Possible pregnancy discrimination

[Justalittlebitblondie]

I went on maternity leave (well two weeks holiday then maternity) - in the second week of holiday I get a message from my boss saying he was leaving. I would be able to do his job and so would usually of been interested in going for it. I message the following Thursday to ask if it has been advertised- apparently the internal advert went out on the Monday with a week to complete the application (deadline following Tuesday). I got back a job spec but with the wrong job title on it - I queried this as the jobs are different and the skill set on the job spec was consistent with the wrong job title. I got confirmation on the Monday it was the right spec with the wrong job title on it. At this point I had less than 24 hours to complete it and so ended up not applying.

One of colleagues has got the job - the one whose job title was on the job spec I was provided with - a whole company announcement has been made, but I wasn’t told - as on maternity and nobody bothered.

Is this discrimination, poor practice, bad manners or a combination of all three?

How do you feel you were discriminated against?

Wasn’t told about the vacancy at the same time as the rest of the business/people who may apply, given duff information and then having less time to apply…

Sounds like discrimination - if everyone was told except you

https://hrzone.com/ask-the-expert-notification-of-job-adverts-during-maternity/#:~:text=You%20must%20not%20treat%20a,the%20woman%20on%20maternity%20leave.

i don’t think it was discrimination, you were told about the job, you could have prepared your application while you were getting more information.

I doubt everyone was told, you probably had more of a heads up than the people who were in the business.

Thank you - all useful perspective. Everyone was told - there was a company wide vacancy email which included it. The job spec very minimal and was missing several aspects which my current boss does - hence my reticence to use it as a basis for an application.

The duff job spec is probably a mistake. That would only give rise to a discrimination claim if everyone else got the correct spec.

If everyone else was told about the vacancy and you weren't, that is potentially pregnancy discrimination. If you want to pursue this, your first step is to raise a grievance. However, I doubt it will get you anywhere. I suspect your employer would take the same view as @Wolfpa - you still had a chance to apply for the job. You didn't have to wait until you had confirmation of the job spec to start preparing your application. It wouldn't surprise me to find that other internal applicants got the same job spec you did but still applied.

Please take lots of notes of what has gone on, speak to ACAS and speak to a solicitor, they are worth every penny!
I spend £8k with mine and successfully claimed against my old firm and got 250k I'm so sorry this has happened but please stick to your guns, sounds to me like you've been mistreated.

Call pregnant then screwed’s helpline (maternity discrimination charity)

I'm not sure you have a case here. The mistake was a company wide one which applied to everyone.not just you
I think you could have still applied or asked for extra time if needed . Given you didn't end up applying for the job at all I think you don't have much chance of saying you were discriminated against in not getting it.
Same applies to the notification of the unsuccessful candidates, you weren't even a candidate in the end as you didn't apply.

The fact that you were on mat leave is completely irrelevant to everything that went on. .

Thanks - it is mostly that I had less time than others as found out later (and indeed had to hassle to get the information) and it is not unsuccessful candidates being notified - the whole company was apart from me and it is my line manager - though appreciate this is poor practice/bad manners as opposed to discrimination

How was the entire company told? Through email?

If so, then do you not still have access to your work email? If you did but didn't check, you can't claim discrimination. But if you couldn't access email then potentially could have a case?

However, I know NOTHING about law etc so may just be talking out my arse.

@jigglywigglyhungryhippo i don’t think it’s reasonable to expect women on maternity leave to check their emails every day?

No but the point being she had the same access as all other members of the company, so therefore she wasn't treated differently.

When I was on maternity, I still had access and so would check every couple of days on current changes. Obviously not expecting her to or anyone to take the same stance as I did.

However my previous point of being treated like everyone else still stands. So she can't say it's discrimination?

Again- I'm no lawyer.

I didn’t have the same access as everyone else- our email accounts are suspended when we are off for long periods or things like mat leave (my account was suspended the day I started my holiday before the mat leave so have no access to company wide communication, the intranet or company systems so am completely reliant on being forwarded information which just hasn’t happened at all…

But if you are not at work, you dont get work related communications? I am not sure where the discrimination comes in, presumably no one who was not at work at that time, got the communication

Might be tough as technically you were on holiday not maternity?

And it gets worse… having spoken to HR around how the communications were handled for the vacancy they admittedly it left a lot to be desired and promised I would be sent any new vacancy information (specifically I asked about the role which was now free following my colleagues promotion and was told it hadn’t been signed off but would be sent the details as soon as it was).

All good except I got notification through LinkedIn today that the back fill for the person who got the job is being advertised - it was highlighted as suitable for me - the irony!! I think I am going to have to speak to the HR Director and raise this as a grievance - the process is that prior to external advertising it needs to have been circulated internally and they just have excluded me despite promising to send me all vacancy emails going forward…