I'm going to try and keep this as vague as I can because I'm absolutely terrified of my bosses finding my social media and firing me. I suppose I'll start at the beginning to provide as much context as is nessisary in order for the title to make sense.
The place I currently work for has 9 employees, including our bosses. When we were all originally hired, it was 13 including them. We have lost people over time due to various circumstances, but we haven't hired anyone new. This is good in one way because it means that we work closer to full time hours, but difficult because it makes it extremely hard to find coverage for shifts, especially on short notice.
My partner, who I live with, has seizures pretty frequently and there have been 2 or 3 times in the last few months where I have had to call out because I was at the hospital with him all night and wouldn't be able to get any sleep before work. Our boss has this policy where you always have to find shift coverage if you're calling out or need a day off when the schedule is already made. When I had to call out because we were at the hospital all night, I did try and find coverage, but the 2-3 who weren't working that day either did not respond or were busy. Each time, I called my boss and explained the situation. Now I guess I could have touched it out and worked with no sleep, but my job can be hazardous, especially if you are not fully present mentally.
Now, to the present. Boss just texted our work group chat letting us know the employee handbook was updated and that if we call out and don't find coverage for that shift, then it comes out of our PTO. If our PTO drips below 0 due to this, it is considered “quitting.” He said that there can be extenuating circumstances but if they choose to re-hire us, it will be back at our starting position meaning that we would lose all the raises we had gained before.
I don't know if anyone else has used any of their PTO yet, but I had discussed using all of it to take some time off to help my partner recover from a surgery he is having in a few days. After receiving the text, I asked him if I could save my PTO for another occasion because the likelihood of having to use it for that reason is high. I haven't heard back from him yet.
Honestly I probably would have left this job already if I felt I had the choice, but my partner is unable to work at the moment and we have a lot of bills that need to be paid. This job pays decently enough and it's work that I almost enjoy. I feel very stuck and I'm worried that this is my boss's way of trying to get me to quit. If I end up being fired, there is a chance that my partner and I could end up homeless again and I'm not sure we could survive.