If anyone can confirm what I can legally do in these circumstances that would be very helpful. Thanks.

We stopped for lunch with friends in a country pub in the middle of nowhere yesterday. As we tucked into the main course the waiter appeared and said they could not take card payments as their machine was down. We didn't have enough cash on us to fully cover the bill and it was roughly five miles from the nearest ATM. I mentioned a cheque and the waiter didn't say anything. The bill arrived and the bar staff and then the Manager refuse to accept the cheque which was already signed and completed. It was being handed to them and they refused to take it as a solution to a problem not of our making. Instead they asked me to leave my card details and security number on a sheet behind the bar. I refused having had a card cloned in a restaurant previously. Then they asked me to leave name/address details and they would phone for the card details, which we did. On reflection I am not minded to give my details over the phone to a company which would suggest we leave the card info on a list by the till, who knows how the information will be disposed of? So, when we get home and they ring for payment can I insist on sending them a cheque?

I am in discussion at the moment, the minute I mentioned the statutory flexible working avenue, it suddenly became possible it could be managed informally. I am thinking about it over the weekend.

It means when I wrote the post I suspected it would happen......and when I got into work the next day, it did!

Thank you. Does the fact that they have done it informally for someone else (to attend University) carry any weight? Reading through the link, it doesn't say that you have to give a reason for the request, so does the reason really matter ? I read it as if they cannot give a reason from the list for refusing, then the request should suceed regardless of the reason for the request (if indeed a reason is given)

Thank you for your response. Do you think my situation would fall under this remit? Are there any guidelines for employers with regard to flexibility due to caring committments?

Thank you, that would really be appreciated.

I have been there for 15 years.

I am contracted to work 30 hours, currently this has been worked over 4 days leaving me with one full day free. I work in a team of over 30 who all either work 30 hours or 18.5. We can all cover all the tasks of any team member. I think that my line manager is going to try to make me work my 30 hours over five days which does not suit me due to having caring responsibilities for an elderly relative and a mentally ill relative. I don't mind which day I have off, but I need it to be one full day as I schedule medical appointments etc, for the day I don't work. I also may be asked to change the day I currenty have off for another one, and whilst I am happy to do this I can't do it for the next three weeks due to having committments which have incurred costs, can they force me to change days and lose monies aready paid? Many of the rest of the team do their hours in 4 days, and at least one has a set day off to attend University. Where do I stand if my manager tries to force the issue? It should be perfectly possible for her to ensure that I only work 4 days but she likes to be difficult and I think she wants to show she is in charge. I have looked at the rules for refusal of flexible working and it appears that on at least 2 points they could not reasonably refuse, but I am not sure if flexible working covers my situation. Can anyone offer me some advice as to what I can reasonably expect of my employer in the circumstances.?

Yes, there is TRO which seems to cover the whole street, but when the scheme was implemented everyone who had garages which fronted the street (and who had not excavated into their front gardens to pull a car off the road) still parked over their garages without a permit. This has happenend for the whole time the scheme has been in operation without tickets being issued - so 12 years. In September the council wrote to residents to say they were changing this (so implicit in that is their acceptance that this had been the case) and that now they would be putting white lines over drives and garages to prevent parking. It was at that point that I challenged them and expressly denied them permission to do that. They have gone ahead anyway, saying that they have always had the right to do it but never bothered. Technically, that may be true, but as residents it was not what we understood we had agreed to, and not what has happened for the first 12 years of the scheme. Even now, they have stated that if we give them the reg numbers of cars that will park there they will "try" to see that enforcement does not occur. I am not happy with that as we have visitors, tradesmen etc and I do not want to have to contact them each time we want to use our own land to allow a vehicle known to us to park. Much easier for them to simply allow an exemption (if that is the process) or remove the line on the basis that we have refused them permission to put it there. All we want is for the status quo to return. We have long since accepted that they rarely ticket those who the scheme was designed to prevent parking. They are simply not there at the relevant times, but, if we have a car parked there all day it is certain they will ticket that if they can.

They are ticketing - mainly visitors to residents homes, or residents whose permits are obscured or who have a wheel over the bay. What they are not doing consistently is to ticket the regular offenders, the ones who are in their cars and waiting for children, the ones who dump ther cars and go and pick up children, the ones whom we agreed to the parking zoning to stop. In the area there were 935 tickets issued in one year, and 2.5 million taken in fines in the borough. So, I think that if they had had the remit to ticket my car when parked on the garage frontage they would indeed have done so. They haven't, not one ticket in all that time. I don't have anything in writing, it is just what has happened over the years, however, nor do they have anything in writing, as according to their parking manager, the records have not survived.

Because we have had a car parked there without being ticketed for 12 years? Because we queried that before we agreed to allow the scheme to go ahead? Because we own the land and did not give permission for that?

The parking bay is marked and does not cover that section of the road. It has never covered that section of the road. It is not and never has been, a designated bay. There have never been any road markings at all in front of the garage, but now there are.

Yes, just signage on the end of the street, and the 1 hour bay only.

Yes, on one side there is street lighting and pavements and on our side we maintain our own pavements and have no lighting. I think that portion was adopted when the school was built there. It gets even stranger! The road ends up in a private road which effectively runs straight through the front gardens of the houses. So, they have house, garden, a strip of roadway allowing vehicle access through to the top of the lane and then more garden. It is a dead end with no through traffic.