Maternity leave cover

[cheekybunny]

What are people’s experiences returning to work after maternity leave, specifically what happened to the person covering their maternity leave? Did the person covering you leave and move on or did they stay with the team/company? I’ve just started my mat leave but found out who is covering me today and not going to lie I’m feeling a bit insecure! I’m with the NHS so I’m doubtful they will have the funding to keep my cover on when I return? What if they are better than me/more liked! Really interested to hear.

i work in the nhs. They can’t give your job away to your cover, they wouldn’t be allowed to do that. Normally the cover is a fixed term post for the length of your maternity leave so they would have to apply for another job at the end. Sometimes if they are really good the department may make new job for them but that would require a business case.

And nhs has no money atm so hard to get business cases through to create a new job

Thanks for your reply. I really don’t think they would have the budget in my department to create another job ? But wasn’t sure if that’s how it worked. So essentially do they just leave when I return? Thank you!

They kept mine on. They let me come back to the same role and same pay however kept her doing the job too so I essentially didn’t have anything to do. This was NHS. I left 5 months later. Much happier now though so it was for the best although I was miffed at the time!

Sorry to hear that. I’ve been ensured I’ll have my same responsibilities when I return. Hopefully they stick to their promise but it’s a new band 7 that’s starting soon too so everything’s up in the air x