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So I am just curious..... I have worked at a salaried position for over 3 years. Never taking a day off without being scheduled, or being injured with a doctors orders to stay off work ( and even that has only happened twice) 2 weeks ago I called and explained to my boss my uncle was dying and they were taking him off of life support and wanted to take one of my PTO days to go so that I could be there, and she told me if I went I would be fired..... Please note I had 127 hours of available PTO time..... Is this even legal??? Obviously it's mean and hateful, but can someone even do that if you have PTO time available??? If it's given can I not use it to call in sick, or for personal situations that arise? Isn't that it's whole purpose???
The thing is there are two businesses owned one is a restaurant and one is a business office. Since I am the only one that can run the restaurant I'm almost forced to never take time off because no one can fill in for me but I know this would never be an issue with her business person now because there are many people that can do those jobs it just doesn't seem right .....
Any light????
So I am just curious..... I have worked at a salaried position for over 3 years. Never taking a day off without being scheduled, or being injured with a doctors orders to stay off work ( and even that has only happened twice) 2 weeks ago I called and explained to my boss my uncle was dying and they were taking him off of life support and wanted to take one of my PTO days to go so that I could be there, and she told me if I went I would be fired..... Please note I had 127 hours of available PTO time..... Is this even legal??? Obviously it's mean and hateful, but can someone even do that if you have PTO time available??? If it's given can I not use it to call in sick, or for personal situations that arise? Isn't that it's whole purpose???
The thing is there are two businesses owned one is a restaurant and one is a business office. Since I am the only one that can run the restaurant I'm almost forced to never take time off because no one can fill in for me but I know this would never be an issue with her business person now because there are many people that can do those jobs it just doesn't seem right .....
Any light????
So sorry to hear about your Uncle. The short answer too your question is that you are NOT entitled to take PTO whenever you want - especially not unscheduled. You mentioned the critical ness of your presence. That would be a consideration.
Having said that, it's hard to imagine how firing you wouldn't put them in an even worse jam. It's also hard to see how someone could be so calloused.
I wonder if there is not more information you could share that would help give us context for their extreme response. Can you talk to us a little more about the nature of your relationship with your boss? How does he/she perceive your performance? From their perspective, how do they see you? Why do YOU think they responded this way?
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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Your boss definitely lacks understanding and compassion, but sorry to say, all PTO is at the discretion of your boss and subject to the needs of the company. If they expected it to be a busy day, and others had already been scheduled to be off, they would be worried about getting the work done. Even just to be mean, they can refuse to grant a day off. Not a good way to keep valuable employees and somewhat suspicious, in your case. I wonder if something else is going on and this was just used as an excuse to get rid of you.
It's managers like that that shouldn't be managers.
Last time I got news that my significant other needed to be taken to the hospital, I sent a text message to my boss and told him I needed to leave and he responded don't worry he'll cover for me just do what I need to. He didn't even make me use my PTO. He said just put down as working from home. When I needed to take a couple days off for my significant other's surgery, again he told me to save my PTO's and put down as working from home.
And for that, I've worked extra hard to make our team look good. We are currently the most profitable engineering team in the company.
I firmly believe bosses who are understanding and friendly the ones they manage yield a lot more results than bosses who demand results from their underlings.
I'm a middle manager and I certainly don't demand anything from my guys.
So I am just curious..... I have worked at a salaried position for over 3 years. Never taking a day off without being scheduled, or being injured with a doctors orders to stay off work ( and even that has only happened twice) 2 weeks ago I called and explained to my boss my uncle was dying and they were taking him off of life support and wanted to take one of my PTO days to go so that I could be there, and she told me if I went I would be fired..... Please note I had 127 hours of available PTO time..... Is this even legal??? Obviously it's mean and hateful, but can someone even do that if you have PTO time available??? If it's given can I not use it to call in sick, or for personal situations that arise? Isn't that it's whole purpose???
The thing is there are two businesses owned one is a restaurant and one is a business office. Since I am the only one that can run the restaurant I'm almost forced to never take time off because no one can fill in for me but I know this would never be an issue with her business person now because there are many people that can do those jobs it just doesn't seem right .....
Any light????
Insensitive and callous? Yes.
Illegal? No.
Now you know what kind of people you are working for.
What a sadistic person your boss is to try to deny you seing you Uncle for the last time! Legal or not its wrong and plain nuts.I hope your family stays strong and you find a great new job with better management.
PTOs are at the discretion of the manager, even if it's for a death in the family. The work still needs to get done and it isn't going to complete itself. At the end of the day most decent managers try to be pragmatic about this and will (if possible) handle it in a way that's satisfactory for all parties involved (the company and the employee in question). But sometimes compromises or hard decisions have to be made, and most managers will act in the best interest of the company in such instances.
That said, I wonder if there is more to the OP's story than what was posted. There's some crappy bosses out there, but it seems unusual for one to be as callous as the OP described. Taking the OP's post at face value...the boss should have handled the situation in a much more professional manner. Compassion is part of being professional...employees are humans, not robots.
Honestly, either the OP or the OP's boss should have already had a backup/contingency plan in place for situations like this. Not having one is irresponsible.
PTOs are at the discretion of the manager, even if it's for a death in the family. The work still needs to get done and it isn't going to complete itself. At the end of the day most decent managers try to be pragmatic about this and will (if possible) handle it in a way that's satisfactory for all parties involved (the company and the employee in question). But sometimes compromises or hard decisions have to be made, and most managers will act in the best interest of the company in such instances.
That said, I wonder if there is more to the OP's story than what was posted. There's some crappy bosses out there, but it seems unusual for one to be as callous as the OP described. Taking the OP's post at face value...the boss should have handled the situation in a much more professional manner. Compassion is part of being professional...employees are humans, not robots.
Honestly, either the OP or the OP's boss should have already had a backup/contingency plan in place for situations like this. Not having one is irresponsible.
I agree with your entire post, especially the bolded.
There has to be more to this story.
I am confused about how when the employee was working, there wasn't anyone who can do the job, but now that she is fired, there are many people who can do the job?
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