Furloughed workers/bank holidays

[roking]

Does anyone have any more knowledge of furlough than I do that can help?

Basically I'm a manager within a company and when COVID hit we had to furlough 90% of our staff as the business totally stopped.

This left the remaining 10% of people doing absolutely everything and trying to ensure that we still had a business to go back to at the end of this. It's been very hard going for the ones still working as there were lots of thing left in complete limbo by the business just stopping and lots needed rearranging and sorted out. We are still battling daily to sort some of these things out. Majority of furloughed staff are still on furlough at the moment as the business hasn't yet recovered

One of my furloughed workers contacted me (and lots of other staff members) yesterday and said they believed they were entitled to have any bank holidays they missed while on furlough put back into their holiday allowance for them to use when they return. After some investigation, it appears they are right. But what I don't understand is why?

I've had some backlash from the staff that are still working because of the fuss this employee has caused about it. They working staff feel the furloughed staff have basically been getting paid to stay at home since March. They were off on these bank holidays so why do they get to take them again? But they (the people who have been working their backsides off to keep the company going this whole time) don't get them back. The thing is. I totally agree with them. It's not fair

I can't find anything that explains the reasoning behind this and when the August bank holiday passes it will amount to a full weeks extra holiday the furloughed staff will now have over the working staff. I personally think it should be the other way round! The working staff need, and deserve, a break. The furloughed staff have already been off since March!

My boss is ill so I can't ask him, the HR company we use for these things are closed and I have staff wanting answers. Does anyone know anything about furlough rules?

My bosses are the same at my work.
Want to give you the bare minimum what you are entitled to and get cross when you pull them up on something that they have wrong. My work wanted me to do training whilst I was off, I googled it and it clearly stated that training needs to be paid at normal wages. I messaged and told them and I was told no it comes in as part of your furlough.
Making the rules as they go along.
If this woman is a good worker she deserves what she's entitled to. Doesn't matter if you think others have worked harder etc.

@MondeoFan

I wouldn't be calling her a difficult woman. She just wants what she's entitled to and nothing more. It's a good job she is on the ball with what she's entitled to because as the manager it seems like you are not. As the manager you should know about bank holiday pay involving furlough workers, not for her to remind you, then you calling her out on here.

Actually I'm not the manager who usually deals with this stuff. That manager is at the moment on bereavement leave and my boss is ill so this has been landed on me to deal with. I don't k ow a lot about it, and our HR company that I would usually go to for help with this is closed until Tuesday. So I'm trying to navigate my way through this

I'm calling her difficult due to her attitude throughout this whole thing. Stirring the furloughed staff into a frenzy with so much false information and refusing to stop when asked.

They had their wages topped up to 100% for a long period of time until we were physical unable to support it with no money coming in, so thinking about it they definitely got paid in full for the Easter bank holidays and possibly the early May one. I'll need to check that on Monday and find out when the pay dropped. They went from being topped up to 100% for a good few weeks before being dropped to the 80% government pay when we physically couldn't keep paying them the top up with absolutely no money coming in. So no, it's not about paying them the bare minimum. They will get what they are entitled to, absolutely no questions about that.

I have no issue with her bringing up the bank holidays. My issue is with the way she has gone about it and how unfair the whole thing is to our colleagues who have been working their arses off while she has been in the house creating hell with false information and causing everyone involved more work. We aren't a huge company. We don't have an HR department with multiple people to deal with this and are trying to navigate through this uncharted territory as best we can

MondeoFan your attitude is pretty poor, do you work in invoicing by any chance

No wonder "difficult woman" is flapping.

We have a slow car crash happening where I work. One person is absolutely rigid in how he does a certain piece of work - that is disappearing in a few years, when they are asked to apply the principles to something different and adapt the skills they don't want to this is a well paid managerial post...

They seem incapable of seeing they are doing themselves out of a job 🤦🏼‍♀️