Hi BassaS sweetie, you sound very, very angry that I'm leaving, as does Emmzzi. quite touching. You keep asking questions, answer them yourself then go off on one getting angry at your own answer.. so you don't really need me to post anything much do you? Just something to prime a rant at your own straw dolls. Regarding enforcing Data Protection, look it up.. if I tell you you'll only sneer at my 'expertise' again. Emmzzi makes gross assumptions she knows things for a fact then gets spiteful about the fiction she's created in her head. Fact is, I have received some useful advice from this forum, plus a very cautionary insight into the kind of minds lurking in HR Depts. Emmzzi would send me to OH with a mind to getting me sacked just for being the type to 'sweat the small stuff and being a tad paranoid', bit of silly reason in my case..one would hope security guards the world over 'sweat the small stuff and are a tad paranoid'. But with just that flippant comment, Emmzzi reveals how OH referrals can be abused to serve the whimsies and agendas of HR personnel rather offer real support to the poor sod who is getting referred. Which is where I started and where I'll end. Thank you all.

Hi Think about it, thanks for the sentiment but fear not for my job, I just got my pay rise and increment.. never had any complaints about my work, the work is not stressful and yes, I am resignedly going through the spread-sheet section by section. It's a hard slog, checking against my own scattered records etc. but already I have enough big errors, totalling over £1000 to request the whole thing is corrected under Data Protection. A new total (backed up by fact) for what I should have been paid, t upsets all previous inaccurate calculations and puts a big question mark over the person who did them, so hopefully some-one else will take over. A grievance is not the appropriate form to deal with complex data, and I wish I'd worked that out earlier. Thing is ...Pay is a matter of fact, not opinion or thinking or belief... In my case, it's the total of set amounts of money for set shifts plus their enhancements; holiday entitlements are in Contracts of employment. Individuals in Management can't go deciding what these will be to suit themselves. Plus, what I was paid is what's on my pay sheets and is what I paid tax and national insurance on plus it is what will go on my Tax self assessment form. Anyone in HR who thinks they can make that up to suit what they want to prove is being rather foolish, they'll have to explain to the Tax office why payroll sent different figures for a start. I accept it may have started as a genuine mistake but digging heels in, and closing ranks on something that is so easily disproved by a set of pay-sheets is gobsmacking and worse, suggests feeling beyond accountability. So far the person has managed to do that ..my frustration has been getting anyone to even add up the totals on my paysheets, just 26 numbers and compare it to the spreadsheet total, let alone take a quick peek at the worst offending entries on the spread sheet. It does seem as if HR is seen as the Higher Realm where reality will be whatever they want it to be, and no-one will challenge them..but there-in lies insanity. Thing is, what all well behaved HR, OH people and management in general need to remember is... data protection legislation and transparency in public office, codes etc. exist with good cause; some individuals will get up to all sorts in the fog of secrecy, so personally doing one's bit to uphold the codes of practice is in everyone's own interest, or one day they may get dragged into the fog themselves and choke. That's why I was so stressed at the time and so angry now about the OH referrals, everyone knew I was choking on management fog and worse getting robbed whilst choking , yet I'm packed off as if there's something wrong with me for protesting (yelling) about it. Anyway, I'm leaving this forum now, I didn't get all the answers I wanted but thanks for your concern.

Hi Emmzzi , I am asking now because the issue has not been sorted out . You are correct, something has happened since. In August last year, nearly 3 weeks after the meltdown, I had a meeting with HR, outlined the catalogue of issues, wrong pay, wrong holidays, no contract or contact incomplete or with wrong pay on it, an attempt to patch things up the previous year with a few extra days holiday which a year later were suddenly taken away leaving me owing holiday with no explanation..The treason why I had the meltdown.it was a final straw. In that meeting, I reported something ACAS had told me and consequently HR had to correct two years worth of shifts which should have substantially increasing my holiday pay, plus corrected all the shortfalls in pay that had accumulated because no-one could work it out. (I do night and weekend shifts of variable lengths etc. and there are lots of different enhancements.. it is ahead ache but HR had set it up that way.) The ACAS advice supported my claim that the way they were calculating my holidays was unfair and plain wrong. Anyway, 2 month slater in October, the review arrived and I couldn't understand it. an excel spreadsheet and a long typed explantion concluding I owed my employer money. a cursory look over the spreadsheet showed mistakes that easily covered what they said I owed them. I asked for an explanation of it all and was told, no take out a grievance. There are two years worth of shifts on that spreadsheet. Most of my colleague security guards don't even have excel on their pc's let alone be able to analyse a data spreadsheet. (I've asked them so I'm not being patronising.. MY line manager refused to help tease it apart saying it was 'too technical' for her. HR's position put the onus on me to deconstruct it.. I quickly realised it was incomplete which meant I had to go over all my own records to check everything and get figures.. the prospect of such a huge amount of work before I could put a grievance in was horrendous, I started having chest pains and breathing problems. I didn't feel safe doing my night shifts.. I work on my own, I didn't know if I just had a chest infection or what so I phone din sick an dhad a chat to my lin emanger basicallyt begging her to ask my DEpt manger to look at the spreadsheet. I was upset. it wasn't a meltdown but I was clearly disstressed but she knew exactly what it was about..then after missing just three shifts, and before I could hand in my 7 day sick note from my doc, I'd been referred to OH again. Again no warning, no asking would I like to go or such just go on your day off.just a letter in t e post. On top of the prospect of having to put in a grievance just to get my records straightened out properly, it was too much. My Department manager said I wasn't safe and told me to go home and see my GP . I had time off on the sick, spent most of it battling to tease out the spreadsheet and write out everything for a grievance ( I also have elderly parent comittments (89) which is why I work part-time evenings and weekends. I split it with my sister who has a weekday job, she does weekends I do weekday hospital runs etc.).. I was up against a 90 day deadline from October when the spreadsheet arrived). That alone was making me even sicker.. so I stopped trying , went back to work had a two month break from it and am now back onto it because the records on the spreadsheet are so totally wrong I'm afraid they will just cause more problems in the future. I am getting stressed again, but this time if HR want to pack me off to OH again I want to be clear on my rights and how they should go about it. Hope this answers your question Emmzzi

Sorry, meant Occupational Health..I think occupational therapy is basket weaving or some such? There you go again looking for sneaky motives...what's with you? Saying I was going to my GP is making my position crystal clear. Does anyone know if I am entitled to ask for Time lieu for attending a referral meeting in my own time at my employers behest?

Hi Bazza, Actually, you were talking earlier about how I reacted then, by saying I could have refused to go.. my point was.. when some-one is stressed the last thing they want to do is cause themselves more stress by doing something they don't understand the implications of. That's the bit you wrote that made me feel you didn't understand stress.

Hi Bazza, I was asking for information about regulations plus , can I legitimately ask for TIL.. paid Time in lieu for the visit to the Occupational Therapist. Also, since I am still stressed, it's not a bad thing to be prepared for the nt time I make my position clear and get bundled off to OH again in my free time. Who said anything about suing..that I think was what was behind the OH referrals.. nothing about my well being.. protecting themselves..which i hy I resent them using my free time to do it. I've no doubt HR reacted the way they did because they think like you and think everyone I son the take so they can do say as they please.

Hiya, don't think you are taking into account that I was very stressed, or even know much about stress by the sounds of it. People are not rational when they are stressed. However, the Health and safety guidelines on referrals for stress do take that into account..stressed people are vulnerable; some commit suicide over smaller things than feeling forced to get themselves to a strange place to go and talk to a total stranger. Also, yes, about risk assessment, as I understand it ..it's supposed to happen before the referral, the employee is supposed to be present and the 'option' of a referral discussed and offered. It's supposed to be a meeting to weigh up what the benefits of a referral might be against adding stress and pressure onto an already stressed employee. And yes, it's in our Company Attendance and Well being policy document. I disagree with you, a referral sent 2 days after I said I was going to my doctor, and a letter shortly arriving on my doormat , without discussion or warning, with a bit stick of what woul dhappen if I didn't go, to a stressed person is not an 'offer' at all ...plus I wasn't on the sick plus it was in my free time i.e unpaid and originally intended to be at my own travel cost. You don't seem able to answer on those points. Some-one told me it has something to do with work time regulations etc., and I should have been given TIL for the appointment, but I don't know where to look for that bit of legislation. No-one I have spoken to has ever heard of someone being sent to OH, so quickly, (within 2 days), when they aren't even on the sick and in their free time ( I work part-time) . So it's not a regular situation, which is why I'm asking on this forum. The referral certainly wasn't out of concern for me or my safety or ability to work; as I'd told HR I was going to see my own GP for an opinion. Also, handling stress carefully is not just down to company policy, the Data protection codes regarding referring people for medical examinations in the first place, especially for stress (I was sent to a clinical doctor) are quite clear about the care with which it should be done . The policy documents make it very clear it shouldn't be done willy nilly by anyone on a whimsy. It's intrusive..and there has to be good reason and some prospect of benefit all round. In this instance the people who sent me knew exactly what the problem was so no new input would come out of a OH referral. When HR got the report it was never mentioned again..ever nor was there any follow up from OH, but in the meantime some-one has seen sense and a meeting was arranged in which the issues causing my stress were discussed and a review started. So clearly the referral was a totally pointless exercise and served no purpose, just wasted my time and tax payers money, plus caused me a huge amount of totally avoidable stress (which is exactly what a risk assessment meeting is supposed to avoid). Regarding what I want out of it I want to see if any forum members have some useful input regarding where I stand with regard to complaining about the referral and how it was done, especially in the long run it's content were ignored.

Hi, yes other things did happen, but as they happened later they are irrelevant to my query. My meltdown ( tears and frustration, yes, I may have sworn but not at the person, more about the stupid situation I'd been put in because leave records weren't being kept properly (actually lost) .) It happened whilst spending more of my own free time trying to get answers from HR. But the point is I was clearly very stressed and up set. I was asking for clarification on something, didn't get a proper answer was given the third degree about what I had and hadn't done to resolve the issues (which went back 2 years on a permanent contract and 5 years with no contract at all! ) and I felt I had done everything possible to help people sort it all out) . When I looked at my employer's Attendance and Well being policy and the Health and Well being codes of the Data protection rules, stress is supposed to be handled very carefully. There is supposed to be a risk assessment to work out the balance between what my employers would gain from the intrusion of a medical assessment, and the impact on me of such an examination. Since I was not on the sick, I had simply said I was going to see my doctor plus HR knew exactly what had upset me (we'd been in communication about muddles with short pay, holiday allowances for months, I feel the OH appointment was not set up in my interest at all. My question was about what rights an employer has to make a person go, in their free time to attend an occupational health session, when they are not even on the sick. OH was not 'offered'

Hi all, wondering if some-one can advise on this. Last year after a catalogue of errors and muddles with my pay and holidays etc, something happened and I had a melt down on the phone to some-one in HR (sheers frustration at being fobbed off and not listened to). It took me by surprise..didn't realize stress had been building up, so I finished conversation saying something like..I'm going to see my doctor and if I am ill you (my employer- public sector) have made me ill. T hat was on the 29th July 2014. I did go and see my doctor on the 1st August, (mainly to let them know the score) and continued to work as normal (part-time, evenings and weekends). I'd made it clear my job was not stressful it was all the management nonsense with my contracts, pay holidays etc that got me down and stressed , as I had to sort it all out in my free time in office hours.. Within a few days a letter arrived from the Occupational health service telling me to attend a meeting on Wednesday the 10th. The referral had been made on the 1st August. just two days after my meltdown on the phone with HR. So, Several questions. (the referral was for stress). a)are employers allowed to ambush some-one with OH like that out of the blue without even discussing the problem properly or formally even letting me know me I would be referred. b) I wasn't even on the sick and had never been on the sick. Did they have to right to refer me, especially without asking?( I idid get sent a consent form, with the appointment letter, but that had warnings about how if I didn't go it might affect decisions my dept made about me. I was stressed, not thinking properly, signed it and agreed to go to the appointment but made it clear it was under duress. c) The appointment was for a Wednesday 1.30, at a place about 8 miles away..in my free time plus I was expected to get there at my own expanse. As it happens I was afraid of driving in case I had a melt down again in the car (basically a high anxiety attack..sobbing not being able to breath etc.) . I asked for Time in lieu as I'd have to go on the bus,.., which would take ages. HR said no way but eventually relented and offered to pay for a taxi. Should they give me TIL as well as the taxi? The OH report basically said I was fine, just having a normal reaction to intolerable management issues. I continued to work for two months, while a review of the muddle with my holidays etc. was carried out. There is more but I'd like to see what people think about this lot first. Many thanks