Fired for being too sick to work?

[keiko]

Apparently "that's how it works at every job" according to my manager, excuse me, FORMER manager.

I texted him this morning to let him know that I'm too sick to come in to work. I would have called but one of my symptoms of being sick is that breathing makes it feel like my throat is being ripped out. My throat hurts too much to scream obscenities at the fucker.

The really fucked up part? Monday I worked a double filling in for a girl who didn't call and didn't show... because she was sick. She was back at work on Thursday, no ramifications. A second girl pulled the same thing Wednesday night, and a third girl came in and left again before her shift on Thursday, because she had cut her finger really bad and the wound opened up when she tried pulling her boots out of her bag.

I'm expecting a phone call next week, probably Tuesday, asking me if I can come in and work. The SOB has four shifts to try and get covered for next week, all mid shifts. Covering all of those on short notice is going to be hell on him, and he brought it on himself.

Anyone else ever heard of this "no sick days" policy? Is it just that I've been spoiled by good jobs/bosses in the past where they gave you a certain number of sick days? Ever been fired for being too sick to work?

~K

[malcolm]

wtf? no. i've never heard of that but i ahve heard of people suing businesses for allowing obviously sick and infectious people to work in the public. that guy should be smacked with a bag full of small pocks..

one fo my other buds who works for a ufcw unioned grocery store found out yesterday because he doesnt have full availability that he's now on a 'we'll call you if we need yuo" basis with the store because he's going to school.

people are being idiots these days with employment.

[keiko]

It's not so much employment they're being dumb with, it's basic health and safety. I didn't want to get anyone else sick, customers and employees alike and my job is mainly conversation carried out over loud music, which I clearly cannot do. I woke up at five am this morning in excruciating pain from my throat being swollen shut. it's been hell ever since.

I did have a very nice fever dream about crushing his windpipe and telling him to take a sick day.

~K

[malcolm]

it's still ridiculous that he'd fire you like that. he should have his windpipe crushed.....want me to go have a talk with him? *puts on brass knuckles*

[Morning Glory]

yeah, all the time. If you don't have a doctor's note most places consider it the same as just not showing up. At my old job if you wanted the day off you had to get someone else to cover your shift and that was it, unless you had that doctor's note. They didn't care if you called in before your shift. Once I did it and I came in for work the next day, even though I was still sick and they let it slide because they were understaffed and I always came in when I wasn't scheduled because they needed me and if they fired me, then there would be no one to come in.

Other jobs I've known it's like a catch 22. If you come in to work the next day, then they will know you weren't sick, so they would fire you even with a doctor's note. I don't know about the law there, but here before you get any job you have to sign a contract saying that they can terminate your employment at any time and don't have to give you a reason.

[Morning Glory]

that's the only good thing about my job now. I never talk to my boss, everything is done through third parties that don't really have any authorization to tell me what to do and I go to different job sites as a company representative so I don't even work with anyone else from my own company.

I get so few hours that they don't care about me and all my boss does is rubber stamp my time sheets that I send in to him and he doesn't even know if I am there or not. Basically it's like show up for work if you feel like it, and if you don't, then whatever. I've taken off a few days just because I didn't want to go in. But I can't really afford that, I can't even afford the few hours that I do get.

[Amelia G]

Apparently "that's how it works at every job" according to my manager, excuse me, FORMER manager.

I texted him this morning to let him know that I'm too sick to come in to work. I would have called but one of my symptoms of being sick is that breathing makes it feel like my throat is being ripped out. My throat hurts too much to scream obscenities at the fucker.

The really fucked up part? Monday I worked a double filling in for a girl who didn't call and didn't show... because she was sick. She was back at work on Thursday, no ramifications. A second girl pulled the same thing Wednesday night, and a third girl came in and left again before her shift on Thursday, because she had cut her finger really bad and the wound opened up when she tried pulling her boots out of her bag.

I'm expecting a phone call next week, probably Tuesday, asking me if I can come in and work. The SOB has four shifts to try and get covered for next week, all mid shifts. Covering all of those on short notice is going to be hell on him, and he brought it on himself.

Anyone else ever heard of this "no sick days" policy? Is it just that I've been spoiled by good jobs/bosses in the past where they gave you a certain number of sick days? Ever been fired for being too sick to work?

~K

I had a boss once who accused me of being hungover when I called in sick on a Monday. I was actually sick. He asked for a doctor's note. I was too sick to get out of bed, much less go to the doctor to find out I had a common cold. Which I already knew. Had I been well enough to drive around to a doctor, I would have been well enough to do that simple ass job. The whole thing was very irritating, so I sorta quit.

[SyntheticShock]

At my work our policy is you get fired after 3 no call-no shows within a period of time, and I think if you are sick more than a few days within a certain amount of time you need a doctors note. But they would never fire anyone for calling in sick once.

[Ajax Knucklebones]

Man, I must be an easy boss or something. I have actually fired someone for being sick too much and also because she was late alot. At the same time, I wrote her up for the same offenses 4 times before I actually terminated her. And also constantly told her that if she kept it up, sooner or later, I would have to fire her. Yeah, she didn't listen to my advice. I don't mind people calling in sick to work, but if it starts to be an ongoing thing, it does drive me nuts. Mostly because when they call in sick, it means those of us working have to work harder because we're covering for the person out. And usually, if it's ongoing (like a couple of times a month) that means two things. Either they're full of shit or they're not going to the doctor to see why they keep getting sick. If it's the latter, then that also pisses me off because at my work, we all have health insurance and a basic doctor visit costs $20.00. Just go.

If someone is contagious with something that also really pisses me off that they come to work. My thing is we're all grown-ups. We know if we are sick or not. I CAN'T STAND someone coming to work sick and just waiting for me to tell them to go home. I won't do it unless they're fainting on the ground. You're sick and want to go home? Just tell me. I never give anybody shit when they do, unless you can tell it's because of partying the night before. And even then, I don't get nasty. I just kind of give them the cold shoulder.

Oh, and last year I did call out sick on a Monday and my regional manager did accuse me of calling out with a hangover. She didn't get nasty, but met with me a few days later and just said that by me calling out because of drinking, I wasn't setting a good example. I actually was taken by surprise that she really thought it was do to a hangover. What pissed me off is I didn't have a hangover and I only drink (if I feel like it) on Fri and Sat nights...Never Sun. night.

[LeilaHazlett]

That's how it worked at my first job. I tried to call out sick once because I was really ill and they told me if I couldn't come in it was my responsibility to get someone to cover for me, but they wouldn't give me the contact info of any of the other employees and told me I should have their contact info already. I was never aware of this policy so I didn't know I was supposed to go up to everyone I worked with and ask for their phone number just in case I happened to get sick.

I almost got fired from another job because they required you to be on call pretty much any day you weren't scheduled to come in. Again no one told me the policy when I was hired so when I got a phone call from my boss telling me I HAD to come into work that morning even though I wasn't scheduled to she got really pissy because I told her I couldn't. I had to explain to her that being paid minimum wage wasn't enough for me to live on so I had a second job and could not afford to be waiting around for the possibility that I might get called in. Soon after that I quit because that placed sucked so much.

[VoltaireBlue]

who said that? mason?

[Velvet-Tongue]

I think the text message is what made him angry Keiko.

[OliX]

I think you need to show your teeth more often so you don't get runned over so easily...

[Aza]

The way the text was worded was part of the issue, I regret to say. Bosses (booking agents, etc.) much prefer to be asked, rather than told, when their employees are calling out sick. All too often, the wording of a request makes the difference in whether or not it gets followed.

The other thing I hate to admit (but have mentioned to you before) is that you really did get spoiled by Inner Room, and by the apparently very lax Florida peeler-policies. Most every line of work out there requires that employees adhere to a set schedule no matter what, at least until the first 60 to 90 days are over and the employee can begin accumulating sick days and vacation. I've had to deal with a set schedule for every job I've ever worked; so has most everyone else I've ever known. With as many privileges as strippers already receive (e.g. the ability to get drunk and naked at work while still bringing home over $100 a night, like one can at no other job in the world), it's not exactly unfair to try to bring them a bit further under the parameters of a "real" job. After all, a stripper's real "privilege" is that she's hot enough to make money that easily in the first place. Strippers in general are spoiled by so much, particularly by the fact that they rarely have to deal with the types of bullshit that the rest of us frequently encounter in our workplaces. Asking strippers to adhere to a schedule sounds beneficial to them, like training for how the real world works.

Don't get me wrong, babe... Mason sounds like a total asshole who has his "Casting-Couch favorites" among the younger girls who do him special favors. He also sounds like a power-tripper who was bound sooner-or-later to fire the girl who was smarter than he. You very much did bust your ass for DV8, and their treatment of you now is about the least "fair" thing I think I've heard this week. That having been said, the job policies you didn't encounter at the incredibly-lax strip clubs in Florida may have come back to haunt you... and may again in the future if we can't adapt you slowly to some of the more common policies of the rest of the working world.

[Aza]

Because I took too long editing, I'll have to make my further addendum here: it is ridiculous to expect any employee in a heavy Customer Service environment to bring a potentially contagious illness into the workplace. That's just a bad decision all-around!

So fuck Mason! Or rather, enjoy the dignity of being one of the chicks who refused to fuck Mason.

[keiko]

who said that? mason?

Give the girl her prize, folks. Right in one.

~K

[keiko]

So fuck Mason! Or rather, enjoy the dignity of being one of the chicks who refused to fuck Mason.

The funny thing is it never came up in our conversations. He never once made a pass at me. From what I could deduce from the way things were worded in the dressing room, I'm too old, ie over 21, to catch his interest in that way.

~K

[athenahollow]

Back a few years ago, I was working in the Deli at Kroger.

I got a really bad stomach flu, and was throwing up blood (yes, blood). I called and told them that there was no way that I could come in because I couldn't stand up for more than 10 minutes without my stomach being in horrible pain, and then throwing up blood every hour or so.
She told me "Well, some one else scheduled the day off, so you have to come in. And if you don't, well, then I don't know how well this job is going to work out"

(Mind you, I'd only been working there for 6 weeks, so I didn't have insurance yet, and I hadn't had a job in a year, so no money to go to the dr.).

I quickly informed her that I didn't think it was the best idea to have stomach flu and being around people's ready to eat foods, and she just hung up on me.

They had the audacity to call me 4 days later and beg me to come back and I retorted with "Sorry, I don't work for assholes who want puking girls to work around fresh food"

[keiko]

ROFLOL!

His partner just txted me wanting to know if i wanted to work this week. I think I'll call him back when I'm done laughing ....

~K

[mystoo]

First of all, I hope you're feeling better. And second, I've never been fired for calling in sick BUT, I used to work at this crappy coffee shop and one day the boss who obviously was mentally ill, flipped out and fired EVERYONE! Ya, even people who were not working that day. What happened was, a co worker made the wrong coffee for someone and left it sitting on the counter and the boss just lost it, stared throwing coffee and garbage at us and screaming something in Greek. It was really bizarre and he went out of business a few weeks later.
As for sick days, we're allowed 10 a year where I work but people are always calling in sick and not getting fired.
So, I know you were all excited to get a job but that guy sounds like a douche, do you really want to work for him?

[VoltaireBlue]

Give the girl her prize, folks. Right in one.

~K

I hate to say it, but you should have called and not texted. if it was me, I would have gone in anyway, and had the bar send me home; that way, I get the privilledge of calling in untill I actually feel better. dancing in pdx is like having a real job. last time I was there, I called in sick to jacks and had to pay a $20 call out fee.

for the record, mason has never been even remotely creepy to me. I'm sure he fucked some of those girls; some of those girls are dumb ass hoes. if I was him and they offered, I'd say yes in a flash if they were cute.

[keiko]

I hate to say it, but you should have called and not texted. if it was me, I would have gone in anyway, and had the bar send me home; that way, I get the privilledge of calling in untill I actually feel better. dancing in pdx is like having a real job. last time I was there, I called in sick to jacks and had to pay a $20 call out fee.

for the record, mason has never been even remotely creepy to me. I'm sure he fucked some of those girls; some of those girls are dumb ass hoes. if I was him and they offered, I'd say yes in a flash if they were cute.

When I had an upper respiratory infection last October I had a pay a $40 missed shift fee, but at least that was clearly posted.

I txted : Would call but my throat is swollen shut. Can't work today, should be fine by monday though.

Literally I couldn't talk without it feeling like if my throat would just bleed it might lubricate the burning sensation and make it more tolerable. I thought I was going to have to go to the hospital instead of going to work. Thank goodness for Throat Soother tea and Thera-Flu or I might have gone to the hospital.

Actually Mason is just a prick. He didn't strike me as anything less that professional when we spoke in person those few times. He's unfair and demanding but not creepy.

~K

[velvet]

When I had an upper respiratory infection last October I had a pay a $40 missed shift fee, but at least that was clearly posted.

I txted : Would call but my throat is swollen shut. Can't work today, should be fine by monday though.

Literally I couldn't talk without it feeling like if my throat would just bleed it might lubricate the burning sensation and make it more tolerable. I thought I was going to have to go to the hospital instead of going to work. Thank goodness for Throat Soother tea and Thera-Flu or I might have gone to the hospital.

Actually Mason is just a prick. He didn't strike me as anything less that professional when we spoke in person those few times. He's unfair and demanding but not creepy.

~K

when i worked for them i had the same experience.they will threaten and fire you but they reaally need you to work.its just a power trip

[nathanmbailey]

That blows. It seems like the people that take one sick day when they're actually sick are the first ones fired, while the ones that pull "no call, no shows" and call off all the time get to keep a job. There was only two conditions that would cause me to call in sick, diarrhea or massive vomiting. Even then, as soon as I got it under control I showed up. There were times I was so sick I had to be sent home after the rush was done, but I'd never complain about being sick. Yet, I was sick as hell and couldn't even call once and was fired.

I was in the same boat though, always taking other people's shifts when they called in or coming in when they needed someone to cover for a "no call, no show." Even got written up (and I quit right after) because I didn't show up for a shift that I didn't know I had because they changed the schedule and didn't bother to let me know.

[Mr Karl]

I've never had to take a day off cause I was sick, but I did miss a half day when a tree fell on my house and they had no problem with that.

[batzilla]

I'm sorry to hear about the crappy situation! It feels terrible to be fired, it's happened to me before. It sounds like you could do a lot better, though. Good luck!!!

[Morning Glory]

A guy I worked with was fired for not coming into work because he got arrested. I thought that was unfair. what is he supposed to do, use his one phone call to call into work?

and it was for driving without a license, big deal. not like armed robbery or anything.

[Vexbeast]

Around here, we have a thing called 'employment law courts'.

The fact that I'm going to have to leave this country scares the shit out of me more and more every day...

[OliX]

"Change"

[Bacchus88]

I think the text message is what made him angry Keiko.

Keiko first question: I have never been fired for being sick. I have only work one other job, Fedex Ground.. There are no sick days, when you own and are the boss. It hard to turn the machine off so to speak..

From an owner and boss, I personally detest texts messages. People are people you have to some understanding of people might not always be there. This manger should have at least gave you a change to product doctor exuse.

Just bare with me, Keiko
really what type of job is it?
how long have you been with this company?
Is this a first time you text in or called not at all ?

[keiko]

Just bare with me, Keiko
really what type of job is it?
how long have you been with this company?
Is this a first time you text in or called not at all ?

I'm a stripper. Been with the booker a month. First call/txt out. My throat was literally swollen shut, I was having trouble breathing. I txted because I couldn't speak to anyone. I was IMing and writing in a notebook to talk to Dave and Timmy till after my second cup of thera-flu and throat soother tea when I could swallow again without wanting to cry. I've never missed a shift, I was late once because I didn't know I was working that day (sched was booked at like 10 am on a day when I was sleeping in) but I did drop everything and was there in under an hour. I've covered for two other girls resulting in having to pay cab fare to get home.

But it turns out I'm not all that fired. I've got three shifts this week

~K

[TheDeathKnight]

That's retarded...

If someone does not show up to work, they don't get paid.
So aren't they already being "punished" for being sick, and not coming in?

I understand if someone is a hypochondriac, and always calling in sick, you might want to hire someone who is more dependable. But everyone gets sick once in a while...

Although my work there is an unspoken rule that you come in, sick or not, when the deadline gets close. But then again I am not dealing with the public. I can stay in my office and be miserable, but still get some work done...

[inox]

Because I took too long editing, I'll have to make my further addendum here: it is ridiculous to expect any employee in a heavy Customer Service environment to bring a potentially contagious illness into the workplace. That's just a bad decision all-around!

Agreed. The mindset that people should always come in is called "presenteeism", and it's been shown that it ends up causing more absences and losses for the business when others subsequently get sick.