Colleague deliberately staying late at work just to accrue TOIL?

[KatParr]

She admitted yesterday she'd been staying past her contracted times, 10-15 mins here and there deliberately and has managed to accrue a whole week of TOIL!? we are a very small team who has an issue (imo) with sickness. Although we all have different roles, it inevitably impacts everyone when someone is off, even for leave. She also arranges appointments and runs regular "errands" on her working days (so leaves the workplace for up to an hour) when she has every Monday and Tuesday off. She is incredibly skillful at "looking busy" and talking constantly about having loads to do. Yes, I do notice it because none of us imo are busy enough to accrue TOIL.

She said she has leave left but wanted to 'save' it. I'm feeling pissed off. She has no reason to stay late every day as she does, genuinely, it's not that kind of role. I'm thinking of speaking to the manager about what she said regarding the TOIL. AIBU or should I keep my nose out?

But it will make a difference to OP when she is one of those who has to take on extra work while her colleague who's played the system is off using the TOIL she's cunningly accrued.

They should promote you! Her manager sounds rubbish…

Haha where have you got that I'm constantly running to managers? Amazing how people always manage to apply their own issues to situations.

I think this is correct, thank you. I can't control this situation so I'm going to disengage from the whole thing.

Shes very smart and playing the system. Also manipulating the system to work for her

If you don't like what she's doing I'd check out the rules, first and foremost to see if what she's doing is actually wrong or is actually allowed

For example..... I dont understand how she can accrue TOIL each day for 15 or 20 minutes each day.....that's a crazy TOIL accrual method and makes no sense. Is it allowed?

AND if she's also using flexi time to do personal chores during her working day.....how does this work? How has she worked enough hours to use flexi AND TOIL?

It needs clarifying.

Because...... if what she's doing is correct, then I'd be doing it too, if I were you

It would take ages to build up a weeks worth of TOIL at 15 mins per day! It’ll be a while before she’s able to do that again.

Is there anything stopping you from doing the same as her?

I've had to use most my AL for DHs hospital appointments, TOIL, is rare, if you stay late you are told to come in a bit later, leave a little later or longer lunch, the next day. No abuse possible, sick leave is a different matter

My conscience!

I had a member of my team who managed to crack the code for flexible working. She would have regular sickness of an entire week, then on her return work extra to catch up and accrue banked hours. Then she’d use those banked hours. She managed to have loads of leave and give the impression she was banking masses of hours working really hard. Problem was she had been with the business 30 years and had a wealth of knowledge it would be impossible to replace.

I just accepted it and grumbled to my husband.

Same for me

That sounds more like a you problem I’m afraid. We work to live, not live to work; join in or leave her be. She’s not breaking any rules.

Thank you @Mumofoneandone

I never take TOIL, much prefer to take is as overtime and get paid for it.

I work in education so you have a combination of salaried teaching staff who basically never get TOIL (accepted as part of the job) and hourly paid support staff who do. One member of support staff put in LOADS of extra hours helping with an extra curricular activity they particularly enjoyed. Got feted by all, so helpful, what a godsend, there at all hours slaving away etc etc - then claimed all those hours back as TOIL and therefore wasn’t available in their actual role to support salaried staff who needed the support! We were fuming! Not so much at the staff member as tbf if they were allowed to do it, why not, but at management for not noticed and putting a stop to it. It has been noticed now though after we said “er…what’s going on…?”

@KatParr then that's on you, but it doesn't mean your colleague is doing anything wrong.

Let's be honest, most people really don't give that much of a toss about their jobs - it's just something they have to do in order to pay the bills, so if they can get away with going to appointments on work days or getting more annual leave, they will.

I'm so glad I'm getting out of this nonsense. It's not just about having to cover her work. She is getting paid for something she's not doing. So it is affecting other colleagues.
My conscience wouldn't let me do it either but then I do have a fantastic work ethic.

I think I'd ask your manager if that's something you could do, a sort flexible working, could you also work an 30 mins extra and save up for a week off or does it need permission or to be pre-arranged by management if there is a business case for it.
I think with the thought of everyone taking advantage this will be formalised as toil for business needs only, not just hanging about to earn a day off. She needs to be more efficient and get her work done in the time alloted.

@KatParr a pp is right do this from a position of is the work fairly distributed as it’s not right x is having to work more time than anyone else.

Try to drop in that her productivity must be higher with the long hours.

Expect your manager to do nothing, most don’t because it requires a difficult conversation. The way for a manager to deal with it is by outputs I.e. how much more is she producing/processing.

The other option is to do the same and build up TOIL yourself, book appointments etc. as you have the defence that x is doing this so why can’t you.

I'm amazed your workplace has such a lax policy on toil. I have to ask permission to stay late and explain why it can't be done tomorrow. Managers are always very supporting and have never declined me staying late because it's always when something urgent and last minute has come in. Being able to just accrue toil without an explanation is wild.

I'd raise it. It's unfair and encourages this kind of behaviour. Your company need to add TOIL to whatever policy is in place re your working hours, breaks etc. Ours is that any TOIL should be taken at the next available opportunity and not accrued.

In my old work there was one woman who was paid hourly, by choice, while others in her team were salaried. She always seemed to be very 'busy', always working late, but nobody could quite work out why. The work I did for her was pretty much leaving her to forward a spreadsheet to the team we fed into. Everything else was done by me, in collaboration with that higher team.
It turns out she was running some sort of personal vendetta campaign against various organisations from her desk. She was also caught monitoring the toilets. Writing down the name of who went to the bathroom, which one they used, and for how long?!
The director did not ask her to do this.
obviously. But would explain why she was always so 'busy'.

It’s not my “issue” anymore. It was what everyone in the office observed.

If you're not busy like you say and all the work can be done within your working hours like you say then I'm not clear on why is this an issue? She's being flexible with her time but she's still working all the hours in the week that she should be. If you have a problem with sickness then that is something that needs to be addressed If that is due to stress or burnout or poor management. Presumably you all have the option to do this and she's not actually doing anything wrong.

I do build up toil in my job and I try to save that for short notice childcare if my son is sick since annual leave needs to be booked in advance and I use it for other commitments, and I can't afford to take unpaid leave. If you go to your manager about this you will risking the flexibility that all your team has because the easiest way for management to resolve this will be firstly to review whether or not you're all needed since you're not that busy and are needing to "look" busy, and you'll lose the ability to be flexible with your hours when you need it. Other colleagues may depend on this to sustain work. As a single parent I need this flexibility and you'd curry zero favours with me if you were the reason I lost that option.

As you say, how on earth has she managed to accrue so much TOIL working 10-15 mins over 3 days a week to accrue for a week off? That's madness!