UK Law - Can your employer stop you from going home sick?

crosspost

Vomiting on my bosses clothes? No, but I did hand my resignation to a previous team leader who was a right bitch to me for about a year, and when she said "It's been a pleasure working with you" I had to say "Well the reverse doesn't apply".

If you worked with food or in some other setting where fluey employees might affect the company's product, phone your city/council health department and detail all the health and safety violations you can think of pertaining to that place of business.

I'm not sure they were legal in demanding that you returned from sick leave in the first place - thye are allowed to ask for a doctor's certificate but not to force you to come back, I don't think.

Though, those with deeper knowledge of employment law could probably advise better.

I am going to the doctor's tomorrow and I am also seeing a consultant privately regarding the continuing kidney stones on Wednesday. These appointments were set up anyway before I did the deed on Saturday. I may not end up claiming unfair dismissal, I would rather never see anyone from that rotten company ever again.

The last time my job were being arseholes in a similar way, they tried to phone me to tell me not to come back to work on a Sunday - Sundays being higher paid, and obviously it'd be suspicious if I just happened to be well enough again the day I could earn time-and-a-half, or something, after only having one day off anyway. Bunch of cunts.

Anyway: my sister who is Good With This Sort Of Thing was fairly adamant that once you've phoned in and confirmed with them that you're off sick, they're not actually within their rights to contact you about it at all. As far as my work goes, they can ask you to phone in yourself every day you're off or provide a doctor's note after five days, and refuse you sick pay if you don't, but they can't contact you to demand you come back.

note - when they tried to screw me out of an annual raise after an excellent review, i handed in my resignation and ended up getting paid to not come to work for the 2 weeks, so maybe if you push the "you can't stop me from going home sick" card, you could get paid to not work, too! and i completely understand your desire to never set foot in that building again. i say good for you!! and good luck!

Also dreadful sick pay - 14 days a year, adding a week for each year of service but it was a 'rolling' period, so if I'd had 28 days sick in a year (and I had, trust me, I had), in the new sick year I would still not got any sick until those 28 sick days were a year behind me.

The more I think about it, the better I feel about throwing in the towel there. I may go along to the CAB this week and see what they say - my lecturer typically was off sick (!) I'll let you know progress next Monday when I'm back in college and have net access. In the meantime, thanks for the advice one and all.

I would say it is better to skip past the CAB straight to a lawyer, it will save time, as they will just point you to a legal body anyway.

If call centres were run along basic tenets of human decency we wouldn't have threads about their shitty employment practices, or Jon Ronson articles, or undercover telly exposes about how awful it is to work there. That said, because these places are widely regarded as high-turnover sweatshops where the workers are easily replaced, the efficacy of the service iself is subjected to diminishing returns as far as the wider public is concerned. Ultimately, the companies will suffer at shareholder level eventually because of these practices. The law will be on your side and you will look good as a man who has worked in these conditions for 4 years (kidney stones! it's such a perfect stress illness your lawyer will probably spontaneously sproik! himself) and really didn't want to change jobs what with a mouth to feed, and was happy to comply with doctors' notes and all that folderol. I mean this might be my inner editor talkin' but seriously, what newspaper do you want to be in?

Go to disclaw.co.uk for some info and a guide to getting a solicitor in your area. Here's some of their stuff.

CONSTRUCTIVE DISMISSAL:
A useful summary of the position was provided by the EAT in a 2003 case in which the judge said that "In relation to constructive dismissal, in broad terms, there have to be four elements. There has to be a breach of contract by the employer which can be either an actual breach or an anticipatory breach, and the breach must be sufficiently important to justify the employee resigning; or it can be one of the last of a series of incidents which justifies leaving. The two other conditions normally are that the employee must leave in response to the breach and not for some other unconnected reason, and, finally, the employee must not take too long about it" (France v Westminster City Council, EAT on 9th May 2003).

Repudiation of contract: EMPLOYMENT RIGHTS ACT 1996 ss.95 and 136

BASIC POSITION
An employer or employee who commits a breach of a fundamental term of the employment contract which is so serious that it goes to the very root or heart of the contract is said to "repudiate" the contract. The other party is then entitled (at his option) to treat the contract as at an end.

If it is the employer who is in serious breach of contract the (ex-)employee will be able to claim compensation for unfair dismissal and/or damages for wrongful dismissal .

The (ex-)employee will also be automatically released from all primary contractual obligations to the employer. Traditionally this was assumed to include automatic release from all restrictive covenants but the Court of Appeal has ruled that this is too simplistic an approach.

There is all kinds of info about the money but don't let's sit here Walter Mittying about settlements, get to work.

I am, ironically, at home today, having called in sick. For me it is stress related, i suppose. I was 'fired' for refusing to work an extra 9 hours on top of the 55 hours/5 days I already worked (this would make it 64 hours a week and six days a week!!!) where as my contract only stipulated I would work 40 hours. My employer seems to lack a heart entirely and the whole job has been nightmare.

So, like you, I am glad to never have to go in again (although I am currently in france where you need to stay at the job for 1 month after you are fired and we are now in week 3. The stress of being treated badly and not knowing what will happen [will they try to say that I did something wrong? How do I combat against any lies from this vantage point and in a country where I am not familiar with the laws?) and would love to avoid the stress of dealing with these people but there is that part of me that wonders what I can do for me. But there are other issues that come up...i think we are reluctant to be the 'victims' and pursue something that seems to put us in that role. Or perhaps that means they have won. Union or no union we do have rights...I am just not sure I have the energy to pursue them right now. But if I or you wait, it wil most likely be too late.

Take care of YOU in this,
Caroline (also known as the goose who recommends things for the gander she cant neccesarily do for herself)