Excessive absenteeism due to home repairs
Ms_Shepard
27 Posts
Hi All,
We have an employee who has many unscheduled absences concerning her house, i.e. furnace repair, plumbing repair, etc. Is it appropriate to ask her for copies of these repair invoices to prove this is why she is out? We tend not to believe her since these unscheduled absences happen on the days her boss is taking a day of leave.
We have an employee who has many unscheduled absences concerning her house, i.e. furnace repair, plumbing repair, etc. Is it appropriate to ask her for copies of these repair invoices to prove this is why she is out? We tend not to believe her since these unscheduled absences happen on the days her boss is taking a day of leave.
Comments
You might want to remind this ee that if she uses up all her time off for things like this, she may not have any left for vacations or anything else. Remind her of your absence policy and show her if she is getting close to reprimand land due to excessive absences.
We frequently need to remind our ee's and managers that an absence is not a bad thing, it is just a fact: the employee was not at work....it is the frequency of absences that can be the problem.
We allow up to 6 unplanned, not pre-approved occassions of absence in a 6 month period. At the 6th there is a counseling session. Sometimes the ee is just not aware of how often "things come up". With the 7th, there is a written reprimand.
An absence is any day scheduled to be worked that is not, whether due to broken dryer, unreliable car, illness, dog having puppies in the drive way....whatever. The issue is that these rarities should be just that, RARE. Murphy's Law is not the rule of the day Even if the day is taken as a paid day off, the fact that co-workers and managers were not given the opportunity to prepare for that ee's absence makes it different than a pre-planned day off.
I know of an HR professional, #2 at his company at the time who was preparing downsizing plans. He knew his boss was having an affair with his assistant. However ignored this while developing the plan, and in the downsizing had her scheduled to be eliminated.
He turned this outline in to his boss who approved it with just one change. He kept his assistant, who was taking care of his plumbing and let go the #2 guy instead.
He told me about this, and his in hindsight foolishness at thinking that it would not matter. Something we should all keep in mind. No need to discuss how inappropriate the relationship was, even in the later 80's early 90's.
My $0.02 worth.
DJ The Balloonman