AIBU to wonder what work are expecting me to do?

[FriskyHeeler]

I've worked at my current employer for 3 years and recently had a change in circumstances (in February) which means I have no childcare for my 3 children after school for 1-2 days out of the week. They have been understanding and accomodated my needs so far but have asked me to look at what realistic options are available and have called a meeting for next week to discuss, as the situation is not sustainable long term. I'll outline the facts below, please read carefully because it's not as simple a solution as most people seem to think.

• I work 8.30 - 5pm Monday to Friday and it takes me 30 mins to get to and from work.
• My husband works 8 - 4.30 Monday to Friday, his office is an hour away and he works from home on Thursdays and Fridays. Soon to be 3 days a week. He used to work nights, so would drop off and pick up the kids each day, however the strain on family life, our relationship, his mental health was not sustainable and he had numerous breakdowns over a long period of time and he changed jobs. Not ideal but I won't make my husband do a job he hated when it made him want to kill himself every day. He can be quite volatile and in the past this has affected work when he last left for periods of time so I've been left to sort the kids 100% of the time, at times. Work know things are rocky and my line manager thinks I should leave him but this would only make the situation more difficult.
• Our kids are 3, 5 & 9. The 3 & 5 year olds attend the same school/nursery and the 9 year old attends a different school.
• 2 out of the 3 kids have special needs and are settled in their schools. They previously attended the same primary school but had serious issues so we had to move them.
• Both schools have breakfast club, 1 starts at 7.50 and the other at 8.10, this obviously means I am often 10 mins late to work on the days they are in club.
• Neither school has ANY after school provision.
• We unfortunately live in an area where wrap around care isn't in demand, so options are pretty non existent.
• There are no childminders in the area that currently or are willing to pick up from either/both of their schools.
• Their are a couple of local nurseries that do after school club and they collect the kids from school and walk back to their premises. 1 of my kids is a flight risk so I do not feel comfortable with this as an option. He has escaped and ran off from his old school twice before.
• We cannot afford a nanny, prices are between £15 - 20 and hour when I have enquired and tbh, given my kids additional needs, I don't think anyone would last a week with them, they are VERY full on.
• My dad can collect the kids 1 day a week at an absolute push but it's his only day off and if he has plans it's not a given he can do it, I don't expect him to plan his life around MY kids. My dad works the other 4 days a week and my mom doesn't work but has stopped driving for health reasons so cannot pick them up and she is not physically able to walk/get the bus etc and as previously stated, 1 of them is a flight risk and she wouldnt be able to run after him if needed. A taxi for her to pick them up and go back to hers would be far too expensive multiple times a week as she has done this once before in an emergency and it was £30 for one pick up, let alone 2.
• There are no other parents at either of their schools that we know well enough to ask. We have no other friends or family in the area at all, aside from my mom and dad.
• So far, on days where my husband is in the office, I finish work at 14:40, pick up the kids from school and then log on at home for the remainder of the day, sometimes beyond 5pm.
• I am a supervisor and our team is growing and I will be responsible for up to 12 people eventually so work are saying I cannot effectively supervise if I am not in the office. We also have a lot of new team members (one being another supervisor) who are not fully trained so things tend to fall to shit a lot of them time if I am not there.
• Not to toot my own horn but i am the glue that holds the entire team together, and effectively, if I were to leave because I need more long term flexibility, they would be absolutely fucked. My line manager and our department manager knows this all too well, but are still pressuring me to find some magical solution that doesn't exist so I can be there 8.30-5 every single day. They've not said they will get rid of me, and I don't think they would, but they're saying I need to work my hours I am employed to do. I agree with this and have no issues with that, I've often said I will taken leave, take the time unpaid etc and they have always said no.
• I could put in a flexible working request to reduce my hours 1-2 days a week, but it would actually be a waste of time, as they can and would refuse it for a legitimate business reason.

I don't know what to do or what I'm supposed to say during this meeting. If you've thought of something I haven't explored above then please please let me know. I'm obviously going to explain all of the above in detail about what I've looked into and why it's not a viable option and see what they say. I'm also considering telling them I'm looking else where for something more flexible in the hope that they back down, but I don't actually want to leave, I really do enjoy working there and don't want to jump ship and end up being somewhere I don't like, or having to take a pay cut that I can't really afford.

www.acas.org.uk/statutory-flexible-working-requests/considering-a-request

Out of curiosity has Labours new employer laws changed things for the better ? Isn’t flexible working considered from day one now? The bill went though didn’t it ?

OP, you sound bizarre. There are so many dimensions to this problem that you are ignoring.

Firstly, you work in a toxic environment in terms of being overworked, not being able to take leave, micromanagement etc. However the solution to that is to find a new job. Not to keep jumping every time they raise the bar. You’re dealing with unreasonable individuals and unreasonable expectations, it’s not going to magically change in your favour. Just like your husband got a new job, so should you. You have reached the limit of support with your employer, they owe you nothing. And as you’ve not raised concerns before, they aren’t going to see any issue in your list of grievances.

Secondly, you have been oversharing with work. They don’t need to know your relationship issues and they don’t need to have opinions about whether you should leave your husband or not. These are not topics you should be discussing with them frankly.

In terms of your proposed meeting points, again you are oversharing. Your situation is simple in that you have disabled children, local childcare providers are unable to offer the specialist care required for them. In addition, your partner also has health problems. What you are trying to get across is the risk of indirect disability discrimination/discrimination by association. Not the ins and outs of everything shared here. Your core point is you are a caregiver to someone with a disability, what flexibility is there and if none, are there other roles you can transfer to support your caring responsibilities.

What you need to get away from are:

• relationship issues
• childcare issues

Your strongest point is caregiving responsibilities to a disabled child which is not the same thing as standard parental responsibility. You’re conflating every personal issue you have into one box, and it doesn’t work because legally your employer doesn’t need to accommodate relationship issues or childcare issues.

Can you quote me where I've said they're being unreasonable??

Lets hope you don't say the same thing to your employers when they state that your issues are not their issues.
It would not surprise me if your 'meeting' is actually the beginning of managing you out.
You are no longer an asset to them if you cannot work your contracted hours when they want you to work them. You are now a liability. I'd start looking for a new job or you or/and your husband need to consider going part-time.

Why are you being so presumptuous and condescending? Does it give you a warm tingly feeling inside?

Honestly, you’re grasping here on the OPs situation is cringe.

Op do you live in a rural area, a village ? Theres no after school
childcare, clubs ?

Between you,your husband and dad, I take it you’ve all been through all the options and can’t find a way of sorting this out between you ?

Could you just take a demotion that would allow the flexible hours you need?

Sadly I think that your notion that you are indispensible in your role is mistaken. Every work place has indispensible team members who can be and are replaced.

As you are well thought of you could request to be replaced in your team leader role and take on something a different role.

Its not ideal. But if your current job requires you to be present to lead a team rather than making up hours from home, I cant think of any other options you have .

It seems odd to me you can’t put in a flexible working request on a trial basis. If you really are the glue, they’ll want to keep you. Your dh could also put in a flexible working request and share the issue.

OP you have my sympathy. Sometimes the unstoppable force of work meets the immovable object of childcare. Your proposal seems a sensible thing to go to your team with.

However, your workplace sounds utterly unsustainable. Have you ever had a dig around on the www.askamanager.com website? Might be worth it to get some advice on work situations where you feel everything would go under without you.

What job does your DH do ? Can he apply for work life balance ? Can you both apply, see what you can come up with ?

It’s very difficult for both parents to work full time when childcare is needed.In fact it’s almost impossible.

The only school parents who I know that both have full time jobs have flexible working hours or childcare at hand. You have neither of those options, from what you’re saying.

Stating outcomes other than what the OP wants to hear is neither condescending or presumptuous.
I've been through a similar situation and have no doubt many people replying have been in similar situations.
Let down by childcare. No family to help out. Expensive nanny.
Tried to go part-time. Tried to move depts. Tried everything.

Rarely missed work but stupidly spoke about childcare issues to employer when I had to take emergency annual leave due to childcare. That was the beginning of the end for me.
Its presumptious of you to assume that the people giving advice are not basing it on personal experience rather than what the OP wants to hear along with ridiculous chat gpt solutions.

If the problems started when your husband moved jobs, what was the plan originally? Were either of you promised more flexibility? As if you have that in writing it will work to your advantage I imagine.

OP i think you need to be zooming out and checking to see if 'bigger' solutions are available to you (new job, move, sell house sort of changes).

As a parent of SEN teens, i want to share that things are likely to get harder and you are going to need to have more time and money available to support them and to cope as a family.

I realize that is so much easier to say than to do, I just want to encourage you to think about your family's situation through a longer term lens.

basically wave a magic wand

For the umpteenth time in this thread, yes, but it’s a right to ASK, not a right to be AGREED.

It’s not clear what you do but it sounds like it might be some sort of call centre or similar? As you’ve mentioned you have a line manager and a department manager it sounds like you’re not too senior so with that in mind, would you not be best going part time to get the hours you want and taking a step down from supervisor/team leader until you can commit the hours the job requires?

I saw a post that said you started on £1800/month which again suggests that sort of work, along with the high turnover - and if it is, the good news is when you’re ready and able, it’s very easy to get promoted to supervisor/ops manager.

Good luck with what you choose to do. You’re making the right decision to try to keep working for sure!

I'm actually astonished at all the answers suggesting op gets grants, extra help etc from the state, when all that needs to happen is she is allowed to work from home two afternoons a week. If done right there needs to be no extra burden on the state and she'll be just as effective in her job. It sounds as if the current arrangement has not had any big impact on her ability to do her job and as I stated in a previous post, her team should be relied upon to get on with their jobs whether she's physically present or not. If her team can't be trusted that's a whole separate issue that needs dealing with.

The company needs to employ more people in your dept OP. It sounds like call centre type work and they are notorious for high staff turnover.

I worked in a company in various depts and have seen people nearing retirement who wonder how the depts will work without them. These people worked in the same company for decades, they had a wealth of knowledge, they knew all the older systems and knew where to pull info from thirty years ago. They looked at anybody who was in the company less than twenty years as inexperienced. They were often the people we went to when trying to resolve non standard issues for they had usually come across it at some stage or they knew somebody who had moved to another dept who would know.....
But OP those people did retire and many people came and left, yet the two hundred year company is still running successfully.

And FGS take your annual leave and stop working on your days off.
The company is taking the piss. They don't want you to leave because they are underpaying you, which is one of the reasons you can't pay childcare. Go into them and propose they take on more team leaders (I'm guessng that is what you are?) . Alternatively if they don't want to pay for more employees, use that as leverage for flexibility. If you are an invaluable as you say, they will give you a payrise which will enable you to pay for full time childcare.

I don’t know how you and your DH can both work full time with 2 sen children,it must be incredibly stressful.Is there any way you can do a part time job and top up with UC even if it was just for a few years?
You say that no nanny would manage your children yet they are ok to be left to themselves at home while you WFH?
Could a taxi take your children to nursery after school club?
It sounds to me like your employer has had enough but they need to upskill other staff also,what will they do if you’re ill or you leave? With all due respect they will cope because they won’t have a choice

Are you reading the same thread? OP has said herself that the 14:40 finishes cause issues with managing her team and getting things done in her absence. That the role is in office full time without any WFH is an indicator that it’s not set up for it. That the employers aren’t offering to continue the arrangements and want to talk about what OP is doing to address the childcare challenge is an indication that it isn’t working.

Unfortunately it's time to look for another job that's fits in better with your life.
I've done it. Not ideal but we do what we have to.
As you've acknowledged it isn't your works problem so maybe it's time to move on so it's not a burden to other staff.

Work are expecting you to do your job.

They’ve booked a chat with you as they have concerns, not to hear your life story. You need to come up with a plan that meets their concerns, or one of you quits I guess.

The trouble is, you don’t want to negotiate flexibility, you want to carry on as you are:
being late for work
being the sole carer of 3 young SEN kids while ‘wfh’ after school.

The situation does not appear to be working for your employer, hence the meeting.

Sorry OP, but you stated your case in the opening post and do not appear to actually be open to any solutions that are not the status quo.

While I sympathise with your situation, I do think you will have to attend the meeting in a proactive manner.

You need to come up with some solution that your employer can support where your team does not fall apart and you are not caring for 3 children while wfh.

Perhaps a slight team restructuring could ease things while you are not on site? Suggest someone steps up slightly on occasion, as part of their career development strategy etc.

it seems clear that your employer will not settle for any option where you are both working and caring for your children - and that is not unreasonable of them.

The problem with posting in AIBU is that some people will think you are BU.

A child being a flight risk can be managed successfully in suitable childcare, if they agree to take your child, they can manage the situation - but I do appreciate your reluctance.

You need a solution to put to your employer - not a shoulder shrug and ‘what do they expect me to do’…

I haven't read all your updates or all the responses as there's just too much to plough through. But I wanted to add my two pennyworth.
I think you should come up with a proposal that works for you and sell it to them. Demonstrate all the positives and then tell them what the blockers are: line manager needs some training/support, untrained staff can be a bit of a liability when you're absent so also need training/,to be able to contact you in an emergency, company owners don't like you WFH, so change of culture needed, etc.). Make it clear you're loyal to the company and want to stay there. Sell yourself using examples that will resonate with them. I suspect they know how important you are and won't want to lose you.
(You could always mention the cost of a nanny and negotiate a pay rise but that could be a step too far right now!)
My team are all remote and WFH and everything works perfectly well. You just need to convince your employer that you don't need to be there 100,% of the time.