Sometimes you have to do what people tell you to do. If you can’t handle doing things you don’t want to do, maybe you aren’t so smart after all.
IOW, shut the hell up. You go on and on about how the real world doesn’t give you everything you want. Even I know that your bosses are going to look down on you if you can’t do your fucking job because you got so drunk last night.
The employer definitely has an interest in hiring reliable people.
In other words, most people at your work are selfish jackasses, just like you are apparently. When someone doesn’t care about other people, you’d better bet it’s my job to make them feel bad for it. Apparently they didn’t learn basic morality in Kindergarten.
And, again, you called me dumb.
Ugh. You guys don’t get it. It’s never just one person who takes off after the superbowl. It’s always several people who either are self-centered assholes like rachel’s coworkers, or, worse, people who can’t comprehend that their job can’t handle multiple people being off at once, and that the people who are responsible adults are going to have to do more work.
I don’t have anything against taking a sick day for reasons other than being sick. I have a problem with the people who think it’s okay to essentially shut down their workplace and/or make their coworkers do a ton more work. Such people are selfish or stupid.
Last post, I swear. I got pissed at rachel and didn’t read the thread all the way through to notice there were a lot more posts I missed since I last checked this thread.
Here’s the thing. Just because they can’t officially fire you for this, chances are you are not perfect at your job, and they can start paying attention to the small things you do, and/or start giving you more crap so you will make even more mistakes.
I sometimes wonder if that’s what’s happening to my sister. And she schedules her time off ahead of time.
Glad you’re not by boss. You sound like a real asshole to work with.
My work has just paid time off. You can take it off, or schedule it ahead of time, either way it doesn’t matter. It’s a very low stress job, so it’s alright if a few people are gone at the same time or not.
Fabulous. Take a vacation day then. Badabing.
Okay, first of all, T, calm down. Secondly, you’re right when you say this:
We get all of the above, plus Good Friday, and usually Boxing Day and another day around Christmas, depending on when it falls. That’s not based on the courts, though; the managing partner likes to go to New Orleans for Christmas.
The vacation days only really matter for the staff, here. Attorneys can in essence take any day they want off, provided (a) their work is done; and (b) their hours are OK at the end of the financial year. There just won’t be any support staff on those days. And that photocopier is freaking complicated.
Well, yes. Being a staff member, that’s all I care about. 
The associates get micro-managed, though, so they tend to observe the office closure schedule too.
I do find it amusing how jealous people are when I tell them I get 4 weeks vacation a year. Amused in a kind of twisted way because I honestly don’t think I have taken more than 6 days in any year.
What pisses me off is that I have to record the days, and there is no acknowledgement of other time worked - for example, I did work prepping for a depo from Thursday through Monday, working about 30 hours on the weekend, flew to California on Tuesday, prepped the witness Wednesday, defended him Thursday, and flew home on the red eye Thursday night. Despite already being at around 70 billable hours for the week, I would have to record Friday as a vacation day if I don’t work. However, if I bill 6 minutes on a case that day, then it isn’t a vacation day. So out of bloody mindedness, I would read and respond to a pro bono email in the cab on the way back from the airport, just so I had something to bill.
Emphasis added. Yeah, I can be responsible and schedule one of my five vacation days ahead of time. Or I can call in at the last minute and take one of my twenty or so sick days. The incentives, they are perverse.
Yeah, I got that part. That is the crux of the entire beef, that faking sick is not the responsible thing to do because you don’t want to take one of your personal days for, you know, personal time, and instead improperly use a sick day, along with 30% of the rest of the office, while everyone else can be damned for all you care. But who am I, the Moral Police? The predictable wave of Superbowl flu isn’t something I can work up any rage over, but it is kind of an irresponsible dick move, I reckon.
In many cases, employees are reimbursed for unused vacation time, but not for unused sick leave. So employees who don’t get sick are being fucked over.
I don’t see why being hung over shouldn’t count as sick time. You’re unable to work due to your physical condition.
I mean, sure, it’s forseeable, but if I broke my leg while snowboarding and had to use some sick time that’d be pretty forseeable too.
Meh, I don’t care if people call in hungover, or use a sick day because they just plain don’t feel like coming in, and they have an abundance of sick time, as their company separates sick from personal days. I’ve done it before (separating sick and vacation time is such bullshit) and each time have described it as “not feeling well,” which manages to be non-specific but still true. I just find it eyeroll-worthy when a good third of the office knowingly hinders operations by “not feeling well,” while everyone else either showed up to work, or sucked it up and used a vacation day.
Someone’s going to ask me “So using a sick day is okay when you’re not sick on certain days, but not others?” Yes.
Um…when did I say I was bothered by it that much? I noted it was something that in some workplaces, like mine, folks might eventually get into trouble over.
Since I actually have a great career overall, don’t you presume to act like a guidance counselor for me.
[QUOTE=Freudian Slit]
I’d hate to be the person who genuinely gets a case of the trots the day after Superbowl…even if they weren’t doing any Superbowl-a-brating!
[/QUOTE]
Sure…and I’ve been sick the day after vacation, too, and I know how it must look. Thankfully I’m in a special category due to my position - I officially “work” 365 days a year (no, you did not mis-read that) but I’m only supposed to* “work” my 2,080 hours a year. Which means I can come in whenever I want and leave whenever I want, with no notice to anyone (except of course my secretary). So a tongue may wag at me, it has no real impact. The downside is, if it’s Christmas morning and I’m in a B&B in Torquay, and a power plant in Malaysia has gone all to hell, then I’m going to be on the phone and net until it’s fixed, or fucked beyond repair.
Maybe I should get drunk on Superbowl Sunday…it might take some pressure off of other folks.
You don’t seem to understand my company’s absence policy, Big T. There is no differentiation between sick and personal time. You call in when you want or need to call in. They don’t ask, we don’t tell, nobody cares why. Everybody gets 7 spontaneous call-ins a year. It doesn’t matter if you’ve got the trots, your kid’s in the hospital, or you feel like going fishing.
It can be difficult to schedule all of our time off in this department, as well. We haven’t hired in a while so we have fewer employees with correspondingly more seniority and more PTO, but less time in which to use it since there are less of us that are allowed to be scheduled off at any one time. If you don’t use up all your PTO before the end of the year, you lose it. So call-ins are actually propped-up by the system.
I find it more than a little bizarre to equate showing up at work (or not) with any kind of morality. I show up often enough to stay employed; that’s all I care about. For the record, I hate sports and would never/have never called off because of that. But if I’m having a stressful week and need a mental health day (despite not being physically incapacitated), I will call off up to the limit I’m allowed.
You start with only *seven days *in your PTO bank, *combined *personal vacation and sick time, per year? That’s *obscenely *atrocious. When I worked for a company that had a similar policy, we accrued 12 hours of PTO a month (for a total more than twice yours).
We got 1 day off per month worked (ie., 12 per year). Now I get 1 1/2 per month. Yay! Yes, that’s vacation and sick leave combined.
I got the feeling she meant 7 days you could use unscheduled, and then maybe vacation time that needs preplanning as well. But I have also learned never to be surprised at how little time off some places give.
Just want to make sure I'm understanding correctly- you get 7 spontaneous calls-in per year for whatever reason you want , and you must be allowed to take leave, right? What happens when the almost the entire department ( or company) is either on scheduled leave or called out on a particular day and there aren't enough people present to function? Do you just close down?