Denied leave from work bereavement

[welshwonderful]

My grandad has passed away and his funeral is on Thursday. With work I am entitled to one day's compassionate leave for a grandparent, which I will take for the day of the funeral. I haven't had any other time off due to his death and have been at work every day since, including the day he passed away. I was advised that if I needed any more time off I could take annual leave, however when I asked for Friday as annual leave they have said no as there are already too many people off on that day.

I wanted the day following the funeral too as I am already pretty upset about losing him, and I expect to find the funeral emotionally draining and will probably be exhausted by Friday. My grandad had also been very ill and in and out of hospital in the weeks before his death so my emotional reserves were already low. I also separately experience depression and anxiety and my mental health isn't great currently.

AIBU to want to have the Friday off too? Where do I go from here?

It sounds really shitty to deny you the day off on the face

You’re not unreasonable to want the day off, but unfortunately you can’t have leave when too many others are already off. 🤷‍♀️

Just take annual leave? I’m sure they will allow it at short notice given the circumstances?

Can you get a sick note?

Compassionate leave can be minimal. I had less than a week when my parent died but I got signed off as I couldn't be in work as there was so much to deal with.

Get signed off

You are not being unreasonable, your workplace are. Personally I would say sod them and go sick for a few days. I there wouldn't agree but to be honest employers like this deserve it.

No don’t do this as it wastes the NHSs time. You are not ill. Tell work you are taking annual leave.

That was meant to say, others wouldn't agree.

Sausage fingers, sorry.

.. on the face of it, but is there a reasonable reason? Needing to maintain minimum safety levels or something? What do you do?
The only thing you can do is push back and repeat needing it for compassionate reasons.

If they say no then you're limited. I guess you could go off sick but it will be pretty obvious. So you'll need to be prepared to deal with that when you come back.

@WeightWhat You need to read the full OP 🤦🏽‍♀️

Sorry about your grandad. If your mental health is not good and you have depression and anxiety, then you could reasonably take a day's sick leave. However, I know that in some jobs, sick leave might be unpaid or can count against you (shouldn't do, but it does).

Where I work, you would go off sick with stress/other mental health reason. You can self-certify for up to a week.

She can self certify for five days. How is she wasting NHS time? If she's too upset to come into work, that's a legitimate reason to self certify.

The first 7 days would be self certified so she wouldn’t require the nhs input.

If you’re struggling right now, I would seriously consider taking sick leave.

Did you even read the OP?

Could you take Wednesday off instead OP? I found at my grandparents funeral that it was kind of final and it was time to move on a bit. The day before I was a mess though with the thought of what was coming up

Sorry for your loss

I understand that too, but what would they have done then if the funeral had happened to be on the Friday rather than the Thursday? I'd have been entitled to 1 day's compassionate leave for that day

Do you know who else is off, can you ask around? I know plenty of us where I work have time off around now just for christmas shopping etc and would happily move it to accomodate your request

I agree compassionate leave for family should be longer though. Policies like this never take into account the closeness or otherwise of various relatives and I have known people being told that they can't have compassionate leave for their aunts funeral even though that aunt brought them up after their mother died.

Sorry - up to 7 days as @BranchGold says.

I was only allowed 3 days when my sister died suddenly, orphaning her two children who I had to look after.

Luckily my head of service told HR she didn't care what they had to do to make it happen, but she was authorising 5 weeks off with no impact on my sickness or annual leave records. God love her!!

I think the issue with grandparents is employers think we all expect our grandparents to die, therefore it's not really that tragic to need more time. Forgetting how close some people get to grandparents. I didn't take time off for my Nan dying, it was expected and actually a relief as she had been so poorly and frankly I was still getting over my sisters death 3 months earlier and needed the normality. My colleague needed her alloted 3 days when her grandad died as she was gutted.

If I were you, I'd call in sick. You can self certificate for 7 days.

Weightwhat...how does it waste NHS time? You self cert for a few days so they are not involved. If her employers can't be flexible and allow her annual leave or enough compassionate leave then what other options does she have.

I can’t believe that any employer is this insensitive in this day and age. I had similar when my own dgf died. It was many years ago and only a pt job while I was at uni but they said I had to get someone to cover my shift if I wanted the day off for his funeral. A kind colleague did swap with me but I found a new job as soon as I could afterwards and didn’t hesitate to tell them why. I’d take the day off sick as you’ll likely be in no state to be at work.

I’m so sorry for your loss op.

I could take sick leave but they have generally been good employers apart from this, and I wouldn't really want to do that to them (though appreciate I may have no choice). I also am still in my probation period for another 2 weeks and the sickness trigger point during probation is 2 occasions of sickness. I have had one day off sick for depression a few months ago so if I phone in sick this time I'd hit the trigger point.

I don’t know. I’m not your employer.

You’ve asked. They’ve given an answer. Presumably, there is an annual leave policy? Have a read and double check but tbh they’re being generous to give you a days compassionate leave for a grandparents funeral.

Read the post

I'm so sorry, it's really awful. My dh worked for an employer like that. He asked for unpaid parental leave because both me and our baby were in intensive care. He was told no. So my in-laws talked to their work and were given 2 weeks fully paid time off each.