Just left my job because I was being bullied and signed up with some locum agencies. Agency have been chasing me about references because I have a position to start next week and I found out today from 1 of the referees that the senior manager has warned them all off from giving me a reference saying 'it wasn't in their best interest to do this'.
This manager has nominated somebody of their choosing who i'd not named because they were connected to the bullying issues
The agency rules are as long as it's not a person of the same grade you can nominate anyone in a more senior position. In my work we don't have any company policy about who can give references it's dependent on what the hiring organisation stipulate. Is a manager able to prevent other people from giving me a reference like this?