Boss not approving Holiday as a have a young child?
Discussion
Where do I stand with this? Other than in front of the HR managers desk....
Spoke to my boss about having a few Fridays off towards the end of the year, to which he said 'If you book all your annual leave, what would you do if you needed to take a day off to look after your child' to which I gave a somewhat vague answer along the lines of 'well we dont know if they will be ill, and if needed I would take it unpaid or potently move my annual leave' no real response.
So shortly afterwards, about three weeks ago, I put in a request for five Fridays off over the last 8 weeks of the year.
Tuesday last week he approved the Friday of the same week 'because there wasnt much time left to talk about it' or words to that effect.
Chased him end of last week about this Friday, the next day I asked for, and I still don't know what I am doing in four days time.
We have a young child in nursery Tue-Weds and I would be providing the childcare on the Friday if I got the time off, so I need some notice to plan.
Absolutely pain in the arse! The irony being that usually at this time of year he is hassling us to ensure we book it to avoid any excess or carry over.
Spoke to my boss about having a few Fridays off towards the end of the year, to which he said 'If you book all your annual leave, what would you do if you needed to take a day off to look after your child' to which I gave a somewhat vague answer along the lines of 'well we dont know if they will be ill, and if needed I would take it unpaid or potently move my annual leave' no real response.
So shortly afterwards, about three weeks ago, I put in a request for five Fridays off over the last 8 weeks of the year.
Tuesday last week he approved the Friday of the same week 'because there wasnt much time left to talk about it' or words to that effect.
Chased him end of last week about this Friday, the next day I asked for, and I still don't know what I am doing in four days time.
We have a young child in nursery Tue-Weds and I would be providing the childcare on the Friday if I got the time off, so I need some notice to plan.
Absolutely pain in the arse! The irony being that usually at this time of year he is hassling us to ensure we book it to avoid any excess or carry over.
If there is an emergency and your child is sick:
If you want to provide regular childcare you have a legal right: https://www.acas.org.uk/parental-leave
Sounds like your boss isn't aware if your employment rights, forward on the links.
acas said:
By law, anyone legally classed as an employee can take time off to help a dependant with an emergency. The law is the Employment Rights Act 1996.
A dependant is a close family member or someone who depends on you.
https://www.acas.org.uk/time-off-for-dependants A dependant is a close family member or someone who depends on you.
If you want to provide regular childcare you have a legal right: https://www.acas.org.uk/parental-leave
Sounds like your boss isn't aware if your employment rights, forward on the links.
Edited by was8v on Monday 13th November 11:50
wasv8 said:
Parental leave
https://www.acas.org.uk/time-off-for-dependants
Yes, parental leave is certainly an option if I want to book a week off unpaid. And I haven't ruled that out.https://www.acas.org.uk/time-off-for-dependants
But as you have to give 21 days notice it isn't really suitable for 'emergency childcare' , more for holidays or prolonged care needs.
Time off for dependants is what as I understand it I would be taking if my child was sick, yes. Unpaid leave for unplanned care requirements.
I have spoken to him about that fact that this exists as a thing, but he is disputing how long 'reasonable' is and suggesting it would only cover the first day or even half day.
Hence currently this is about me taking my annual leave and him not approving (or rejecting) it for me.
Boss sounds like he is behaving like a bit of a plum. At the very least he needs to make decisions promptly and communicate them, even if the decisions are wrong. No decision is even worse than a wrong decision.
Perhaps ping him one more time and suggest that you'll assume he's OK with your leave request unless you hear otherwise.
Perhaps ping him one more time and suggest that you'll assume he's OK with your leave request unless you hear otherwise.
dhutch said:
Spoke to my boss about having a few Fridays off towards the end of the year, to which he said 'If you book all your annual leave, what would you do if you needed to take a day off to look after your child' to which I gave a somewhat vague answer along the lines of 'well we dont know if they will be ill, and if needed I would take it unpaid or potently move my annual leave' no real response.
Perhaps invite him to speak to HR about the relevant applicable law... What is the company policy regarding holiday application and response time?
How aggressive do you wish to be?
I have spoken to HR about it, and they are going to look into it and speak to me later today hopefully.
Our normal HR manager only works Tue-Thurs, so I spoke to one of the others, but the three of them all work and sit in a team together.
We shall see.
I cant see anything in the Handbook about the timeline for holiday requests/approvals, just to arrange with your line manager. I understand we are to give a days notice for each day of leave as a minimum, ie 24hr for one day of, five days if booking Mon-Fri off.
Wanted to gauge initial thoughts and response to the current debacle and avoid a big tldr, but there is a bit more history to this:
- Between initially mentioning wanting the Fridays off, and now, I ended up taking off three days last week while our child was ill, being physically sick so understandably her nursery wouldn't touch her even if we had been happy to leave her with them. (shes not 2 yet, usually pretty well, and this is her first vomiting incident as a toddler).
- A year ago I asked to work four days a week, 80% pay, Fridays off for childcare and work life balance. This was initially approved and I did a successful 6month trail March-Sept. But then just towards the end two of our team of six left to work elsewhere (sad no more...) and hence we ended up a bit short staffed. They have yet to advertise for the positions, so lord knows if and when they will be replaced.
- I appealed this on various grounds including mental heath, because I have been increasingly struggling to balance work and home life the way work is going and with a young child at home (my wife also works 4 days 80% and long hours) which was also rejected as a flexable working request, but has been referred to Occ Heath and is ongoing there.
- During the appeal process I also booked off an weeks annual leave Fri-Fri (which was approved) and the other two Fridays of October (which where approved, on the grounds of the appeal being on going, but triggered an email saying speak to me first if you want to book holiday off in a pattern like this again, hence I spoke to him before putting in this request).
Hard to know, but I get the distinct feeling that I have bruised his ego by appealing the flex working request, and or taking emergency child care as dependant leave rather than annual leave which apprently is what he did/does.
Our normal HR manager only works Tue-Thurs, so I spoke to one of the others, but the three of them all work and sit in a team together.
We shall see.
I cant see anything in the Handbook about the timeline for holiday requests/approvals, just to arrange with your line manager. I understand we are to give a days notice for each day of leave as a minimum, ie 24hr for one day of, five days if booking Mon-Fri off.
Wanted to gauge initial thoughts and response to the current debacle and avoid a big tldr, but there is a bit more history to this:
- Between initially mentioning wanting the Fridays off, and now, I ended up taking off three days last week while our child was ill, being physically sick so understandably her nursery wouldn't touch her even if we had been happy to leave her with them. (shes not 2 yet, usually pretty well, and this is her first vomiting incident as a toddler).
- A year ago I asked to work four days a week, 80% pay, Fridays off for childcare and work life balance. This was initially approved and I did a successful 6month trail March-Sept. But then just towards the end two of our team of six left to work elsewhere (sad no more...) and hence we ended up a bit short staffed. They have yet to advertise for the positions, so lord knows if and when they will be replaced.
- I appealed this on various grounds including mental heath, because I have been increasingly struggling to balance work and home life the way work is going and with a young child at home (my wife also works 4 days 80% and long hours) which was also rejected as a flexable working request, but has been referred to Occ Heath and is ongoing there.
- During the appeal process I also booked off an weeks annual leave Fri-Fri (which was approved) and the other two Fridays of October (which where approved, on the grounds of the appeal being on going, but triggered an email saying speak to me first if you want to book holiday off in a pattern like this again, hence I spoke to him before putting in this request).
Hard to know, but I get the distinct feeling that I have bruised his ego by appealing the flex working request, and or taking emergency child care as dependant leave rather than annual leave which apprently is what he did/does.
At which point I guess in summary the questions are.
- Can he decline or otherwise fail to 'approve' my annual leave based on the potential for my child to be off sick over Nov/December?
- Can he force me to take annual leave rather than dependant leave if there is a reasonable reason for the leave.
- Is three days 'reasonable' for a child who is vomiting and or not able to attend nursery if you dont have, and or can not arrange, other childcare options.
Fairly sure I know the answer to all three of those having read various articles online, and asked them to the ACAS support line, but it is still hard to know what best to say or do to escalate this for the best effect.
- Can he decline or otherwise fail to 'approve' my annual leave based on the potential for my child to be off sick over Nov/December?
- Can he force me to take annual leave rather than dependant leave if there is a reasonable reason for the leave.
- Is three days 'reasonable' for a child who is vomiting and or not able to attend nursery if you dont have, and or can not arrange, other childcare options.
Fairly sure I know the answer to all three of those having read various articles online, and asked them to the ACAS support line, but it is still hard to know what best to say or do to escalate this for the best effect.
dhutch said:
- A year ago I asked to work four days a week, 80% pay, Fridays off for childcare and work life balance. This was initially approved and I did a successful 6month trail March-Sept. But then just towards the end two of our team of six left to work elsewhere (sad no more...) and hence we ended up a bit short staffed. They have yet to advertise for the positions, so lord knows if and when they will be replaced.
Reading between the lines, I suspect that this might be the issue, rather than holiday or dependants.You want to do a 4 day week, the company doesn't want you to?
Taking 5 Fridays off in 8 weeks basically amounts to doing a 4 day week, albeit by using your holiday allowance. Does this create an operational problem for your boss?
If you took these Fridays, could it be seen as an indicator that your 4 day week proposal works - especially if you're going to Occy Health about it?
Tricky situation. Do you have enough of a relationship with your boss to sit down and have a frank conversation about what the issue is?
If you want to do 4 days and it's going to cause a problem for your boss if you do, you either need to find a compromise for that or one person is going to be disappointed.....
cookie1600 said:
dhutch said:
Our normal HR manager only works Tue-Thurs,.
Who sanctioned that then??!!! lol Apparently its always been a 3-day per week role, for historic reasons, before the HR dept became more merged.
Presumably she likes it so had stuck with it.... doesnt even have kids. Sigh!
Muzzer79 said:
Taking 5 Fridays off in 8 weeks basically amounts to doing a 4 day week, albeit by using your holiday allowance.
Yes, but I would say, in terms of team productively (man hours per week, its very different to working a four day week and then having my holiday on top.Obviously this is also only a short term bridge, during the ongoing appeal and working request application and as we cant just turn on/off the extra day a week of childcare.
Muzzer79 said:
Does this create an operational problem for your boss?
It does not, no. We have little or no external or even inter-team interaction, and basically just sit at our desk doing our job. Days worked = amount of work done, and not much more or less than that.As said, the 6 month trail went well, certainly no issues with me working four days not five, and has only been turned down now because of a reduction in overall resource due to two unexpected leavers. There is no real reason I cant work for days per week.
Obviously I cant covered a lost 10 days/week with one extra day per week of my own, even if my productivity and motivation to work remained constant.
dhutch said:
Muzzer79 said:
Does this create an operational problem for your boss?
It does not, no. We have little or no external or even inter-team interaction, and basically just sit at our desk doing our job. Days worked = amount of work done, and not much more or less than that.As said, the 6 month trail went well, certainly no issues with me working four days not five, and has only been turned down now because of a reduction in overall resource due to two unexpected leavers. There is no real reason I cant work for days per week.
i.e You may not interact externally or internally, but if you're doing 4 days rather than 5 - he loses a day of production.
Likewise, if the business has lost resource due to unexpected leavers, has it been deemed that there is not the budget to replace those leavers, therefore it's necessary to get the maximum out of those remaining?
Again, that would mean that losing you for a day a week, plus losing two full time staff, could mean that your boss won't get what needs to be done, done.
Jasandjules said:
Your actions are, to my mind, dictated by your required outcomes.... And how much you are willing to push/upset the manager..
Required outcome- Getting the three days off to spend with my child, to provide childcare, work life balance, and to attend a pre-arranged parent and toddler class. (17th, Nov, 1st 8th Dec)
- Hence also not having to use those days for emergency childcare for last weeks unexpected vomiting toddler.
- And in the long term, revert to four day working to maintain work life balance, stress, anxiety, etc and parent my child.
Muzzer79 said:
Tricky situation. Do you have enough of a relationship with your boss to sit down and have a frank conversation about what the issue is?
If you want to do 4 days and it's going to cause a problem for your boss if you do, you either need to find a compromise for that or one person is going to be disappointed.....
Until recently I would say we had a reasonably good relationship, and certainly chatted on a superficial level without issue. We often had lunch together, chatted about hobbies and cars, our children, whatever.If you want to do 4 days and it's going to cause a problem for your boss if you do, you either need to find a compromise for that or one person is going to be disappointed.....
However he has always been a bit slippery when it comes to the crunch, such as if you want to talk about a problem or escalate an issue to him, when he will just try and smooth it over without inconveniencing himself or his senior management reports. I believe the senior engineer who left used the term 'gas lighting' a several times during his exit interview which says it all.
Obviously currently things have somewhat broken down.
I don't want to irreparably damage the relationship if I can help it, as while it is only ok, this job pays fine and I don't really want to disruption of moving at this time. Plus even as a white collar development engineer, mechanical engineering companies that will entertain four day working, while certainly available, are not as common place as other sectors.
Equally, right now this week, I would happily let his tires down if I thought I could get away with it. (joking....)
Muzzer79 said:
But does your boss lose production numbers?
No, both myself and my boss work in a design/development role, with no direct link to manufacturing.Muzzer79 said:
Likewise, if the business has lost resource due to unexpected leavers, has it been deemed that there is not the budget to replace those leavers, therefore it's necessary to get the maximum out of those remaining?
The company is trying to do some 'belt tightening, due to current economic conditions' but they are multinational which could afford to recruit someone new anytime they wanted, our business unit is doing better than most in terms of profitability, and obviously in dropping a day I also save them 20% of my wages...Kermit power said:
Is your job something that you can reasonably do remotely?
If it is, then over and above your legal protection, surely even more unreasonable to try and make you hold back some of your holiday allowance in case your child is sick if you can work remotely!
I could easily do my job from home, certainly hybrid with a day a week in the office / on site if I wanted to and if my boss would allow it.If it is, then over and above your legal protection, surely even more unreasonable to try and make you hold back some of your holiday allowance in case your child is sick if you can work remotely!
Occasionally he lets people do a day from home if they have a plumber coming round or the car is in the garage etc. But he has a thing about the fact you cant work from how and provide childcare, which to be fair with a toddler (rather than say a 10yo) I broadly agree with.
As a compromise, and because I felt pressured by him, I worked the afternoon of my 3rd day looking after a poorly child, as she was a bit better and I was able to get a family member who doesnt like doing any childcare to supervise said child for a few hours.
dhutch said:
Muzzer79 said:
But does your boss lose production numbers?
No, both myself and my boss work in a design/development role, with no direct link to manufacturing.Muzzer79 said:
Likewise, if the business has lost resource due to unexpected leavers, has it been deemed that there is not the budget to replace those leavers, therefore it's necessary to get the maximum out of those remaining?
The company is trying to do some 'belt tightening, due to current economic conditions' but they are multinational which could afford to recruit someone new anytime they wanted, our business unit is doing better than most in terms of profitability, and obviously in dropping a day I also save them 20% of my wages...By 'production' I simply mean work - does your boss get less work out of you in 4 days rather than 5?
One assumes yes, therefore is that a problem for him? Does s
t not get done or not get done fast enough because you're doing 4 days rather than 5?This is a question you can't answer, hence suggesting talking to your boss.
If they're doing belt tightening, this adds credence to the theory of other people not being replaced.
Being a multinational and making profit is irrelevant - you need to think past your situation and think big picture, like your boss has to.
I'm not saying he's right or wrong or you're right or wrong regarding your working hours - just put yourself in his shoes for a bit and talk to him. If he says he can't afford to lose you for a day a week, you have to take that at face value.
If he says he won't lose you for a day a week out of principle, that's another matter.
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