Employer Messing Me About - Thoughts?

[sangie5952]

Really? Which law is that, because it certainly isn't the Working Time Regulations? A worker is entitled to one day per week off (basically, although there are still ways around that in certain circumstances). So an employer can force you to work six days weeks forever if they so desire.

 

OP, you have been well advised by Emmzzi. Based on what you have said here the employer is doing nothing unlawful.

They may be doing something - but you have provided no evidence that they are, so any advice about them not being able to force you is incorrect.

 

At best b it's a guess based on nothing, and at worst it's going to get you sacked.

But I wouldn't worry about it too much because the minute you go in demanding anything at all, you won't have any hours to worry about - you'll be dismissed.

 

And if the reaction you got from the other site you posted on, which is mostly HR and employers, is anything to go by then you need to think carefully before you test the theory that your employer can't do anything.

 

You are entitled by law to refuse to work overtime, unless your contact specifies that overtime is compulsory. Unless you have signed an opt out, you cannot work more that 48 hours per week, averaged over a 17 week period. And your employer is entitled to dismiss you for any almost any reason they like, including refusing to do overtime.

 

You have next to no rights at all.

So at two months into the job, you demand nothing, you ASK.

And you decide whether you want the job or not before rocking the boat, because your are likely to be unemployed within the week if your employer decides they can live without you.

[sangie5952]

The sort of attitude suggested by some has allowed employers to do whatever they want and it's a slap in the face to all the workers who lost everything to fight for employment rights.

Yes, if you rock the boat they may dismiss you, but do you really want to work for someone who's telling you "what do you want your contract for"???

This should send alarm bells ringing, if you don't have a copy of your contract even in 10 years time they could say that you accepted all sorts of conditions and you won't have anything to defend yourself.

Show some dignity and respect for past union activists and if this means you have to find another job, at least you can walk away with your head up, knowing that you've said no to unfair treatment (i call it slavery but some find this word offensive)

 

You are entirely misrepresenting my post, and you know that.

 

The workers (mostly union members) who fought for these rights did so with their brothers and sisters in the movement.

They didn't post their problems on internet forums, and they certainly didn't sit around fighting armchair revolutions with other peoples jobs.

 

If the OP would like to nip down to their union branch, get some membership forms and start recruiting their colleagues in the army of workers fighting overtime, that'd be great. At least then they could get sacked for something that is actionable in law - trade union activity!

 

There is a vast difference between hundreds, or indeed thousands, of workers acting in concert and solidarity, and some individual who isn't in a union and has an entire two months service under their belt when they need 24 to get an inkling of a case for unfair dismissal. Of course, the OP maybe didn't mean it when they actually says that they were worried they could be sacked for this.

 

They're probably sitting on a big bank balance and don't need the job.

But personally, I'm taking them at their word

- if they are worried they could be sacked, then they deserve the truth, and that is that they may well be sacked.

 

Telling them anything else is simply saying something that is untrue.

 

For all your revolutionary fervor, I'd lay bets I've been part of more industrial struggles then you over the last 40+ years. And when the barricades go up I'll be on them.

 

But what I won't be doing any time soon is lying to someone about the chances of them being sacked, telling them they have rights they don't, or suggesting that they singlehandedly take on the collective forces of capitalism so that someone else feels good about the fact they stood up for themselves and got sacked.

 

The OP is entitled to resign or get sacked if they wish. They are entitled to engage in the class struggle if they wish. They are also entitled to the truth about where those decisions might lead.

Edited May 21, 2018 by sangie5952
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[sangie5952]

Sangie, can you please explain where and when i didn't say the truth to the op?

I said that if he rocks the boat they may dismiss him/her.

Cannot make it clearer.

Finding another job in a more ethical and lawful environment is also an option.

Dignity and rights have no price, some people fight for them, some others become slave of the system for a little cash even if they have a choice.

Your responses to many problems seem to be in favour of employers.

I don't know what wars you fought, but as a union activist for the good part of half century i will never suggest to anyone to work for dodgy employers who refuse to release a copy of contract.

Plenty of jobs here in UK, so no need to accept that some bandits take our dignity and workers rights from us.

I have left jobs on day one for these reasons and being sacked for rocking the boat on my own, but i always walked away with my dignity and integrity.

If the op is willing to work under any conditions it's their choice, but my advice remain unchanged: Find another job and get away from there.

Or they could rock the boat at risk of being sacked.

However, on a couple of occasions i found that rocking the boat and standing up for workers rights has the effect of gaining respect and trust from a lazy employer.

Op's call.

 

Those are your choices, made in a different time. If you think they're are plenty of jobs in the UK and people can simply walk and pick or another one the same day, you haven't been living any place I know about recently. Maybe those are the right choices for you. But your post made it appear that they were the only right and principled choices. They are not. Supporting yourself and your family is also a principled choice. Putting food on the table is a principled choice. The world is not so easy a place as to have only one option on principles.

 

The employer has not broken any laws. So the OP doesn't need to find a more lawful environment. And ethics are a matter of opinion, not fact. Asking or expecting someone to work overtime is not unlawful and it is not unethical. There's nothing dodgy in that. And they haven't refused to release a copy of the contract - if they are out of time they are only just, and it isn't something that is actionable in its own right in law. And none of that is supporting the employers side - it is pointing out facts.

 

Nor did I say that they shouldn't rock the boat - I said that they should be prepared to be dismissed if they do. If they aren't, that's a bonus. But they certainly may be.

 

As for rocking the boat and standing up for worker's rights (which don't actually appear to be in any danger here - there isn't a right not to work overtime) bully for you getting respect for it. I got sacked. And I'd do it again even if I got sacked. But i knew exactly what risks I was taking, I took them anyway, and I had no worries about doing so. Go back to post 3 - the OP states they were worried about getting sacked for refusing to do overtime. Does that suggest that they know the risks they are taking and are prepared to take them?

 

If the OP wants to stick their head under the parapet and quietly get on with it until they find another job, that is a perfectly legitimate choice. Not everything is about furthering the class war and not everyone had subscribed to the struggle. You make it sound like acknowledging that choice or choosing it is spitting on the graves of workers. It isn't.