To tell them to sod this meeting

[Lazykitten]

This is the second time this has happened.

I have a weird set up where by I'm employed by the London office but work out of the Manchester office (live just north of Manchester). But as I'm officially part of the London office my client base is predominantly South East.

I have a client in Maidstone. We have an in-person meeting with them every quarter. It's been scheduled for....... 9.30 Monday morning.

The bit that's peed me off most of all is there's a massive email chain between everyone confirming availability that I wasn't included on. Then it gets forwarded to me as a 'FYI Lazykitten meeting is 9.30 Monday'. This happened last time, but was a Tuesday after a bank holiday.

I'm by far the least important person there in terms of rank, but the most important in terms of client relations and doing the actual work. I get I have to attend meetings but it's a 6 hour commute for me which I would have to do on a Sunday. I'd lose half my weekend because once again I'm an after thought to the important people who live 'down the road'.

I raised this last time. I have no reason why I can't go but tempted to invent a preexisting weekend break so they don't keep doing this. But will massively p off client to rearrange now it's confirmed.

Just 😡

Why dont you just ask them why you weren't considered in the email chain? Do you think it was maybe done on purpose if it's happened before I see a pattern

They must know you have a long commute so would need to be asked prior to booking this client in?

I would say ‘sorry, I’m away that weekend and so I can’t get there for that time. Had I’d been involved in the email arrangements, I’d have made it clear then. I can do a teams call or do later that day/another day?

@Lazykitten I think you’re getting a lot of replies on this thread from people who don’t understand how professional services work. I spent over 25 years in the big four, the last of which at very senior levels. I also was based in the regions but working in a London team. That’s pretty common for some of the more specialist roles. As an aside, I actually spent most of my time working remotely for clients based in the US which was never an issue in practice as I was clearly the best person to be servicing those clients.

For the whole of my time in the big four, including when I was running the clients myself, it was drilled into me by everybody that you must never ever inconvenience a client. I spent my whole career tying myself in knots to never risk causing a client even the slightest irritation.

I’m now the client. And maybe I’m just more relaxed than most, but things that irritate me include not delivering advice when I need it, charging me for advice but not actually answering my questions, wasting my time with meetings when the people with the expertise aren’t in the room, and not being transparent about fees. Occasionally changing a meeting date or time is not a problem at all, provided I’m given reasonable notice. In your shoes, I wouldn’t hesitate to tell the client that unfortunately I’m unable to make that time. I might make up an excuse about having alternative plans, but if you are the best person to advise that client then it is entirely reasonable for you to say that 9:30 am on a Monday morning when you have a three hour commute is not a suitable time for the meeting. The issue you have is actually managing your superiors here. However, given the amount of money they are saving by basing you in Manchester rather than London, and if you are in specialist advisory area, then they need to accommodate you. In some areas of professional services there are not enough people for the jobs available so the employment market is slightly different. You will know best whether that applies to you.

I’d be careful, it’s an important part of the job and if you start causing a fuss you never know what may happen in terms of agreements and they could say right Erin person meeting every Wednesday. Unconvinced twice a year isn’t that bad, I’d be fuming but I’d suggest you suck it up !

To me the clincher is the fact you already mentioned it in the past, made the effort to make it, and they ignored you. This will continue to happen unless you act. I would, as previous posters have said, invent a weekend excuse - wedding was a good one - that makes you unavailable to travel on Sunday. Then offer to attend by teams if they wish. I guarantee, next time they will check with you first.

Suppose you were a single parent with young children? You couldn’t just leave them alone overnight, and tell them to take themselves to school. Arranging overnight childcare needs a big run-up.

so they should be considering you when arranging meetings

if you give them a reason you can't make this specific Monday I would put money on them rearranging it for the following Monday - clearly someone enjoys either making you travel in your own time, or early Monday meetings in Maidstone.

Whether you choose to make a stand re this meeting or the next, the stand really does need to be a more general one than a specific inconvenience, imho.

At the end of this meeting could you take a proactive approach to getting the next one in the diary - or saying “Tuesday’s* work best for me given the travel time etc” or stsrting the ball rolling with the person who initiates scheduling the meeting?

Failing that, could you get a permanent 9.30am Monday meeting in your diary that can’t possibly be moved to accommodate the London meeting?

*or any other day/date/time?

I think the issue here is that for whatever reason, you're not being included int he meeting organisation in the first place. Why is that? That's what you need to address.

Why don’t you take charge of arranging meetings? At the end of this one suggest diaries are got out and fix one for when suits you.

Check your work travel policy. Ours says you can't travel on a weekend.

Absolutely say that prior commitments on the Sunday mean you can't make the 9.30 meeting. Suggest alternative times.

I don't think it makes any difference. The point is they didn't check with her when they set the meeting up . It's rude to arrange a meeting and expect someone to attend without even checking that, that person was free. She could have been on holiday, have a hospital appointment or anything.

I’m pretty sure they have to pay you for travel time because it’s not your normal commute!
If I ask my staff to visit a client it’s done in work hours but if not then we give them a half or full day off.
It’s not acceptable to expect staff to give up their own time to arrive at a work meeting on time.

This isn't about the cost of travel, it's about the idiocy of excluding the person who's doing the travel when making arrangements about availability and ignoring the practicalities about the distant location and disruption of the OPs weekend.

All these high ranking people involved in the arrangements and not one of them seems to have realised that if you have someone travelling from Manchester to Maidstone, best not make the meeting first thing on Monday morning, despite it being pointed out to them previously.

It's too far to go there and back in one day, so @Lazykitten needs to tell them that she is available on any morning from Tuesday to Friday inclusive so she can travel the night before and then return home after the meeting (other work commitments or leave accounted for obviously). As they've already been told this, I'd push back and say 'this is the second time this has happened so you need to go back to the client and agree another day' because you are not available on Mondays.

Yes I’d send an invoice for this and why can’t you zoom your contribution ?

I’ve sat in a few meetings where a laptop has been propped ip for a remote contribution, why can’t you do this ?

There's a BA flight from Manchester leaving at 19.50 for £81, arriving LHR at 20.50

Not very environmentally friendly, but . . .

its not London, its Maidstone, Kent.

Could you not catch an early train on Monday morning? I just think there are many parts of work that aren't always ideal and you just have to crack on with it because well, it's work! You're already in the preferable position to "wfh" most of the time so the occasional trip isn't too much for your employer to ask. You say you're "quite low down" so you don't want to scupper your chances of any future promotions.
Take a book and some headphones, have a little nap on the train down. You'll be fine.

FFS how much of a stupid people pleaser would you have to be to make up a lie to solve a problem caused by someone else's incompetence?

This might be the only time the client can make so maybe there wasn't opportunity for a later time. Can you speak to the client directly if you really can't make the earlier time to rearrange?

Your base is London though - it’s your choice to live a long way away

I think YABU, as an EA we arrange meetings in the availability of the most senior people attending and assume this is what’s happened here.

I would call it out again and say, I’m ok to attend this time but as I mentioned last time, early meetings on Mondays will become a problem if I have Sunday evening plans, please can we make sure this is taken into account in future planning.

Could the meeting be an email instead?