Husband’s female colleague’s issue being taken very seriously.

[Sweetmarzipan]

So background. DH works in a fairly male dominated industry.

When he first started in this company he would be away fairly often. One or two nights away every 4/6 weeks. One week in April and the odd conference.

I almost always went with him if I could for no other reason than the free hotel. If there were other colleagues they would have have their spouses with them as well. We became friends with many of them and still socialise. Irrelevant to my post but we always had separate bills and we never exploited expenses and we never saw other colleagues do this either but obviously the room was the same price regardless of occupancy.

Covid came along and other ways of doing things came about so audits etc were done remotely and these trips are now few and far between.

Last week I did join him for the first time in probably 6 months. He was leaving the centre with a male colleague in his fifties and a female colleague (mid thirties but I don’t know if anyone will find ages relevant) who had joined the company around three to six months ago (DH and colleague differ on the dates).

As they left to check into hotel the female colleague asked if they were eating, but they said that they had their wives with them and the male colleague said that she was welcome to join them but she declined. We had booked a pub meal on our own.

They were all together on Friday but over the weekend she has made a complaint suggesting that I and the other colleague’s wife had deliberately tagged along as they believed she would be unprofessional and inappropriate.

An email has now gone out saying that spouses are no longer able to tag along.

Colleague was spoken to face to face and the bosses did seem apologetic. DH was on a site and saw the email and was phoned by one of the directors again with apologies.

Surely she should have been told about the culture of the company. I am really gobsmacked. Two other wives have texted me this morning and they feel the same. We had a really nice lifestyle there which is bound to have created a nice work environment.

So as the meals eaten then are being paid for by the company are you saying the company can decide what you eat and drink?

What sort of things exactly? Surely the risk is companies infringing on employee rights by dictating what they do in their free time e.g. who they have dinner with.

I honestly don't understand how having dinner with a spouse after work is a risk for the company?

Agree - OP, as amusing as this thread has been for the rest of us to debate, considering your update you might want to get MNHQ to delete.

If there’s a chance of ‘further action’ over what may have been perceived as inappropriate by this new colleague you don’t want it picked up by the tabloids.

Quite.

I have been on work trips that quite frankly were a massive chore as I have got up at silly o'clock in the morning to get on a red eye flight somewhere, head straight to the client office from the airport, sit in several hours of engineering meetings that you absolutely have to switched on for and paying attention to before getting to your nice but bland business class hotel at 8pm where at best I might I have a glass of wine in the bar, dinner in the restaurant and then straight to bed having watched 10 mins of tourist adverts for Egypt on the TV before falling asleep and flying back early doors the next day. Not glamorous or fun.

Other trips have been a lot more relaxed where I have had time to see some of the sights, have fun in a few bars with work colleagues/clients, eat in amazing restaurants, go for a run in some gorgeous park or sea front etc. Depending on the nature of the trip my wife has joined me towards the end and instead of me flying home on the Friday we have had a romantic weekend away. Company had no issue with the latter and did not shit the bed when she stayed in my hotel room.

hopefully keep us updated please as this is an intriguing case

I suspect this is actually a policy the company wanted to implement and they are using this as a reason.

It all sounds so odd and the female colleague has been thrown to the wolves by repeating her complaint to her colleagues. It is all just so unprofessional.

Oh I am going to steal that line - professional victim. I know a few 🤣

I said within DH industry. Your industry mileage may vary, it sounds very different from my sphere of reference.

But you don't work in HR.

Tagging along on a spouse’s work trip kind of blows my mind! I’ve never heard of this before. However, if that was allowed and everyone was doing it then it sounds like she’s never worked anywhere like that before and no one explained it to her in advance. So she’s looked for a reason for it and come to the wrong conclusion.

The fact the company has stopped it implies they were looking for an opportunity to stop it anyway.

I think you might find that this one runs and runs because she’s complained, they’ve done something in response…but…then they’ve messed that up by potentially sharing details that shouldn’t have been shared and now they’re going to get a complaint in the other direction.

They definitely shouldn’t be saying to people that they’ve made that change just to keep her quiet. The company’s policy is the company’s to decide and if they’ve made that decision and put it out to everybody, they shouldn’t be gossiping behind her back. Sounds like a bit of a shit show!

Unless his work trips are somewhere really fancy or the hotels are 5* and out of this world, I don’t understand why all the ‘wives’ want to go along anyway? Don’t people have obligations like pets, kids, or like being in their own homes?

Except they’re not always are they? There’s usually an expectation you’ll have dinner with your colleagues and it’s often paid for by work. I’m an academic and even our university budget stretches to this when we work away!

The reason meals are funded when working away from home is because you can’t cook for yourself. There may be an expectation that they’re eaten with colleagues but it’s not a compulsion. Once working hours are over it’s up to the employee where and what they eat and with whom.

Nice to see you back op. Quite the palaver this has turned into 😂

I work away a lot, and outside of the obvious client dinners, there is NO expectation that we will eat/socialise with colleagues in the evenings. It might be an open invite, some might want room service and to call
home, some go and meet people we know in the cities from before or other work contacts. There is no way people expect to be entertained by each other. It’s also absolutely fine to sit in a restaurant and eat alone while travelling. No one has to babysit you.

So when I was working away from home, I shouldn't have, in the evening after work, been visiting my friend who lived in that city but should have taken annual leave to visit her?

Don't be so bloody ridiculous, and take that stick out from up your bum

the7Vabo

It is not always a Travelodge and since Covid no longer every month. However. It was always a change of scenery.

This change of policy has come about because of this colleague, had they wanted to change it before they would have done.

The staff do not know the reason behind the change only DH and the male colleague who was with them .

The only male gay colleague has definitely brought his partner on trips. There is absolutely no homophobia that I have witnessed. Genuinely nice place.

What do you do with the kids? And what your own job? If you want a change of scenery would it not be better to book a night away for the 4 of you?

I made a very clear distinction between the company paying an employee expenses for costs the employee had incurred and them contracting with the hotel and paying directly for a room they let the employee use as they create two different legal situations.

In terms of food, if the company is buying food for you and offering it to you (even if through a set menu at a hotel), rather than reimbursing you up to a set amount for food you buy, then yes, of course the company can dictate what they make available for you to eat. This is quite common with, for instance, catered meals during a meeting, or at a company party. It would be sensible of the company to ensure they make the range diverse so that they do not discriminate against someone on the basis religion, believe, or disability. And if they want happy staff then making sure it's something they will actually like is also sensible. But if they only want to provide vegetarian food because meat doesn't fit with the company ethos and won't provide meat, they can. Of course they can't make you eat the vegetarian food but they don't have to provide you with meat.

However, a hotel room they have paid for in advance is different. The analogy might be closer to you taking the sandwich work provided at lunch and splitting it with your wife at the end of the day. I'm not sure whether they'd be able to justify stopping you from doing that or not. An argument that you can't take food out of the room for cost control reasons because they can't tell what's needed for the lunch and what's people trying to get a free dinner too might well be considered a justifiable reason for stopping you from sharing. Harder to justify if they provide you with a pack lunch to take on your business trip and you share it with your wife (never heard of a company doing this though!).

Similarly with the hotel room - a company might book hotel rooms for single occupancy only (maybe in order to get a better rate with the hotel). If they have done that then a policy that bans you from taking a guest if you stay in the room they provide is likely justifiable. But if haven't and don't have any concerns about you, for instance, picking someone up at the bar, much harder to justify a policy banning your spouse from staying over.

I don’t think Op needs to justify why she enjoys a night away with her husband.

Why wasn’t the female colleague told by management she could have a plus one on this trip before the trip ? if it was company policy that everyone could. It sounds like it was a surprise to her.

Of course you can visit whoever you like after work. Just don’t invite them to stay with you on the company’s dime.

Nah. If she's raised a complaint, they have to address it with the claimed offenders, don't they? So they tell the men "It has come to our attention that your familial behaviour at offsite accommodations has led to colleagues feeling excluded". They seem to have skipped the next part, where they invite responses before proceeding, but it doesn't take a detective to figure out who complained.

I hope the men do respond. I'd be surprised if there's anything in their contracts or implied terms about responsibility for the emotional wellbeing of peers (what a fascinating can of worms that would be!) And they did actually offer company to the lonely little flower.

So prejudice does not exist in an entire industry because your husband has not witnessed it? That is quite some statement to make.