Hey all,
Before I start, I just wanted to say that I'm not specifically looking for advice or anything, but am happy to receive it if anyone feels that they can help. I'm merely looking for a way to vent, to sort of check if I'm being entitled in this situation, and, in a way, am looking to make myself feel better about the situation, because at the moment, I feel really depressed and angry about the whole thing. Also, please let me know if this is the wrong place to post this.
I live in the UK. Recently I quit my job that I'd worked at for nearly 4 years because I was feeling like I'd stagnated and wanted to move into an industry that I've been passionate about since I was a kid. I've been at my new job now for around 5 months and am really enjoying it. The company has won multiple awards for being the best employer in their region, the staff are lovely, my manager is the best manager I've had in my whole career, and the pay is very competitive.
Since moving here, I've been given a huge amount of responsibility and have been given the challenge that I've been craving. The company's seen a very impressive growth with a good outlook for the future. We've had several company-wide meetings claiming that the company is doing really well and I have seen nothing but positive news.
Roughly 2 months after I joined the company, I was told that I'd be receiving an annual pay increase (being a substantial amount and my first actual annual increase in any company in my 20 year career, so I was very excited). A week later, I received an email stating that only employees who were eligible at the time of pay review would be receiving the increase, and because I was still working my probationary period, I was not eligible and wouldn't be eligible after my probationary period had ended.
As you can imagine, I wasn't happy, but my outlook was pragmatic in that “rules are rules” and I could understand why the rules were set out like this, so I took my lumps.
It's worth noting that I had a chat with my manager about it and he was very proactive in trying to do everything he could to “bend” the rules for me, but unfortunately, human resources weren't having any of it.
Now, for a bit of back-story: around a year ago, my wife and I had been trying to get pregnant with our first child. We'd been told by multiple doctors that we would find difficulty conceiving due to some medical issues. After some time, we'd basically given up hope, which was quite a difficult and stressful time for both of us.
One week after I moved into my new job, my wife discovered that she was pregnant. We were overjoyed! Fantastic news! We couldn't believe it! My manager was great about the whole thing. Let me take time off (as long as I made it up) to go to midwife appointments with my wife, etc.
Fast-forward to now and I've been working at the company for almost 6 months. My wife is due early next year and I've been talking to HR about paternity leave.
As a side note: I want to say that I'm not sure what the paternity allowance laws are like in other countries. I may have it really good here in the UK, and I don't want to seem like I'm taking that for granted, so please don't be offended by my ignorance if your country's laws/allowances might not be as “good” (for lack of a better word) as ours. I could also be way off and the UK might have terrible laws when it comes to paternity, so please also take that into account.
After having a chat with HR, I was directed toward my employee handbook, which states that I'm not eligible for 2 weeks of paternity leave (on top of my annual leave allowance) or statutory paternity pay due to my length of service (the company's policy (and, I believe, the UK government's policy) is that you need to have been continuously employed for 26 weeks by 15 weeks prior to the estimated due date of birth, and I would have been employed for just over 15 weeks), so I will have to take any leave to bond with and care for my new born child and to look after my wife out of my annual allowance instead.
I'll be honest, I'm pissed off. I was already annoyed at the way fathers are treated when it comes to paternity (I know we have a less prominent role in the whole process, but it still feels like we're living in the '50s here) but to basically be discriminated against for choosing to start working at a new job and then, suddenly finding out that my wife is pregnant and being told I'm not “entitled” to take any leave from work to look after my child and wife, is disappointing.
Now, as I mentioned before, I really just wanted to rant and vent about the whole situation. There's a lot of negativity in this post, and I'm not looking to start an argument or anything, but I have a lot of anger and resentment right now and I have no idea where to direct it.
My HR team are just doing as they're told, my manager doesn't deserve any negativity thrown their way, I don't believe that the company as a whole is at fault. The government could really do with improving their stance on paternity, in my opinion, and maybe that's where my anger should be directed, but I have no idea and I can tell that I'm becoming more and more incoherent as I write this, so I'll end it like this:
I don't know what I hope to gain from this post, but I already feel a bit better having shouted into the void, so perhaps that's all I can hope for. Happy to have a friendly discussion on the subject and would love to hear from anyone else who's felt victimised by the same situation.
Thanks for reading my rant!