Is this allowed?

Diddums

Diddums

Diddums

Caporegime
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I got to work an hour late yesterday due to a traffic incident. Given that we are a 24h shift, someone had to wait for me. I arranged with him that he can arrive an hour late or leave an hour early whenever he wants - he was more than happy with this and was very understanding of what happened, I am never late for work.

Now I arrived this evening to start my night shift, and he tells me that the manager and supervisor had told him to come in an hour late to make up for me being late. He said we had an arrangement and they told him to come in late tomorrow "to get this out the way".

Are they allowed to do this? I've no issues with the hour, what's annoyed me is their automatic assumption that I can just stay around an hour longer, and then not even have the decency to pick up a phone or call me. They simply grapevined it to me via the guy I was relieving.
 
Diddums said:
I arranged with him that he can arrive an hour late or leave an hour early whenever he wants.
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Ok

Diddums said:
Now I arrived this evening to start my night shift, and he tells me that the manager and supervisor had told him to come in an hour late to make up for me being late. He said we had an arrangement and they told him to come in late tomorrow "to get this out the way".

Are they allowed to do this?
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Yes, if you owe an hour you owe it to the company, not your colleague.

EDIT, Just to rationalise, I've been in a position where as a supervisor keeping track of who owes what to whom, for an hour here or there regardless of past performance, can be a real pain to keep track of and leads to a lot of bickering.
It's much easier just to be straight down the line with this kind of thing. You said 'whenever' so the company has every right to dictate when that 'whenever' is.
 
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Ok thanks, fair enough. I don't mind the hour at all, hence why I made the agreement in the first place, but their backhanded way of going about things in this place is really starting to wind me up.
 
It's not your works fault, for it's best to keep on their side and not kick up a fuss. I find the more flexible and approachable I am, the more flexible my employers are. The chances are they haven't assumed this and are just hoping you'll be able to stay late to "get the rota back to normality", nothing more.
 
Diddums said:
Ok thanks, fair enough. I don't mind the hour at all, hence why I made the agreement in the first place, but their backhanded way of going about things in this place is really starting to wind me up.
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Edited my previous comment, just to add your supervisor should really have approached you and said something along the lines of 'we expect to be busy next Tuesday so I expect you to do your hour then'.
 
mattyfez said:
Edited my previous comment, just to add your supervisor should really have approached you and said something along the lines of 'we expect to be busy next Tuesday so I expect you to do your hour then'.
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This is exactly my point.

As it is I am doing a 12 hour night shift. I arrive to relieve the chap who was on days and he told me he's coming in an hour later tomorrow as per the manager and supervisor's request. This is how I found out.

This manager and supervisor are the most unprofessional cowards I've ever met.
 
Diddums said:
This is exactly my point.

As it is I am doing a 12 hour night shift. I arrive to relieve the chap who was on days and he told me he's coming in an hour later tomorrow as per the manager and supervisor's request. This is how I found out.

This manager and supervisor are the most unprofessional cowards I've ever met.
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Did you inform your manager when you were late, or just come to an agreement with your colleague?
 
I rang them up whilst on my way to work to tell them I was stuck in traffic. I also found the reason the the Beeb's traffic feed and took a screenshot in case they get iffy.
 
Diddums said:
This is exactly my point.

As it is I am doing a 12 hour night shift. I arrive to relieve the chap who was on days and he told me he's coming in an hour later tomorrow as per the manager and supervisor's request. This is how I found out.

This manager and supervisor are the most unprofessional cowards I've ever met.
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or the guy is just using them as an excuse and thought sod it he owes me an hour so he can work later tommorow
 
Diddums said:
I rang them up whilst on my way to work to tell them I was stuck in traffic. I also found the reason the the Beeb's traffic feed and took a screenshot in case they get iffy.
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Ideally the supervisor would have then taken control of the situation, and dictated you pay your hour back when it would be useful, and dictated your colleague take his hour back when things are slack.


s innes said:
or the guy is just using them as an excuse and thought sod it he owes me an hour so he can work later tommorow
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It depends on the nature of the workload, the size and amiability of the team but this is precisely the kind of bickering that can arise when people start trading hours with each other 'under the table', it affects morale and it affects the business in the sense that it becomes difficult to plan for coverage, it's a can of worms from a managerial perspective.
 
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