Help - Second Disciplinary Hearing About Different Issues

[StevieB78]

I've been working for this company for about 4yrs now, during this time I have seen over 30 managers go through the place on all levels. just under 2yrs ago, a new general manager joined the company who not only heavily favours all his own staff that he brought with him, but over the last 2yrs, i swear he has been searching for ways to get rid of all the other members of staff that were already there before him.

 

Now it looks like its my time to come under the spotlight. My first disciplinary was quite fair as it was due to the amount of time i was off sick and i could not really defend myself against it. I received my first written warning after this hearing.

 

I've now just received a letter containing a date of a second disciplinary hearing and including details of what they are about. Many of the things detailed are about me not being doing my job properly, but i am very angry about this as in 4yrs nothing has ever been discussed. Nothing has changed in those 4yrs, just the management.

 

I have written a note to my manager making points about why sometimes it is not possible for me to do a job properly.

 

What i want to know is, would they be able to sack me for all these other offences? or should it just be a final warning?

 

Should i appeal if they do sack me? Do i have right if i feel that the issues raised are not entirely my own fault?

 

If you need me to go into greater detail I can, but any advice will help

 

Any help and advice would be greatly appreciated

[Sidewinder]

Hi Stevie and welcome!

 

For your first disciplinary, was it a first written warning or a final written warning? Either way that seems a little extreme for excessive time off sick - depending on how bad your attendance was, this would normally warrant only a verbal warning first. What does your contract say about absence and the company's sanctions in the event of it being considered excessive? When you received the warning did it warn about escalation in the event of further absences, or did it refer to any further misdemenaours of any sort?

 

So the employer has never seen fit to pull you up on any aspect of your work in the past? THis makes me wonder why they are going straight to a disciplinary rather than having a quiet chatand suggesting ways in which you might be able to improve. I think we would probably need to know a few more details before forming an opinion as to what is right or wrong, but from what you have said this all seems a little too harsh.

 

So, some more questions....

 

What exactly are you supposed to have done wrong? Has anybody else been pulled up in similar circumstances and what was the result? Have you been advised what the outcome of the DH might be? Have you been advised of your right to be accompanied?

 

You say that you have written to your manager - was this before this all came up? Was it worded as a grievance?

 

Depending on your answers, it seems as though they are playing fast and loose with procedures in order for this manager to make his mark!

[Bigredbus]

Hi,

 

(a) What makes you think that they could dismiss you?

 

(b) Could you, briefly, state the reason(s) invoked by management in order to bring you to a disciplinary hearing?

[StevieB78]

Hi Sidewinder,

 

My first disciplinary was just a written warning I believe, although cant seem to find it in my paperwork anywhere. My attendance was very bad, 27days absent, and the disciplinary was more to do with my failure to call at a suitable time, and considering sometimes I work at 6am in the morning its quite difficult to call the 4hrs before I was supposed to.

 

I never recieved a proper verbal warning, for me, a verbal warning means taking me somewhere, sitting me down and talking about it. That said, my absence was discussed while walking to another building on site.

 

The Company handbook says That disciplinary action will be taken should excessive absence happen. I was told that if my absences continued, further action will be taken. A lot of my illness was vomiting and diarrhoea, and when working in the hotel industry, you cant go in and doctor was not really visited as most times i just put it down to a bug. They did ask for my consent for getting details from doctor, which i allowed, but i never heard anything back from doctor, neither did they.

 

Back to the DH i have tomorrow, the employers have never pulled me up about any of my work before, in fact I was promoted the previous year and even though i was heavily absent last year, i received quite a lot of compliments from guests (although, I've found this to really mean nothing to the new management)

 

 

The things that i'm supposed to have done

 

Disappearance From The Site

 

When i saw this, it made me very angry. In 4yrs of my entire time of working here, I've only left the site once and that's because i forgot my medication when on a 12hr shift and didn't think i'd cope that long without it.

 

I followed what i thought was a fair enough procedure, by informing the duty manager as soon as i realised, and ask if they would mind covering me when they got a moment while i went to get it, they obliged. i was gone 20mins max.

 

Failure To Complete Set-Ups

 

Yes, on many occasion i have failed to complete set-ups, but if you understood why, then i think you'd agree its a bit harsh. First point to make here is, that my job entails many variables.

 

Being put on a shift to set up is one thing, they give me a list which i follow, but then i get asked to do something else, have to go off to find the thing i need to do the job, take a delivery, answer phones, see to guests etc. But i am expected to work alone all the time. Also, whenever i am on my days off and somebody else has to do my job, they put 2 or 3 people on it to do roughly the same thing.

 

Failure To Complete Tasks Detailed On a Porter List

 

Again, much of the above applies here

 

Failure To Follow Instructions In Relation To The Signing Off Of Agency Time Sheets

 

This also made me very angry, only 2yrs ago, when i was promoted was i given permission to sign off agency time sheets. Since then I have never been verbally told or shown a memo on how to sign off the agency time sheets.

 

others include meetings which took place between myself and the operations manager in 2007 and 2008. I'm not quite sure what these meetings were about and they were quite some time ago. the last one is about my previous formal warning.

 

My DH is tomorrow at 9.30am and yes they have allowed me to take someone with me, but its very difficult when you feel all your colleagues are against you and I'm not part of a union.

 

May I add that all managers are very clicky, and are more than likely to lie for each other than admit they they did ask me to do jobs that took time during one of the set-ups that didn't get completed.

 

Sorry for the delay in posting, has been a busy week at work. Hope you get back to me and of course i will let you guys know the outcome

[Sidewinder]

Hi Sidewinder,

 

My first disciplinary was just a written warning I believe, although cant seem to find it in my paperwork anywhere. My attendance was very bad, 27days absent, and the disciplinary was more to do with my failure to call at a suitable time, and considering sometimes I work at 6am in the morning its quite difficult to call the 4hrs before I was supposed to.

 

I never recieved a proper verbal warning, for me, a verbal warning means taking me somewhere, sitting me down and talking about it. That said, my absence was discussed while walking to another building on site.

 

The Company handbook says That disciplinary action will be taken should excessive absence happen. I was told that if my absences continued, further action will be taken. A lot of my illness was vomiting and diarrhoea, and when working in the hotel industry, you cant go in and doctor was not really visited as most times i just put it down to a bug. They did ask for my consent for getting details from doctor, which i allowed, but i never heard anything back from doctor, neither did they.

 

Sometimes employers will ask for permission, and the fact that you agree is sufficient to indicate that the doctor will just confirm what you are saying so it goes no further...

What is 'excessive' absence? I'm not asking you for an answer with that, merely pointing out that the wording is insufficient to indicate at what point absence becomes unacceptable. Excessive can only be measured by a scoring system or benchmark, otherwise somebody's mere opinion of 'excessive' can be in itself discriminatory. A proper absence policy will have a trigger factor, at which point you should be informally interviewed and be advised that the number or frequency of absences may become a disciplinary or capability matter if there is no improvement. A 'verbal' warning still needs to be recorded in writing, as correct procedure states that at each stage of the process the employee should be advised in writing of what action has been taken, why it has been taken and give you the right to appeal. Mind you, correct procedure also states that you should be given the right to be accompanied at any hearing, so is it possible that this was more of an informal discussion, but you were 'warned' that it might be escalated in future? It would seem that the mitigation of not being able to phone at 2am to report the sickness and the fact that there are strict rules in the catering industry which would prevent you from orking when in another occupation you might have been able to 'soldier on' would probably have been sufficient to argue against a warning anyway. When was the original 'warning' given? You say last year, but good practice also dictates that warnings should be expunged after a specific period - it is considered unreasonable that a warning should stay on file for evermore - normally a warning will indicate that it will remain on your record for X months.

 

Back to the DH i have tomorrow, the employers have never pulled me up about any of my work before, in fact I was promoted the previous year and even though i was heavily absent last year, i received quite a lot of compliments from guests (although, I've found this to really mean nothing to the new management)

 

You must stress your positives rather than make a big thing about the absences. As stated above, if there have been no further instances of absence then this must be taken into account - a warning after all is designed to encourage improvement. You do need to put across that you are hardworking, dedicated, well though of by guests, and only a short time ago, considered worthy of promotion.

 

 

The things that i'm supposed to have done

 

Disappearance From The Site

 

When i saw this, it made me very angry. In 4yrs of my entire time of working here, I've only left the site once and that's because i forgot my medication when on a 12hr shift and didn't think i'd cope that long without it.

 

I followed what i thought was a fair enough procedure, by informing the duty manager as soon as i realised, and ask if they would mind covering me when they got a moment while i went to get it, they obliged. i was gone 20mins max.

 

Then the manager presumably had the authority to agree to a reasonable request to leave temporarily on medical grounds. You acted, you thought, correctly, and the manager agreed to this, so you are bemused as to what exactly you have done wrong....after all, it was an exceptional circumstance and has never happened before or since.

 

Failure To Complete Set-Ups

 

Yes, on many occasion i have failed to complete set-ups, but if you understood why, then i think you'd agree its a bit harsh. First point to make here is, that my job entails many variables.

 

Being put on a shift to set up is one thing, they give me a list which i follow, but then i get asked to do something else, have to go off to find the thing i need to do the job, take a delivery, answer phones, see to guests etc. But i am expected to work alone all the time. Also, whenever i am on my days off and somebody else has to do my job, they put 2 or 3 people on it to do roughly the same thing.

 

You know the nature of your particular role far better than I would understand, but this seems a reasonable argument on your side.

 

Failure To Complete Tasks Detailed On a Porter List

 

Again, much of the above applies here

 

Failure To Follow Instructions In Relation To The Signing Off Of Agency Time Sheets

 

This also made me very angry, only 2yrs ago, when i was promoted was i given permission to sign off agency time sheets. Since then I have never been verbally told or shown a memo on how to sign off the agency time sheets.

 

As for the point I made above, you are bemused as to why you are now being criticised for doing something which was made part of your role. You have been doing this for two years without criticism and are happy to change it if you have been wrng, but if you did not know it to be wrong, cannot understand why you should be disciplined for it.

 

others include meetings which took place between myself and the operations manager in 2007 and 2008. I'm not quite sure what these meetings were about and they were quite some time ago. the last one is about my previous formal warning.

 

You need clarification as to what this is about, and if they throw something at you which needs clarification, you are entitled to ask for the meeting to be adjourned.

 

My DH is tomorrow at 9.30am and yes they have allowed me to take someone with me, but its very difficult when you feel all your colleagues are against you and I'm not part of a union.

 

Then you can take your own notes, at your own speed, or accept the notes that somebody else makes, so long as you can agree to them at the end of the meeting and given a copy signed by all parties as a true record of what was discussed. The purpose of having somebody present is basically as a witness/note taker as it may be necessary to clarify what was discussed and what you may not have taken in at the time.

 

May I add that all managers are very clicky, and are more than likely to lie for each other than admit they they did ask me to do jobs that took time during one of the set-ups that didn't get completed.

 

Par for the course I'm afraid, but don't be afraid to put them on the spot, and if there are witnesses, feel free to get their input as well. If this is an escalation of a previous warning, then they should have proper records of what happened at that time, and as I said before, it would be unreasonable to take that into account in a cumulative process if it a) occurred a long time ago, and b) had the desired effect on the misdemeanour that the action was taken to correct. They should be looking to correct behaviour which does not seem in itself worthy of dismissal, rather than throw the book at you.

 

Sorry for the delay in posting, has been a busy week at work. Hope you get back to me and of course i will let you guys know the outcome

 

Hope it goes better than you hope, and please do let us know how you get on

 

..

[StevieB78]

I got a final formal written warning, although some of it is a joke. I wont post all the questions and what i answered, but i will post the replies i got in the letter. There is no point to appeal, as i know wont be listened to, but i think my notice will be in the managers hands after my week off.

 

 

Disappearance From Site

 

Question: On thursday 10th June 2010 between 1pm and 2pm the general manager was trying to find you. He walked the entire site, asking if anyone had seen me, but couldn't locate me. Where were you and what were you doing?

 

Answer: I did not leave the site, but i cant remember with out checking with the rota (Minutes say different). I often miss seeing people who are looking for me because i spend a lot of time in different places around the site.

 

Response In Final Warning: You deny the suggestion that you had disappeared from the site on june 10th but do agree that people have had difficulty in locating you on more than one occasion. In the companies view, this is not acceptable.

 

My Thoughts: Firstly, I work on a massive hotel complex and dont always work in the same place. Quite often I have to go to another place on the site to get something i need for the place I'm currently working in. Secondly, there's not just one single route between each places, so missing somebody could be quite easy.

 

Thirdly, I could probably name over 100days where i could have been missing for over an hour due to me having to travel about so much. fourthly, just because i cant be found, doesn't mean that i've left site nor does t mean that i'm hiding, nor does it mean i'm not working. I work alone most of the time. Do they expect me to just sit there, pick up the phone and ask for someone to bring the stuff over?

 

I'm still quite angry about this!!!

 

 

Failure To Complete Set-Ups

 

Question: On friday june 18th, you were askd to set up the Manor Suite (a seperate building about a 5 mins walk away from main hotel building) for a function the following day. By 3pm on the friday , the set up was no where near being completed. Why was this?

 

 

Bare in mind that i am only rota'd for 8hrs 30mins, and 30mins of that is unpaid break

 

Answer: I was stressed all day about not getting things finished. i felt everything should be done. On that day, I was asked to move the wall back into position (A moveable partition wall). it hadn't been taken down properly and was all over the place so this took me over an hour to fix and put back properly. I had to sweep & mop the floor and that took over 1hr (This function room can seat upto 400 guests and the floor has to be mopped by hand, also, this wouldn't normally be on my list of jobs to do).

 

Then i had to go back to the hotel to get the cutlery and crocker because it was all over there, while i was there, the duty manager asked me to clear a room, this also took about 1hr.

 

After, i went back to the Manor Suite where a guest was waiting to test his ipod on our PA system for a function that was happening in the same building on the sunday. This took about 45mins because i couldn't get it to work and was trying to figure it out.

 

after that, i received a phone call from the bars manager to help direct a company that we had stopped using to collect all thier empty beer barrels, this took another 45mins by the time i had signed all the paper work.

 

So all in all, i had wasted about 3hrs of this day not doing what i was meant to.

 

Response In Final Warning: You have admitted that you failed to complete the set up on june 18th but suggested reasons why this happened. An in complete set up is not acceptable and steps will need to be taken by the company and myself.

 

My Thoughts: Why wasn't i asked why it hadn't been done before bringing it this far? the managers obviously do not communicate enough with each other. Why should i be in trouble for what i see as managers failings, not mine? I did not get my 30mins unpaid break this day, so effectively i worked 30mins for free.

 

 

Failure To Complete Tasks Detailed On A Porter List

 

All of the above applies, even the questioning and the response they put in my final warning letter.

 

Failure To Follow Instructions Relating To The Signing Off Of Agency Time Sheets

 

Response In Final Warning: You claim never to have been given instruction on the correct signing off proceedure in relation to agengy time sheets. this is disputed by the company. you regularly sign them off in the correct manor and then occasionally, omit to deduct breaks. it cannot be proved whether this error is due to carelessness or laziness. However, it is, in the company's opinion, not down to lack of knowledge or experience.

 

My Thoughts: Again, i did not know i had to deduct breaks on the time sheets, all i've ever done is sign them off. The only reason i can think this is happening is because the agency staff have filled in their own breaks and on some occaisions, haven't. I could actually prove this with my own hand writing.

 

 

Meetings Which Took Place Between Myself & A Former Manager On August 7th 2007 & February 7th 2008

 

Response In Final Warning: You do not re-call attending 2 meetings with the former manager in respect of various issues relating to your work performance. theses issues were itemised by email on both occasions. i am welcome to read these emails.

 

My Thoughts: Well, these meetings certainly did not officially take place. This former manager has only ever spoken to me about my performance when I first applied for my promotion. Why is a supposed meeting that took place over 2yrs ago being brought up now? surely this issue should've been raised at the time. Why wasn't i informed?

 

 

 

Thats about it, apart from the rest of the letter saying what action they have taken. I never signed the minutes of the meeting and to be honest, not everything was written down exactly as i said it.

 

After the formal art of the meeting, we discussed doing a "time and motion" log, so that can see exactly what happens in my days work. Is this actually legal? At the time i said i would gladly do, because some times what i have to put up with is ridiculous.

 

 

Any feedback and thoughts would be great

[griffzilla]

 

Question: On thursday 10th June 2010 between 1pm and 2pm the general manager was trying to find you. He walked the entire site, asking if anyone had seen me, but couldn't locate me. Where were you and what were you doing?

 

Response In Final Warning: You deny the suggestion that you had disappeared from the site on june 10th but do agree that people have had difficulty in locating you on more than one occasion. In the companies view, this is not acceptable.

 

i received a phone call from the bars manager to help direct a company that we had stopped using to collect all thier empty beer barrels, this took another 45mins by the time i had signed all the paper work.

 

First thing that springs to mind, if the bar manager could phone you, why didn't the general manager phone you? If you are issued with a departmental/team phone or similar, were you carrying it?

 

When I used to work in a hotel, I used to carry an internal cordless phone, along with a walkie talkie and a pager when working as skeleton staff so I could be reached anywhere (except on the roof). This was both for the hotel's benefit, so they could locate me when needed, and so I could always contact people if I ever experienced troubles. (working in hotels, a lot of strange, and horrible incidents occurred!)

 

Failure To Follow Instructions Relating To The Signing Off Of Agency Time Sheets

 

Have you received, and signed to say you've received other training - eg COSHH training? If so, I would question why this supposed training wasn't again signed off to say you had understood and undertaken.

 

 

Failure To Complete Set-Ups

...

Response In Final Warning: You have admitted that you failed to complete the set up on june 18th but suggested reasons why this happened. An in complete set up is not acceptable and steps will need to be taken by the company and myself.

 

The fact that they are saying that action needs to be taken by the company is positive in your situation. They seem to be admitting failings on their own part, and for not having adequate staffing to achieve all required tasks. You mentioned before that they at least double the headcount when you are not on shift.

 

 

Btw, it is my understanding that you are entitled to ask for a copy of the hand written minutes from your meeting also, which you should have signed after the meeting to confirm they were a true and accurate copy of what was said.

[StevieB78]

Hi Griffzilla

 

The bars manager contacted me on the phone which is on the desk in the building. Before, i used to have a cordless phone, we all did, but somehow, all the managers managed to lose them. These days, if i cant be contacted at the desk, most managers will ring my mobile phone, but of course, this is on silent during my shift.

 

I could easily prove i hadn't left the site by looking at the cctv which points directly at where i park my motorbike. I've even got a funny feeling i either was on holiday, they changed my actual rota, or i was doing something else. I know for a fact the GM didn't look the whole site (more than likely, just all the function rooms).