Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

[basa48]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

When will people get the idea that an employer is not responsible for its employees health or health care except and unless you are sick due to your employers negligence, and even then the employee has a duty of care to themselves (and colleagues) to avoid and draw attention to hazardous situations.

An employer employs you to work and pays you as a result, end of. If you don't or can't work that is not the responsibility of the employer, it is the employees. Sure they have a few rules to abide by, mainly to avoid charges of discrimination or to allow leave (as in holidays). But the rules are very flexible (and vague) and as long as an employer pays a fair days pay for a fair days work that is pretty much it. Anything more is down to negotiation and agreement.

[Inca]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

It makes me so cross when people become antagonistic because the advice they are given isn't what they want to hear. Noone can make the 'truth' fit.
I'd rather be told the cold hard facts of why I'm wrong than be fed a crock of crap and placated with lies.
The very fact that knowledgable people give up their free time to help on our forum is a bonus and to brush that advice aside as inconsequential is just plain rude.
If you don't want the answer,,,,,,,don't ask the question.

[Eloise01]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

When will people get the idea that an employer is not responsible for its employees health or health care except and unless you are sick due to your employers negligence, and even then the employee has a duty of care to themselves (and colleagues) to avoid and draw attention to hazardous situations.

An employer employs you to work and pays you as a result, end of. If you don't or can't work that is not the responsibility of the employer, it is the employees. Sure they have a few rules to abide by, mainly to avoid charges of discrimination or to allow leave (as in holidays). But the rules are very flexible (and vague) and as long as an employer pays a fair days pay for a fair days work that is pretty much it. Anything more is down to negotiation and agreement.

I agree - employers aren't social workers. But to be fair, the OP is labouring under an illusion that many people hold - including, it would appear, their union rep. A sick note, or fit note as they are now styled, is not a get out of jail free card. I cannot recall the exact wording on one now, but they are advice to refrain from your normal work, and as I pointed out, this does not include investigations or disciplinaries unless specifically stated by the GP. It does not matter whether someone thinks the allegations being made are fair, or true - an employer is permitted in law to investigate alleged misconduct. If they are found to be not guilty, or there are mitigating circumstances, then that shows that the system is working correctly - as happened in the first instance the OP described. An employer cannot simply "time" their decision to investigate alleged misconduct to a convenient date. With the best will in the world, without any comment on the OP's veracity - there's an awful lot of "going off sick" when employers investigate employees or decide to hold disciplinaries. If employers were to halt everything because a fit note is submitted, then there wouldn't be any disciplinaries ever, warranted or not.

Where an employee is signed off sick in such circumstances, my advice to their union has always been that, unless they are playing for time, get it over with. Disciplinaries are stressful and that doesn't go away because someone is signed off, it gets worse. And if there is a case to be made or a legal argument to win, the sooner the process is out of the way, the sooner we can get on with that and try to get a resolution. Where someone is in a union they are generally well protected in these circumstances, so delay does nothing but increase the normal levels of anxiety associated with such things. The only good reasons to delay are if someone is genuinely not fit enough - in which case their GP should be saying that, as I have pointed out; or if the union (or they) know that they are guilty and they are playing for extra wage payments. Since the latter appears not to be the case here, then the best advice is to deal with it if you can, or get the GP to deal with it if you can't. Although in these circumstances, it appears the employer is opting to postpone until the individual returns to work anyway.

[CleverClogs]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

When will people get the idea that an employer is not responsible for its employees health or health care except and unless you are sick due to your employers negligence, and even then the employee has a duty of care to themselves (and colleagues) to avoid and draw attention to hazardous situations.

Not to mention the duty of care owed to the employer, whose valuable machinery might be seriously damaged if blood and bits of employees got stuck inside. In the food industry, it could be even more serious - a whole batch of lasagne might have to be thrown away!

An employer employs you to work and pays you as a result, end of.

Which is, of course, why an employee is supposed to hate their work; an employee who likes his work is evidently not being made to work hard enough, so the work load should be increased until resentment and industrial unrest starts to set in. If the employer then reduces the work load slightly - possibly with the excuse that quality of output should improve - he should have found the optimum working rate of maximum production for the standard daily pay.

Of course, none of that applies to company directors, who are paid pots of money and bonuses in return for doing bugger all.

[scoobydoo]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

Of course, none of that applies to company directors, who are paid pots of money and bonuses in return for doing bugger all.[/QUOTE]


:tinysmile_hmm_t2: that must explain why both myself and MOH have been working today on our day off then.(both Directors):tinysmile_grin_t:

[CleverClogs]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

:tinysmile_hmm_t2: that must explain why both myself and MOH have been working today on our day off then.(both Directors):tinysmile_grin_t:

But what were you actually doing?

[scoobydoo]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

working on management review meeting notes and management structures if you must know!:typing:

[CleverClogs]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

working on management review meeting notes and management structures if you must know!:typing:

But that's not really work, is it?

[Inca]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

Yer a pi ss taking git aintcha Cloggy? msl:

[scoobydoo]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

I would answer cloggy - but it would clog () up the thread and the OP may decide to come back.

signing off - stressed Co. Director

[CleverClogs]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

the OP may decide to come back.

:flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig: :flypig:

[CleverClogs]

Re: Harassed by Managers whilst of work sick (NPower)

Looking at this another way, the employee has a duty to refrain from divulging information about the employer's business except in the course of a legally held investigation by the police or by Parliament.

If the (reported) success of the back-to-work programme was impaired by the staff being over-worked or if the "positive outcomes" proved to be temporary or illusory due to inadequate monitoring, wouldn't that be of interest to at least one Parliamentary Select Committee?

It may well be that the employer cannot employ enough staff to cope with the workload and still hope to make a profit, but is it entirely wise to instigate a disciplinary hearing into a mistake or two made by a member of staff who was made ill partly as a result of overwork? If the employee were to be dismissed and then claimed unfair dismissal, their claim might be rejected but enough details might leak out to cause some people to question how well that employer was fulfilling its contract.