AIBU - team holiday requests

[aibuboss]

This is playing on my mind and I know I will get honest replies here. NC because it's potentially outing...

I am A in this situation.

A is a senior manager with a small team- B is a manager too (£50k salary to demonstrate seniority) and directly line manages Employee C.

September is normally a busy time for us so holidays not really feasible unless an exceptional circumstance. The team is only 5 people, all quite different jobs, so only ever one on leave at a time unless it's August (quiet month).

I have recently approved a week off for B in September as they told me they needed to travel abroad to sort out some urgent paperwork for an elderly relative. Yesterday C declined a meeting request for the same week telling me that she was on holiday.

C hasn't booked through online holiday booking but did sent B an email that she's approved - it was before her request (via booking system). B didn't tell me this. I was fuming and told them yesterday they have told them they have until lunchtime today to sort it out between them and agree who is taking it else it's unpaid for both. Both have already booked overseas travel.

On reflection I actually think B should be the one to cancel or be unpaid- she should have known the holiday was overlapping from the email she'd approved. C has booked a holiday in good faith. This isn't the first performance issue I have with B and am now thinking about issuing a warning based on ineffective management- she shouldn't have approved C's leave anyway because of workloads (no exceptional circumstances- it's a 2 week all inclusive cheap deal!).

AIBU??

This

exactly what @AngelaChasesBestLife says
Thank god i don't work for you. We are also a small team with very specific jobs, no one does my job when i am off, people can do urgent bits if need be. There has been a few times that we have had more than one person out from the team. We survived, you can not control life, people get sick, people die, unexpected issues crop up etc. You need to learn how to deal with these.
A previous company i worked for was similar to you, manager i had wouldn't let me have time off as two other people were out that day too. She got very thick with me as i pointed out to her she all ready approved three people to be off in same team last week. and three people were off in a months times (also one of the people off was her friend ). We all worked on the same team but different areas so us taking time off didn't affect any of the other peoples work . Needless to say we had little respect for that manager, she didn't help her case she rang in sick at least once a month plus then took 6 weeks holidays off. They were also very stupidly never included the people need to do things for certain projects until last minute . For example stock take happened every year meetings were arranged but they didn't included the inventory manager ??? He had a holiday booked for stock take ( booked before stock take dates were announced and they were different to previous years) came to him last minute asking to come in, he was like i have holidays booked, they were like you have to cancel, he refused they end of paying him for his cancellation costs of his hols ( it was an expensive sailing holiday) so he could take part of the stock take. Needless to say turnover was very high
Let them have there holidays - have a good look at how your team is structured but plans in place incase something like this happens again ( possibly god forbid you might get sick to and there will be more than two people out at one time ). Be a leaded that people respect not a manager people hate

Presumably hobble along if it is a few days but if longer than a few weeks, hire in temps at extra cost and training for unexpected long term sickness.

Not sure how unplanned sickness is relevant. The private sector does not have people sitting around at excess capacity so that they can cover for people who are off sick.

OP has a holiday procedure which was not followed.

OP I can see the frustration here for you, honestly I do.

C should of used the correct system and your company rules are no holidays April and September (some companies do this - I do not think unreasonable if employees know before joining) and that is her mistake. However, B did approve her holiday and this is the tricky part if B is her line manager. You are being unreasonable telling C she might have to take this as unpaid but C should be told this cannot happen again.

B has a legit reason to take time off. What B did wrong was not telling you she also approved C’s holiday for the same time. In future C needs to book properly and B needs to tell you if their holidays clash. Yes you are absolutely unreasonable to expect B to have this unpaid too - it is for a legit reason she needs to have off. B had already approved C’s holiday before she knew she needed time off so unfortunately this is just one of them things that need to not happen again.

You need a back up plan especially being a small company if 2 people are off at the as me time which sometimes is going to happen. If you have to pay agency then that’s what has to be done.

I would have formally moved forward with a management process for allowing holiday in September.

I'd say (not read all the responses, but I've read all your updates) that your issues are really how to deal with the situation as it stands now, as opposed to how you organise your company leave policies. They seem pretty clear cut to me, but I also work in industry, so maybe it's a thing here!

But we've had similar issues - no one is limited in when they can take time off, but we at the moment have a policy of not approving leave for more than one person at a time as we're understaffed. We can make exceptions in cases of emergency, but it has to be a pretty big emergency!

This hasn't stopped some people not follow procedure, which then leads to conflict to be resolved. In some cases I've had to sit down with individuals or groups of people to hash out agreements on when people are taking time off, and we've had less of an issue after having done that a few times.

So I would recommend that - sit down with both B and C, reiterate the policy and why it's in place (although bear in mind, if B is a crap enough line manager that she let C book off in September then she probably hasn't actually told her anyway); explain the clash and why it happened; very nicely ask C of she is able to move her holidays/flights; if she is then easy, if she can't then unfortunately I don't think there's anything you can do if B didn't inform her she couldn't take time off that month and approved the leave.

As to blame and sanctions - you're on dangerous territory if you try to dock salary for paid holiday time they've earned unless it's written into their contracts. You'll need to speak to HR, but I would be inclined to avoid that at all costs because it's too easy for them to sue and get that money plus back.

B needs to have a formal reprimand for badly managing the entire situation, including holiday bookings, and staff induction and training.

C is in no way at fault - even if she was told that she couldn't book in September she can get easily argue that she forgot unless she signed a piece of paper with it on. And I'm seriously doubting she was told at all anyway, which falls back to being the fault of B.

No, B would normally distribute the work between the other 2 in the team.
If B was off I could cover urgent things

Ok, so presumably, as you approved B's holiday you were expecting to cover B and since B approved C's holiday, B was expecting to distribute C's work between the other 2 team members. Why can't this happen? I'm sure it's not ideal but it looks like you can cope for a week.

Outside of that, C needs reminding that the correct procedure should be followed for booking holiday (and perhaps inform everyone that going forward only holidays approved on the system are valid - emails don't count) and B needs to confirm why they allowed C holiday in the first place.

Do not do this unless you are absolutely sure that:
a) C REALLY needs the job. You may be running the risk that C takes the week off regardless and then just doesn't come back.
b) B is not likely to just get signed off sick, potentially longer term than the 1 week originally requested.

I don't understand why C is getting off lightly here. They knew they had to use the company booking system to book annual leave but instead wrote an email. If it says in their contract they must use this method to book annual leave then surely they have broken their contract regardless of B authorising it, for the record B is just as bad for not making C follow company procedure.

If someone canceled my leave, regardless of the circumstances, I'd be looking for a new job immediately.

The more decent thing to do on this occasion would be to fully remind them both of the procedures for the future, and chalk this up as one of those things.

You're going to do yourself no favours whatsoever.

If your employer cancels your leave in accordance with the legal requirements, do they have to reimburse you any costs you can't recover or is it just tough luck?

I feel like you've filled in a whole load of gaps with your own projections based on experience.

Compassionate leave is unpaid by the way so allowing holiday in exceptional circumstances is normally seen to be more supportive...

Compassionate leave is not always unpaid. It can be unpaid as a default, but decent employers tend to pay out of, well, compassion.

@aibuboss have B or C come back to you as you asked by lunchtime today?

I don't know any employers who have an unlimited pot of money for their staff to take a paid week off on top of holiday to sort out paperwork for an elderly parent. No one died.

Read the thread. C's request was simply on a email trail. We have a comprehensive booking system that is very easy to use and transparent to see who else is off- it just wasn't used.

so how did you come to the conclusion that B is out of line. For all B knew, nothing in the system meant C could have changed their mind. Either you have a system or you don't.

@aibuboss

I've never worked anywhere that compassionate leave wasn't fully paid

But then again it seems like you don't work for the most progressive organisation based on your posts

I stand by my earlier comment, B needs to be dealt with and either apply for compassionate leave (which sorting things out for a relative doesn't usually count as) and C should be allowed their holiday as it was approved by their manager at the end of the day

I met with them both this morning to say I'd reflected at I'd been rash in my decision yesterday (as per my OP). B told me when she approved C's request she didn't actually read the email properly but to make matters worse C requested the leave on the holiday booking system last night and B approved it this morning- WTAF?

I am meeting B at 3pm to let them know that I will be invoking a formal investigation with the possibility of issuing a disciplinary warning as well as instigating formal capability measures (this is not the first 'genuine mistake' by far).

I am meeting C at 4pm to remind her of the absence reporting procedures and annual leave rules. I will be following up in writing because I think she knew what she was doing and has taken advantage of the fact B is ineffective. I don't appreciate her making the request on the system after our conversation.

I agree, but this isn't compassionate leave. It's paperwork leave. If her mum was British she'd be doing it in her lunch break like everyone else.

Eh? So B approves an annual leave on email but I'm expected to know this but equally B isn't expected to remember it?

HI OP, I think some people have been very emotional in their answers based on personal experiences, and not really addressed your issue.

You've already acknowledged B is at fault here and it's a performance issue (which you should address asap following company processes, don't leave it till after they come back). C needs a reminder/verbal warning to use the proper leave system in future.

If you are to enforce unpaid leave for B, make sure you do following the rules for notice for withdrawing leave approval. If you have an HR department I'd check with them first. And for what it's worth, as a line manager I'd be pretty annoyed with B too.Have he/she given a reason why they said yes to C? It's an odd decision to make if they knew the policy on leave in busy periods, and they must have realised you'd find out eventually.

So C gets written up because B is ineffective?

Completely unacceptable imo.

This is odd.

unpaid leave sounds petty.

If it was me:

C would get a verbal warning for not following process which has contributed to the issue. Verbal warnings are generally meaningless (in law) but they are usually enough to make sure it doesn't happen again. I don't think it would be fair to invoke disciplinary process here as B should have knocked it back straight away as not following procedure

B - as they are a manager i agree I'd go for investigatation/disciplinary process if this isn't the first instance of having concerns over their capability

I am meeting B at 3pm to let them know that I will be invoking a formal investigation with the possibility of issuing a disciplinary warning as well as instigating formal capability measures (this is not the first 'genuine mistake' by far).

with respect, OP, you're being a pompous knob. All you have to say is that they are aware of the rules, B has now approved C's absence and therefore B must be there. Without all the pomposity and pissing-offed ness of disciplinarys. Maybe B has decided to push off for a better boss and will resign soon