how to go about starting a grevience

[paranoidandconfused]

Right I am about to start a grevience and against my manager

I have been on the acas website and it says you should firstly approach your line manager, but I would assume that is who my grevience is about

In HR there is a woman that dealt with all my maternity stuff and apparently she is who I should need to approach

this lady in Hr though would appear to be very friendly with my line manager, and although I am sure she would have to act fairly I am concerned that my letter stating my grevience may just be ignored or no aken serioulsy seeing as how my manager is so high above me

I have been online and found an email address for the head of HR should I copy him in too on my letter as well as my line manager and this other lady, thus making sure my complaint can't be "ignored", or would this be overkill?

I kind of wanted to copy my complaint to the bullying sector, the health and safety sector and equal opportunities sector but my dad says this may be overkill lol

But I feel so upset about the way in which I have been treated at work, during my pregnancy and afterwards I want to make sure that this gets addressed correctly

TIA

Check your companies policies they should have one on greivance procedure, ( if you are unsure who to contact than you should approach HR) In addition to this your company should have bullying and also H&S policies, refer to these to find out if you think your grievance on these issues is valid.

Having gone through something similar, I found a free legal helpline with my home insurance was usful you can also ring ACAS free help line.

Your employer will have a grievance procedure, and before you do anything you need to get hold of that. It will tell you who to write to with your grievance and will explain things like timescales and what will happen next.

If your grievance is about your line manager you shouldn't send it to him/her, even if that's what the policy says.

Normal procedure if the grievance is about your manager is to send it to the next manager above him/her, copying in HR. There is no option for them to ignore it or anything, as I say they will have a grievance procedure and if a formal grievance is raised under that procedure they must respond appropriately and hold a meeting with you to discuss it.

thanks, so I should NOT copy him in on it then at all?

there is no one above him there, so would I just send it to his friend in HR? That's he only name I have in HR as it is quite a big head office and without getting into it too much they all seem to deal with different areas of work.......she was the one who dealt with all my pregancy stuff and who I had to contact to arrange changing my hours etc though. Or could I write to head of HR?

green tea72 never thought about home insurance will check that out, do acas help with stuff like for example if I did need to attend a meeting would someone come with me to it? He has behaved appallingly for someone in his position of power I didn't realise quite how badly until I spoke to others about it and really can't see a way I would be able to return to work there after this

There's no one above him at all? So he's the managing director or owner of the company?

Check and see what the policy says, but if he's that senior maybe the Head of HR would be best. It doesn't really matter hugely, the person you send it to won't necessarily be the person making any decisions anyway.

Ok I'll give HR a ring on Monday to get an idea of the grevience procedure
do I have to tell them my name I'm really worried about him finding out that Im going to complain about him until HR are involved so if I call the lady, explain the job I do but not tell her which place it is that should be ok shouldn't it?

Sorry I've never veen in this situation before and don't want to make things worse but don't want to let him justget away with it either

Oh sorry yeah he's right at the top it's a very small place and there's my manager and them him and that's it

It's a small place but you have an HR department??

Just ask for a copy of the grievance procedure, have a read of it and follow it. If you're going to raise a formal grievance your manager is going to find out very shortly anyway.

well itr's difficult to explain without me actually telling you the full set up, which I fear would make me identifiable to anyone whom I know who might look on here

It's a huge organisation and from that organisation there are hundreds of different offices large and small with managers in each, the office we work in is very small and the staff apart from the office staff have nothing to do with the main office which is where HR is situated

thanks for all your help anyway and I'm going to start it all on Monday

No need for the full set-up. My point is that if it's a big organisation your manager will have a boss he reports to, even if that person doesn't work in the same office.

Many grievance procedures will tell you that if your grievance is with your own line manager, you should write to your manager's manager in the first instance. See what your own company's procedure says, it may be the same, or it may be straight to HR. But make sure you follow whatever the procedure says.

Good luck with it.

thanks again