Grievance meeting- tips, advice, what to expect?

[Downandout01]

I submitted a grievance following an unsuccessful flex work request. I've since been invited for a meeting by someone from an external hr company which has taken me slightly by surprise. Company policy says chair of trustees would oversee the grievance investigation etc. However I haven't had any contact at all with them since I submitted the grievance to our internal HR manager. I am sceptical still as to impartiality of an external hr company as presumably they won't want to upset a regular paying customer by siding with an employee...?

My grievance is about the way in which my request was dealt with compared to what policy said and how other colleagues have been treated with regards their flex work requests.

I will be bringing union representation with me.

Has anyone got any advice for how I should best prepare for the meeting? I just don't know what to expect and have been losing sleep over it all

You need to talk to your union - they know the circumstances and we don't.

But I will give you one piece of advice. It doesn't matter what happened with other people, because that was then and this is now. Every ask is considered individually. A simple example. You have 10 full time staff working five full days a week. Five ask for no mornings and get no mornings. The sixth one is refused because SOMEBODY has to work mornings!

You never compare to what someone else has. And it's best to offer a solution. You can ask all you want, but most employers have a reason to say no. So pre-empt that reason by working out how it can be accommodated.

Your absolutely correct to be sceptical about the impartiality of external HR companies. I made the mistake of thinking my external HR grievance investigator who held the meeting with me understood my concerns and was genuinely impartial. What a shocker it was when I read her grievance outcome report!

It was obvious her main purpose was to clear and protect the employer of all wrong doing and twist what I had said to suit the employer. My advice to you would definitely be to stay on guard and not to fall for the 'i'm totally impartial' speech that they'll rehearse to you at the start of the interview. If you are with a union try and get a representative on board, if not make sure you receive the minutes of the meeting and that they are correct. good luck x

Also, easier said than done as I had the poops when the date for my meeting was approaching. But this is your meeting for you to get your point across. Try the following:

Get the rejection e-mail for your flexible working request onto a word document and set it all to bold.

Then under normal font write your response to each of their points and explain why you don't agree with them. When it comes to the meeting have it in front of you so you don't get flustered trying to explain things, which i ALWAYS do. obviously some people have a knack for thinking/speaking on the spot but my self-confidence, since all my employment issues have begun, has just plummeted and i'm a dithering mess in meetings.

Thanks for all your advice. I really appreciate it. The meeting is remote so at least that means I can have all my notes etc easily to hand to refer to. I also have a union representative with me too.
I am just so angry that the whole system just seems to be such a box ticking exercise and essentially employers can do whatever they want- even down to not following their own policies correctly- and get away with it.
Have any of you had any experience with ACAS conciliation? That is next step after formal grievance for me if we can't resolve matters. I feel like ACAS don't have any vested interests at all so would actually prefer to be working with them than the external HR company on this.