Working away

[marioooocart]

DH works full time remote on approx 26k salary. Contract is fully remote although there is a head office, he never has to visit.

Manager has delegated some more responsibilities to him (for no extra pay!) and has now asked him to go and do some team bonding in the head office. This invokes a four hour train journey the day before, two days team bonding and then 4 hours back the day after training. So I would lose him for four days. We have a two year old and zero family support. No extra pay involved for this but will pay expenses.

Company are acting as if they are doing him a massive favour and as if it will be very fun. Around 20 of them are going (not his whole company, there’s thousands, and not from his team either as he’s never heard of these people) as it will be team bonding and they are talking about a fun night out although no talk of company paying for this.

Manager is now saying this could be every 3 months or so. I will need to take time off work to deal with childcare etc if he does. AIBU to think this is not the great deal and fun his manager seems to think it is? It’s not a free holiday and massively inconveniences us and DH is on barely more than minimum wage. I would expect trips away for someone on a much higher salary. It just seems a bit of a piss take.

DH can say no as it isn’t in his contract but I’m unsure if I’m being unreasonable here and I think he’s a bit worried about not seeming like a team player.

I don't see what his salary has to do with it, it's pretty common for remote workers to have to attend their office for this sort of thing. I think it will negatively affect his job / career if he doesn't go. I used to travel internationally when I was getting paid less than he does!
3/4 times a year isn't that much. Can you ask that they pay for the extra childcare costs? If he has extra responsibilities he should request a salary review. My DH travels internationally a few times a year, we have a toddler, but WFH the rest of the time so I don't have any issue with it.

'Sounds amazing but I have a kid so not possible as it will incur childcare costs I can't afford, sorry.' That should be his reply. I'm a teacher and this is my stock response to overnight trips. I'm definitely not paid enough to take them on!

Can he not travel late the night before, or in the morning? Trains leave here from 4.30. Or drive in the morning? Why can't he come home after the second day in the evening?

It's only 4 days.

Will it eventually lead to opportunties for promotion?

I would agree that it's a great opportunity for him, working remotely is fine to a point, but you don't build same relationship, progressing in career is just as much about who you know as what.

A couple of days every quarter doesn't seem that bad, my DH would travel abroad for couple of weeks at time and we managed.

Its in his contract though!

Not possible. We live rural and have one car which I will need so he can’t even drive and expense petrol. We’ve never needed two cars as he WFH.

The travel is an absolute nightmare. He’ll have to get 3 trains and 2 buses each way due to where we are. They won’t even pay for a taxi to the city centre train station and are making him get two buses instead.

No it's not. Read last paragraph

Of course salary matters. 26k is nowhere near enough for this.

DH is a high earner and I know this comes with him having to work late nights and away occasionally. He doesn’t get any extra but we benefit from him having a high salary. I would not be happy at all with him being away for 4 nights with no additional pay on 26k.

It would depend on the job and the promotion prospects.

It was totally normal for me, to expect to travel with no extra pay, but I did progress and build a solid network as a result, and the salary grew as I did.

However, if this is a job with no prospect of advancement, then I would think twice about continuing in the role.

Edited to remove bit about being in his contract, I misread.

No it isn’t?

Ah sorry, I misread that!

What do you mean by arrange childcare? If you both work is this not already in place?

Just to add this isn’t a career/ it’s a job.

It’s unskilled, not really much likelihood of promotion. It just works for us right now due to WFH benefit and childcare. He will start looking for something better once DD is in school. There isn’t progression in this company.

Can you get some flexibility from work for a couple of days to drop/collect your child from
nursery etc?

DH works 1230-9.

DD is in nursery afternoons only. He walks her there before work and then walks her back on his break. I get home as his break is finishing and do night time routine.

Unfortunately not due to how far away I work/her nursery hours/my job. I would have to take all the days off.

I think it’s fairly reasonable, once every 3 months. It is important to see colleagues face to face when you’re remote and it’s a fairly common ask. Yes inconvenient for childcare, but many families have to manage around it. Not unreasonable of his employer to ask.

Is his contract fully remote or does he say he needs to go into the office, or is hybrid?

Many people wfh like going in occasionally. DH and I are often away, although rarely for four consecutive nights but it’s in our contracts and we get paid well for it.

It’s fully fully remote. Think remote call centre vibes. There’s thousands in his company. His actual team is a team of 30 and not one of them has been in the office. Some of them have been there for 5 plus years. He’s only been asked to go as his manager has given him some more responsibility.

I think his manager has some work he’s wanted to off load, seen he’s a hard worker and decided he wouldn’t say no.

I think they’re pushing their luck by framing it as fun. I would just say sorry that doesn’t work with our childcare commitments.

Going isn't unreasonable, I do similar 3-4 times a year (I do earn more then 26k though) and DH either wfh or does short days and makes up the time when I'm away (we do have childcare but normally he drops off and I pick up so we can both do a full day + commute).
However if the journey by public transport is that tricky / takes that much longer they should pay for him to hire a car (assuming he can drive), it's probably not that much more expensive than the train. They should also pay for any time spent travelling beyond his normal commute (which is presumably zero if he is actually contractually home based).

I’ve just seen this. They are absolutely taking the piss to expect him to go away for four days if he works in a call centre for just above minimum wage.

I’m just sat and trying to work out how we would swing it if he had to go for 4 days every 3 months.

That’s 16 days of the year I would have to take off. I don’t have enough holiday left for that. I can’t do a half day because that wouldn’t work with my job.

I don’t know if it would be better for him to go once or just tell his manager he can’t do it and delegate the responsibility elsewhere. Although I’m not sure how well his manager would take that.

Is he in the CS by any chance? There is an expectation that employees do these things, usually in the job description and buried in the T&Cs.

My previous job also had the expectation that you'd go to HO and make nice periodically, but they paid for everything including food and drink, which went through payroll/expenses.