Receiving a disciplinary for breaking up a cardboard box

Ellieseleven

bouicca21 wrote: »

So by what authority can the AM dictate this? And is this verbal or in writing? Definitely a matter for HR!

My daughter has a letter headed piece of paper with the details about the cardboard box issue on it. She is querying whether this has ever been submitted to HR

liney

Can she not speak to HR about the promotion directly? How can she be stopped applying for a promotion on the grounds that no wrong has been done - this is after the all the outcome: they are not taking it further (because they know they are being ridiculous)

Les79

Given your daughter is a solicitor, I won't be elaborating much but I'd be looking into the possibility of sex discrimination here.... Maybe, maybe not. Depends a lot on the specific circumstances, but a lot of it sounds a bit iffy.

elsien

Ellieseleven wrote: »

My DD has not been disciplined yet as she has asked for a solicitor to be present. They have now said they will not take the matter further but she cannot apply for any promotion.

The boxes do not have a value, they are intended to be broken up and a knife is provided to aid this.

I do know the back story, my daughter has not done anything wrong, she has been bullied and victimised systematically for 2 years. This has been verbal e.g. called a bloke in a dress and a Psychopath for no reason.

She is good at her job, well liked by all her colleagues and customers and has earned nothing but praise in her role.

This manager has used her position of power to prevent her from progressing in the company. My daughter is now looking to move away but will be raising a grievance with HR

She does not have the right to have a solicitor present either at an investigation or disciplinary hearing. If she's going to assert her rights she needs to check what these actually are before she makes herself look silly.
Is she in a union?

Ellieseleven

liney wrote: »

Can she not speak to HR about the promotion directly? How can she be stopped applying for a promotion on the grounds that no wrong has been done - this is after the all the outcome: they are not taking it further (because they know they are being ridiculous)

Our thoughts exactly, they are being ridiculous and we wanted other peoples opinions.

My daughter is contacting HR but we wanted to see what others thought.

Thank you for your comments

Ellieseleven

elsien wrote: »

She does not have the right to have a solicitor present either at an investigation or disciplinary hearing. If she's going to assert her rights she needs to check what these actually are before she makes herself look silly.
Is she in a union?

She is in a union and she had made them aware of all the facts. They have confirmed she does have a case.

The mention of a solicitor (albeit a family member) was enough to stop the AM in her tracks as she was bringing a trumped up charge.

My daughter is approaching HR and raising a grievance - the purpose of my question was to gauge what other people thought about her being accused of breaking up cardboard boxes and whether you thought this was acceptable

Ellieseleven

Les79 wrote: »

Given your daughter is a solicitor, I won't be elaborating much but I'd be looking into the possibility of sex discrimination here.... Maybe, maybe not. Depends a lot on the specific circumstances, but a lot of it sounds a bit iffy.

I don't think my daughter has a case for sexual discrimination. The manager just said this as a nasty comment

splishsplash

On the face of it, complaining about how your daughter broke up a cardboard box three months ago is completely ridiculous.

However, if there are other background issues that you are possible unaware of, and if the cctv footage showed your daughter attacking the box a la Norman Bates in the shower scene in Psycho, then *maybe* it is just one thing in a long list of worrying behaviours.

I'm really stretching here though, and rapidly circling back to the whole thing being completely ridiculous.

Les79

Ellieseleven wrote: »

I don't think my daughter has a case for sexual discrimination. The manager just said this as a nasty comment

Fair enough!

But I wasn't exclusively talking about the nasty comment (which does seem to be sexist) but more:

- A possible male-dominated workplace (though I'm guessing to be fair)

- The possibility that the area manager didn't spend hours trawling through the CCTV for male colleagues who have applied for said job.

Anyways, sounds like you've got a grip on things The only other thing I could suggest is making a Subject Access Request for various things such as:

- Internal emails/messages containing daughter's personal information (to try and understand the AM's rationale).

- A copy of the CCTV (to see whether it is farcical or not)

- A copy of the personnel file (to see if daughter has been naughty in the past)

- A copy of the employee handbook and the employee contract (to see where breaking a box aggressively fits in with that)

Ellieseleven

splishsplash wrote: »

On the face of it, complaining about how your daughter broke up a cardboard box three months ago is completely ridiculous.

However, if there are other background issues that you are possible unaware of, and if the cctv footage showed your daughter attacking the box a la Norman Bates in the shower scene in Psycho, then *maybe* it is just one thing in a long list of worrying behaviours.

I'm really stretching here though, and rapidly circling back to the whole thing being completely ridiculous.

There are no other background issues. I do believe my daughter when she says this and the fact she is now bringing a grievance confirms this in my eyes (she resisted making a grievance when many people advised her to do so for fear of being transferred away which have meant she would have had to give up her job).

She didn't attack the box in a Norman Bates way, she said the box was particularly tough and therefore she used scissors to break up the corners. She and others had broken up boxes many times in this way, I too have taken more notice of how I have broken up cardboard boxes for fear it something she inherited:rotfl: