Refusing to work notice period

[quakerapple]

A member of my team has handed in her notice today. She is required to work a 4 week notice period.
She has 5 days annual leave left and has requested to take them before she leaves, meaning she wouldnt work the full notice period.
I have refused this as we need her in, we are incredibly shortstaffed.
She will be paid the 6 days annual leave in her final pay.
We are NHS. is this unreasonable ?

It's not our problem to address. Or hers.

OP hasn’t said anything at all to indicate she’s ’burned out’.

This woman having a week off isn't going to change anything

No one can address how I am expected to shoulder the extra work

Without knowing the area of NHS, if a ward, clinic or otherwise, these are some things I had to do in the past:

-Bank staff
-Agency staff
-Overtime
-Short term deployment from another ward/team
-Divide work within the existing team
-Wrote a report that our staff to patient ratio wasn't safe for a period of time due to sickness/leave/resignations and to help rationalise/justify the request for additional staff (bank or otherwise as a temporary measure)
-Managers help cover frontline roles

How can you possibly say, "...she sounds really burned out" based on the info the OP has given? You're making it up. She could be a total arse hell bent on being difficult, however we cannot know that from the OP's post.

I work in the public sector and we HAVE to use as much annual leave as possible during our notice period to avoid it having to be paid. Yours seems a strange attitude to take.

So what about the remaining staff? That is not her problem.
The recruitment freeze causing staff shortages and management reactions like this is what is causing people to leave the NHS. You cannot unreasonably withhold someone's leave entitlement, and certainly not because you are short staffed. Is no one ever to take leave until your department has full capacity again?
As someone else pointed out, she could end up going off sick for the full notice period, then where would that leave you?

I think this situation really depends on the quality of workplace relationships.

I have asked staff if they would work their notice periods previously and let us pay their annual leave at the end of the contract, but I think this is something that has to be negotiated and agreed, rather than just assumed - if the employee doesn't want to work the full notice period, then they won't have much to lose from going off sick at the end of it.

If relationships are generally good and employees feel that they have been well treated, then I find that most people don't want to leave their colleagues in the lurch and they're quite happy to be flexible. If relationships are poor, then they won't have that level of good will.

So in this situation, I would not refuse the leave, I would ask the employee if they would consider alternatives.

Agree to dates of your choosing where the inconvenience would be the least possible.

Why would she care about that, she’s quit.

I wouldn’t be at all worried and nor will she. For her remaining days/weeks, she’ll be in the “departure lounge”, so will do the absolute minimum and leave the rest to you.

You should have a longer notice period then.

As someone else said, it's like any other holiday request - you can refuse if you want.
But she might just ring in sick and you can't really stop her.
And the remaining staff might feel you acted inappropriately.
It's not really her concern anymore how understaffed you are. She is entitled (in law) to paid holiday, you can't stop people taking it just because you're busy.

She is not refusing to work her notice, she is asking to do what a lot of people do and use up the last of her leave entitlement.

Reading your posts and general attitude towards her and this situation, I can see why she is leaving.

Instead of blaming her for everything that is wrong with the NHS and work not getting done, maybe you (as her line manager) should do your job, which is to ensure that you work out how to cover the work. If this means making a number of suggestions or proposals to your line manager, then that’s what you need to do.

Its hardly surprising the NHS is in a mess when your attitude is to come on MN and moan about a member of staff refusing to work their notice (which is incorrect), then blaming them for the work not getting covered. The whole place is absolutely rotten from top to bottom with poor leaders.

The thing is nhs recruitment takes wayyy longer than 4 weeks (more like 3 months) so there is going to be a significant shortfall in staffing regardless and an extra six days isnt going to make a massive difference in the grand scheme of things anyway.

I've known instances where the leaver, due to workload or availability for handover, has been paid in lieu for holiday accrued and not taken. Usually it's at the employer's discretion.

The title is misleading, she is not refusing, is she?

You are griping about the team covering an extra week only. I assume it’s unlikely you will fill the position within the four week notice period (but you might? It’s an employers market at the mo), but that is on your organisation’s policies, not the team member.

What are your contingencies for if one of your team has an accident and is suddenly off work for a few weeks? Just deploy those plans. Let them have their leave, yes you are being mean and shitty to try and make them work it. I wouldn’t want someone in their position to be in my team working, it wont be a happy period for anyone and I don’t like the risk of contagion tbh!

Your title is misleading, she isn’t refusing to work her notice, she’s just asking to use some holiday during it, which is an entirely reasonable and normal request (many employers prefer people to use up their holiday before they leave). You should approve or decline the request based on staffing levels just as you normally would, that she's leaving shouldn't come into it.

You wont be able to recruit in that time anyway.
5 days makes no difference.
If I were her I'd ring in sick and then you'd have to suck it up.
(I'm NHS also... and shit management is one reason staff are leaving in droves)

Asking to use annual leave within your notice period is not 'refusing to work notice'.

I am confused as some people say that she can just take sick leave. Surely you have to be sick to get sick leave?
Am I naive?

You should be consulting your HR department, not us.

I have worked in public service previously and it was normal practice to expect people to use up their annual leave during notice period, otherwise they have to to be paid for it after they’ve left, which is a cost to the department.

If you work in a department where leave usually needs to be arranged months in advance and it’s difficult to accommodate, I would thin it reasonable to ask, but not demand, that the person doesn’t take the annual leave.

The key thing to remember here, is that when a person gets a new job, they will be asked what their current notice period is. If they say 4 weeks (as that is what is in the staff handbook), then their start date may be agreed on that basis. So…if they aren’t allowed to take their annual leave, that doesn’t carry over to the new employer…meaning that the person might get the equivilant of an extra week’s pay that year….but they won’t have had the minimum statutory annual leave allowance accord the whole year and both employments. So if having to be paid for the week’s leave rather than take it within the employment….you are effectively making the notice period 5 weeks instead of 4, because really they should then I have a week’s gap to ensure they have that time off…but…that probably needs to be communicated as an expectation when you employ the person, not when they’ve already handed in their notice. There is also the issue that the employee may not be happy about that becuase they may end up needing to pay a voluntary NI contribution to cover any week that they aren’t officially employed anywhere…to avoid that gap causing them to miss out on whole year’s stamp.

You say being short-staffed is an issue, but what happens in week 5 once this person has left? Do you already have a replacement lined up…or will you also be short staffed then? If so, all you are doing is having an extra week of a problem that is going to impact anyway.

In a large organisation such as the NHS, it shouldn’t be down to the individual employee to have to do something unusual such as not take their annual leave, just becuase management haven’t got plans in place to cover. If someone was off sick, it would need to be covered, this isn’t any different.

You aren't her responsibility. If that's your attitude, I can see why she's quit

Are you a nurse? This sounds like the type of petty, miserly nonsense nurses do to each other. Just give the woman her holiday.

This.

Well, as much as it’s sad that you’re short staffed this individual doesn’t want to be in your team and it’s none of her concern what happens to the lot of you after she leaves. As PPs said it’s incredibly common to use your holiday entitlement to shorten your notice period. Choose your hard woman but she may well call in sick and leave you hanging.

You sound like you have a huge problem that you and your team cannot manage and it’s unfair to leave it on your shoulders alone. Alert senior management to this issue and ask for support - they get paid a lot more than you. Make it their problem - if your staffing levels are being a danger to frontline care I would whistleblow if I were in your shoes.