To refuse to provide bank statement to my work to prove I was in the office

[HanExplorer]

I’ve found myself in a very unusual situation and am standing firm so far despite pressure.

I work in a hybrid role with a requirement to attend our office twice a week, this is measured monthly based on card swipe data. On one of the days in May, I forgot my pass so was issued a temporary one to use that day.

Earlier this month my manager flagged I was showing a day short for office attendance in May and said I’d need to make up a further day in June. I looked at the dates they had on record and quickly realised the missing one was when I had the temporary pass so that obviously hadn’t registered on the system.

I explained this to my manager and she still maintained I’d need to attend an extra day to balance the totals on the system as there ‘wasn’t any record of me attending’.

I realised I’d spent money in the on site restaurant that day and there’d be a record on my bank showing the company name. I screenshotted this on my phone, cropped it so you could see the date and sent it to my manager.

She has checked with her manager and told me that I need to provide a copy of a bank statement which shows my name and the transaction - that would of course also show all my other activity!!

This has been dragging on and I’m standing firm so far, but I’ve had a call booked in with my manager and her manager for tomorrow and I’m wary of what they are going to say.

My office is over an hours train journey each way so not a case of driving 5 minutes down the road to work a further day - regardless, I don’t feel I should do out of principle.

Could you print off the first page and page with the transaction on and use a heavy black pen to remove the other transactions?

Learn to pick your battles.

The point is that OP has already proved it with a screen grab of her banking. So why should she continue to jump through hoops providing personal data when fundamentally the problem is that the company is completely failing with regards to both security of their offices and employee safeguarding?

Yes, but in order for security to hand it over to my manager for review they first would need to blur anyone else in view and that’s been deemed by them as ‘too time consuming’ for the issue at hand! Given it’s not a security incident or similar. Which shows how ridiculous this whole thing is.

But surely security don't need to hand it over? They can just review it and confirm you are there? Unless they think you're bribing the security team??!

I have had to provide bank statements for expense claims for decades (usually related to foreign transactions / exchange rates). You don't have to use an IT solution that may or may not have flaws. Print a paper copy of the statement then physically cover the irrelevant transactions with paper, pen or by cutting them out, and then scan the redacted document and email it in.
Choose carefully the hill you want to die on and ensure your concerns are proportionate to the issue in hand. Your employer already has your full name, date of birth, bank details, national insurance number, next of kin details (presumably), address, etc. They are being ridiculous but that's no reason to match them!

What if there are systems in place? What if security routinely does record names and times and IDs of those to whom it issues temporary passes and denies issuing one to OP that day? What if there's no evidence of any unrecorded temp pass being used? Or of OP logging onto the IT system?

I used to be a manager. Either OP's employer, large enough to have an on-site restaurant, runs a laughably lax security regime and anyone can stroll in and out unidentified or logged, or they have good security protocols in existence — which have raised questions about her presence on a day she says she was in the office.

If the security is terrible then she can prove she was there with her bank statement and then raise an alert about their appalling systems and ensure that nothing like this happens again. Why wouldn't a reasonable person do that?

Do you not have a record of your train ticket- either a paper one or an email booking?

Bit old school but can't you just do a screen shot of the statement, print it, redact it by hand with a marker pen, take a photo of the redacted document and send that in as the required evidence.

And if my employer behaved like OPs I'd be looking for a new job!

Under UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018, if you appear in CCTV footage, you can request a copy via a Subject Access Request (SAR).

To: [CCTV Operator / Council / Business Name]
Subject: Subject Access Request – CCTV Footage

Dear XYZ
I am writing to request access to CCTV footage under the UK GDPR. I believe I appear in footage recorded by your cameras at:
Location: [Insert location]
Date/Time: [Insert date/time]

I have attached a copy of my ID and proof of address to confirm my identity. Please confirm if you hold footage of me and, if so, provide a copy.

If redaction is needed to protect others’ identities, I understand. Please respond within the statutory 1-month deadline.

Yours sincerely,
OP

I'd stand firm just based on their crap responce saying they need to blur others from the footage - internally there would be zero reasoon to do this. This manager could resolve the issue in under an hour by visiting the CCTV room, reviewing the footage, and then closing the matter.

There’s a lot of pettiness on both sides here.

Your employer is wasting time and resource following up this one day, rather than accepting your word.

You are wasting time and resource by either not giving them a copy of your bank statement to prove your point and resolve the issue quickly, or by not working an extra day to balance things out.

If you take a job that is over an hour away by train which has an office presence requirement, you can’t complain about having to travel over an hour by train to be present in the office, so leave that out of your complaint.

This.

And then send a paper copy to those making such an issue of it. Obviously they won't be able to review it unless such time as they are in the office and they are unlikely to want to share their home address so you can send it directly 😃

For goodness sake. Im starting to think that some of the people posting on this thread dont actually work themselves because their stance is so unrealistic. Stop taking everything so personally. You are not that important in the grand scheme of things. Companies have processes and procedures. They are not necessarily wanting to accuse you of lying, or wanting to pry into your private financial affairs. They just have policies they have to follow and steps they have to check off so that they can sign off your attendance and move on. So just do what is asked and get in with your life and work.

Where do you work that managers have time to be faffing on demanding evidence like a crime scene investigation over office attendance! Especially if otherwise you’re a well performing and truth worthy employee. I’m a manager myself and find this ridiculous. I’d be looking to work elsewhere ran by adults that don’t waste money micromanaging like this.

I'm in the "print it out, sharpie, show it/scan it in again if necessary, shred" camp. Not worth fighting this one.

Jeez. This is ludicrous. I really struggle to believe that there are organisations out there that would micromanage like this and in turn, question your honesty and integrity. Grateful that I don't work somewhere similar - not sure I could put up with it if I was you!

The company I work for can see where we are working from based on our log ins. They sound like an awful company, being very heavy handed.

You seem to be dragging your feet on purpose…

Screenshot the statement, put white marks over other transaction, then screenshot the result. I’m curious how your DP thinks this is not foolproof.

Second solution: go to online banking, search for the transaction: screenshot the result. This should show the account info on top and the one transaction only.

Third solution: print the online statement. On the paper, use black marker over the transactions you want to hide (or put cardboard rectangles on top). Scan the result.

This is a good example of why the UK has low productivity.

A shortage of marker pens, photocopiers and common sense.

Sorry , haven’t read the whole thread but can your company IT not look for the IP address on that day as that would tell them your location?

Can the person who gave you the pass not vouch for you? Anyone else in that day? CCTV?

Where I used to work we had passes to access our work area. If we forgot our pass we would have been issued with a visitor pass which would have been recorded. Does this not happen at your work. We also had a signing in and out book for each team. Needed for fire drills and recording overtime.

Why are you picking this fight? You don’t need to use software to redact the information just do it yourself.

They are saying you didn't go to the office.
You have followed the process for accessing the building by getting a temporary pass.
Ball is in their court in my view. What if you hadn't bought something on site? Same problem.
I would say to them, this seems to have highlighted a flaw in their process. If they cannot fix it, in future you will take a photo of the temp pass and send this on to your line manager. However, you now feel that your integrity is being questioned.

It is absurd but I would print out the statement and redact with black marker, then send it to them or send a copy if you believe they can read stuff through the black marker on the original.