Coffin Dodger

My Dad lost his battle with cancer the Sunday before last

I appreciate this is fairly insignificant in the grand scheme of things but I thought my employer may be a little bit more understanding.....

The Thursday before he passed away I got a call from my Mum saying that the hospice he was in had advised her to gather her close family around. As were the other side of the country from them we made our way down there that evening. We were able to spend a couple of days with my Dad before he passed away, not pleasant to see but a fact of life I guess.

I got in touch with work on Sunday evening (via email), told them that I wouldn't be in the following week and I'd advise them as to when I did feel able to work again. Once things had settled a bit at my Mum's and we'd got a date set for the funeral we came back home. As it's not until next Tuesday I thought I'd better come back into work for this week.

Now according to our terms and conditions we are granted up to three days of paid compassionate leave in such circumstances. I'd kind of hoped that I'd be able to book the week we were at my Mum's as sick leave as I wouldn't have said I was fit for work under any circumstances. I'd intended to use the compassionate leave for the funeral itself. This seemed to be met with some surprise and that I was expected to take the remainder out of my normal annual leave allocation. I was also told that as I didn't follow procedure and phone in sick on the Monday morning it could not be sick leave. Am I being unreasonable?

If I ever lose another family member I'll go down the doctors, break down in front of them and get signed off for a couple of weeks

Jamo

iTrader: (23)

not sure what to advise, however a call to www.acas.co.uk should see you right. im sorry for your sad loss

kingofturds

iTrader: (1)

Sorry to hear of your loss. Unfortunately there are some right ******* employers out there. A few years back my old employers docked one of the staff for being 3 hours late back from his dads funeral.

bigsinky

just take it off sick and get a note from your doctor. **** work. family always comes first. you are no more than a payroll number to them.

urban

iTrader: (1)

How long have you been employed there?

If you've only been there a short time, then I can kind of understand their reaction.

Not easy - been there, done that

Doobs Scoob

iTrader: (2)

Sorry for your loss. Most people in your position would probably go to the doctors and just get signed off with stress.

Coffin Dodger

Over 17 years

The obvious thing would be to get signed off by the docs, problem is I have a fairly major phobia of them and moved out of the area covered by the last one I was registered with quite a few years ago. So doing that is not so easy. Must face my fears one day

Tell you what though, I won't hesitate about having a sicky or not coming in if I feel even slightly off colour from now on.

Leslie

Sorry to hear about your dad.

These days you always seem to get "bright young" managers with their heads in a nasty place and who are not only trying to impress the man in charge but also only able to operate "by numbers" Too stupid or too selfish to have any kind of helpful thought for someone like you in such circumstances!

There should have been no question about you having that time off under the circumstances.

Les

albob

R.I.P. your Dad
-- you are not being unreasonable : as has been said, family come first - a reasonable employer would say 'take some time out' instead of sticking ridgidly to the 'terms of employment'

donny andi

iTrader: (3)

, perfect advice

Condolences to you and your family

mart360

Sorry to hear of you loss Mate

Hope you and you mum are ok, and you take all the support you need.

Its a difficult one, from an employee's point of view it appears cut and dried, you have a bereavment, you take time off.

From an employers point of view, some are understanding, some like to play the letter of the there employment contract law.

Sometimes its not because of you personally, but because of abuse of the system.

I worked with guy once, wh's grandma had been buried 3 times !

When this was pointed out to him the 3rd time round, he span it out to a remarried parent x3

How does the employer deal with that. ??

You will prolly find, they may walk you through the system, but in reality it will be a paperwork exercise, with no outcome other than you didnt follow procedure consider your wrists slapped etc


Mart

SwissTony

iTrader: (19)

Sorry to hear of your loss, cant really help out aside from saying that your employers are *****

Jamescsti

Sorry to hear about the loss.
I'm the sort of person who is never off sick as I'm sure the op is but in these circumstances I would be down the docs getting signed off. There should be flexibility in the circumstances.

Lee247

So sorry to hear your sad news

The Company you work for seem like a right bunch of insensitive swines. I know times are hard, but FGS, it's your Dad. Surely they would understand.
My good pal lost her Dad last Thursday and she is taking two weeks sick.

Account deleted by request

Poor show by your employers especially after 17 years service.

They should be ashamed of themselves.

Chop

astraboy

agreed. I had similar when I lost my uncle. they said I could have the funeral off as special leave, but not the travel time there and back.

the person who said "You are just a payroll number to them" hit the nail on the head.
astraboy.

Dingdongler

Sorry for your loss and that's a real poor show from your employer. I have no idea what the rules are but if my employer treated me like that I would be livid.

Lisawrx

iTrader: (1)

Firstly, I am so sorry for your loss, thoughts are with you and your family.

My workplace has the same policy by the sounds of it, 3 days for bereavement. And our policy does also state that for sick time, you must phone in a least 2 hours (sometimes this isn't possible) before the start of the shift that you'll not be turning up for.

From an employment law perspective, I'm not 100% sure how things stand. If they have clear policy and you haven't followed it, and they are *******, you might have some hassle. If I were you, I would say you got in touch asap (I assume you sent the e-mail as nobody would be available to speak to at that time) to let them know you were unavailable for work as you have explained in your OP and that you meant for that time to be sick leave, but because your head was all over the place, you may not have explained yourself as well as possible. Just say you thought the fact you sent an e-mail would negate the need to then also phone up on Monday morning. Hopefully they might do the decent thing and show you a little compassion. At the end of the day, you didn't just fail to let them know what was happening completely. I just goes to show (so far) that showing loyalty and not taking the **** doesn't make you any more thought of as an employee.

I hope it all works out and they show some understanding.

urban

iTrader: (1)

We'll then, that's a disgrace on your employers part.
Must be the industry your work in - manufacturing perhaps?

However, at least you know where you stand with them now.

Sy5

iTrader: (6)

Sorry for you loss mate. Very sad.

I lost my Stepson just over 4 years ago. My Wife was devastated as you can imagine. I worked with him at the time too so it had an impact on my employer and made it really hard for me to go back. Anyway, I was advised to see my doctor and get signed off with Bereavment. This was ok with my employer and due to our sick scheme I got full pay for 7 weeks.

My wife on the other hand did not visit the doctors and had 4 months off fully paid.

I guess it is down to your employer but a visit to the doctors won't do any harm.

Coffin Dodger

Thanks for all the messages, it has been a traumatic couple of weeks and the funeral next week is going to be a difficult time

I have been pretty shocked by my employers adherence to the rules but it's difficult to know what to do otherwise. Luckily I still have a fair bit of annual leave left to use before April but it has scuppered any plans for the fortnights holiday I was hoping to have. Oh well under the circumstances it the least of my worries.

It's weird because they were very good about the paternity leave I had at the start of the financial year, our terms and conditions say one day off paid for this, the rest at statutory pay but I got two weeks on full pay based on some sort of understanding they have.

Not sure whether to pursue it with HR or just put it down to experience. Annoyingly our HR contact has just gone on holiday until the end of the month. I get the feeling things are all a bit complicated at the moment for the firm as we were recently taken over by a very large American company and maybe they need to be seen to be sticking to the rules.

My brother's firm on the other hand (also American owned) couldn't have been better. Even when my Dad was ill his boss told him he'd be checking up on him to make sure he wasn't on his Blackberry or connecting on his laptop to often as it was more important to him that he spent time with his family.

Gear Head

iTrader: (2)

Sorry to hear of your loss fella. Thoughts are with you.

It is such a shame that your employers are acting like that, especially after 17 years of loyal service.

I am in a fortunate position of working for a smal,l family run business and they are always flexible with things like that.
May be your companies stance comes from employing large numbers and having to deal with people that take the p!ss, which is now effecting everyone.

Just concentrate on your family fella and make sure your mum has all the support she needs.

Simon K

Hi there.

Firstly sorry about your dad. I lost mine 10 years ago to cancer, was a long hard battle and a really awful time. The funeral will be the hardest as it hits home that he's really gone, so make sure you have your close family nearby.

The death of my father was far too important to be a situation discussed within my old works HR department, so I just took the time as holiday leave and left it at that. I felt that if I had argued with my company, HR w4nkers would be discussing my situation like it was someone taking to take the pi55 almost belittling my father. MY family business has nothing to do with work, as my old work's suck 4rse :-)

So, for me, if your works wants it down as holiday, whatever, I cant be bothered to argue, or have the matter of my father's detah be discussed between a load of jobs worths.

Best of luck mate, time does move on, healing wounds and loosing our parents is a fact of life, its hard, but now is when you truely become a man and take the name of your familyforward.

SBK

Terminator X

iTrader: (7)

Tricky one, our place allows 3 days at discretion of a director anything else is unpaid or holiday time so sounds like the op. Tbh it's not really "sick" time so whilst a tad unsensitive is perhaps why they've behaved that way albeit poor on their part imho. You could of course throw a sicky as many people do however do those types do well in the end or not (no idea if you are or indeed give 2 hoots about that of course) ...

TX.