Lord, the NHS isn’t a charity! It can’t be run on goodwill and a few volunteers. Skills cost. I’m sure the OP would be happy to be on call for the right price. Except wait - there’s no money for things like that as the service has been underfunded for years 🙄 What actually needs to happen to force change is for everyone to stop working overtime, stop going above and beyond and for there to be an even bigger crisis than there is now. Multiple deaths is the only way that change will happen. Enabling the situation will not help long term (and, quite frankly, isn’t fair). God pity the poor patients who are caught in the crossfire. Makes me feel glad I have private healthcare cover through work!

Good luck with that. You do no that private healthcare provides NO emergency cover. You'll be relying on the good old NHS at Christmas I'm afraid.

I’m nhs. I have given up annual leave, worked additional (unpaid) hours, been on call and fitted in extra patients where no space. Unfortunately after 18 years with not a single sick day it pushed me to edge of a breakdown and I needed several weeks off as a result. Unless there is a genuine risk to patients you must take your annual leave. Switch off properly. Both you and your patients will benefit more in the long term.

NHS manager here. I suppose it depends on your speciality but in mine (primary care so no RTT or USC issues) we would look to cancel routines and have a triage system running with a senior consultant. Recognising the struggles my staff have faced, including redeployment to covid wards, I would think twice about cancelling any leave and try to pull some favours with the senior medics.

@MsAgnesDiPesto

None of the NHS clinical staff that I’ve ever known would knowingly leave patients without care, even if they were supposed to be on leave. Emergencies happen, especially in a pandemic. If you know that this manager won’t offer other ways to give care (cancelling outpatient appointments would be particularly savage given the waits people have had during covid) then I don’t know how much you’ll be able to enjoy your leave anyway.

Surely clinical staff have been known to actually travel during their annual leave, like not be available to pop back in for emergencies?!

@helenabonhamfarter

I'm senior clinical NHs- my leave has been cancelled today and I've also been told I'm working Christmas Day. The whole 24 hours. It's not great, I have very young children and elderly parents. But you know what, I chose the job I did to care for ill patients. Unlike other jobs people come to harm if there is no one to care for them. You don't sound very caring or professional to me- are you in the right career?

I don’t sound caring or professional because I along with my colleagues expect our manager to not rely on cancelling annual leave with no notice instead of proper planning? There are other options she could take instead of asking people to come in last minute during their leave, of course none of us would leave patients to die or suffer, but someone having a non essential outpatient appointment they could have had remotely is not a clinical emergency.

@helenabonhamfarter

I'm senior clinical NHs- my leave has been cancelled today and I've also been told I'm working Christmas Day. The whole 24 hours. It's not great, I have very young children and elderly parents. But you know what, I chose the job I did to care for ill patients. Unlike other jobs people come to harm if there is no one to care for them. You don't sound very caring or professional to me- are you in the right career?

What band are you?

@Foolsrule

Good Lord, the NHS isn’t a charity! It can’t be run on goodwill and a few volunteers. Skills cost. I’m sure the OP would be happy to be on call for the right price. Except wait - there’s no money for things like that as the service has been underfunded for years 🙄 What actually needs to happen to force change is for everyone to stop working overtime, stop going above and beyond and for there to be an even bigger crisis than there is now. Multiple deaths is the only way that change will happen. Enabling the situation will not help long term (and, quite frankly, isn’t fair). God pity the poor patients who are caught in the crossfire. Makes me feel glad I have private healthcare cover through work!

Absolutely this ^ (although the private health care option is not good for emergency needs):

I work part time nhs (weekdays only) and some weekends at a private hospital. The weekend rate there is lucrative. I wouldn’t consider nhs weekends as they don’t pay enough to warrant the inconvenience.

I did used to go “above and beyond” but it was drummed out of me once when I asked to come in 2 hours late and work 2 hours over to watch my ds nativity which was announced with only a couple of weeks notice. (Our leave had to be booked 6 weeks in advance). I was told I couldn’t as it wasn’t fair on others who were full time and couldn’t change their hours. Since then I have been asked on many occasions to swap and change hours to suit the manager but have only helped out if it suited me to do it. Goodwill works both ways.

@PAFMO

How do you not know that of course NHS annual leave can be cancelled in an emergency? And you're clinical and "fairly senior"?

Wow, you're rude. Is there a reason why you can't talk in a civil manner to people?

It is disgraceful to do this to you. So sorry. There are too many managers in the NHS who get away with crap like this. There is a lot of lip service but when it actually comes to making life bearable for the people under them, they wont put themselves out.

Asked DD1 this morning what leave she had over Xmas. Band 5 scientist. She said 4 days but would be called in to cover at least 2 days probably due to covid absence and would happily do it.

My partners in the same kind of boat. He was approved weeks and weeks ago some time off over Xmas.
He works three long days a week as contract and picks up three long days as bank shifts.
So 6 days a week, all 13 hour shifts.
It really helps his ward that he does so many days.

So he wanted a bit of time off over Xmas, enjoy the celebrations, relax and have some days to chill and have a drink, spend much needed time with family.

This has now been cancelled and he's to work long day Xmas Eve, and half days both Xmas day and Boxing Day.

To say we are seething is an understatement, the poor man works so hard and they don't complain then! But to cancel his annual leave and work all three important days over Xmas.

He's recently had an interview for a senior role and got the job which we are so thankful for as it gets him away from his absolutely shit bag of a manager.
Oh to be clear, his manager is off over Xmas. Their Xmas won't be interrupted.

He's taken this higher and hoping to talk to someone very senior before the shifts hoping to at least get one day off.

OP turn your phone off and enjoy your break. I just wish my partner could do the same.

Turn off your phone OP. I'm in a corporate role now (also a 7), but at least when I'm asked to work clinically by my manager to cover I can guarantee she'll be doing her fair share too.

I'm retired NHS and thought you were being unreasonable however 'the manager is non clinical so won't be coming in' changes my take on this. If she can apply a different strategy as you say to avoid any problems with staffing then definitely turn your phone off and enjoy your holiday time with your family.

Leave the phone on,put it on silent. Don't look near it until your working again

I'm.not NHS but I am management and in times like this yes I would expect to work to cover sickness. Indeed I fully expect to be in working with the cleaners in January if any of them have to SI. That's what managers should do.

@helenabonhamfarter

I'm senior clinical NHs- my leave has been cancelled today and I've also been told I'm working Christmas Day. The whole 24 hours. It's not great, I have very young children and elderly parents. But you know what, I chose the job I did to care for ill patients. Unlike other jobs people come to harm if there is no one to care for them. You don't sound very caring or professional to me- are you in the right career?

It's professional to have boundaries - I wouldn't consider being a martyr prepared to drop everything to go to work during annual leave very professional actually.

One of the reasons NHS staff have poor pay and conditions is due to the government being able to exploit and utilise the goodwill of workers.

You are replaceable at work - you aren't replaceable at home.

helenabonhamfarter there is absolutely no need for that attitude.
Ignore her OP, take your leave and don't feel guilty about it. It took me forty years to realise what a mug I'd been working extra shifts, doing extra on calls etc. Always being guilt tripped with the ' think of the patients ' mantra. When staffing issues were often the result of poor management decisions in the first place.

The problem is that the manager herself is not clinical so won’t be coming in during her leave and the deputy managers refuse to do oncall (claim they are too busy), so there are options that could be taken to prevent people being asked to come in during their annual leave that don’t harm patients that are not being utilised, and the people making these decisions aren’t affected by them either.

I understand that it would be a goodwill gesture to come in, but my goodwill has been abused on numerous occasions, today I’m covering someone’s oncall at short notice due to low staffing (after doing two on-calls over the weekend) and agreed to do it as a swap, this then got turned into “Elsiebear is doing both on-calls as no one will swap” and “Elsiebear will be doing another oncall during her leave too if X is still off sick” without me even being asked. It is just assumed I will do all these on-calls as and when they need doing when the managers are unwilling to do any themselves despite being able to. I wouldn’t mind but I only get paid £14 for being oncall for 14 hours so I’m not even properly compensated.

I would never let patients come to any harm, but we’re not talking about that, we’re talking about a manager refusing to postpone routine non urgent outpatient appointments (that could be done remotely anyway) because they prefer to demand people cancel their annual leave with no notice instead, which as far as I can tell is against trust policy.

I think we are the same profession op (based on your replies) and I agree things could and should be managed more fairly and contingency plans should be in place.

This is just my opinion (fwiw 😬). Staff working in the nhs are still human beings. They have been pushed to their absolute limits since the pandemic kicked off almost 2 years ago (and most likely way before then if I’ve been understanding correctly) with no end in sight, in fact we’re again being told it’s going to get worse before it gets better.

Op booked their leave in plenty of time and yes, there is an emergency going on (it haunts us all every day), but there is no end in sight so how much longer can we expect people already running on empty to carry on like this without a decent break? Don’t we want our nhs (especially clinical staff) to be well rested so they don’t make mistakes or lose their compassion as they’ve given too much already. We all know who’s to blame for this but nows not the time to go over that. I think op needs a break, 10 days in the whole scheme of things that will buy us all extra time seems logical. We’re all very grateful for the ones that keep going but eventually even they will burn out which helps no one. I work in construction supply and we’ve never been so busy, can’t get days off, we supply the contractors who fix the roads, schools, hospitals, rail alongside housing, we’re all knackered and in danger of crashing, this is a common theme across our country. I hope op and those like them manage to recharge.

Our trust doesn’t allow any annual leave over the two week Xmas/new year period for any nursing staff regardless of band as it’s a notorious time for sickness and patient safety comes first. I thought that was the norm for most trusts tbh. You’ll find that they expect a lot more of you now you’re a band 7, ignoring work calls/emails won’t go down well at all now you’re management, it’s like selling your soul to the devil at times!