Suspended since 8/7 on full pay. First disciplinary hearing was adjourned due to conflict of interest with investigation Mgr. Awaiting outcome of 2nd Investigation meeting.
Hello,
I am interested in getting opinions from people with experience of HR matters in regards to my Case.
I work in a Contact centre and have worked their since February 2025. I initially worked on a team for about 5 months dealing with a wide variety of queries, but I struggled on this team due to not feeling sufficiently trained to deal with some of the types of calls that we received.
I was then offered a move on to a different team which I jumped at. The reason for the move was unrelated to my struggles but I saw it as a good opportunity to stay with the Organisation and start afresh on a different team dealing with more specific queries.
I did some e-learning in my first week on this new team and then had a week's annual leave.
I take medication for diagnosed mild depression and began struggling with my mental health during those first 5 months, and had increased symptoms of anxiety and OCD. I hoped the leave would help me recover, but when I returned to work to start on my new team I felt overwhelmed and felt unable to work.
I spoke to my GP and my medication was increased and I was put on a waiting list for some talking therapy. I self certified for 7 days and was then given a further 2 weeks sick leave by my GP. After about 3 weeks I felt able to work and managed to start on my new team and begin to establish myself as a valued team member. I had good support from my Manager and HR during this time.
Our main role is to answer inbound calls but when it gets quiet there are task lists that we can work on where we can make outbound calls to clients. There are various targets we have to meet based on the calls that we make - such as AHT, Wrap time, financial outcomes etc, and the success in meeting these targets is invariably linked to how many calls you take.
I have struggled completing tasks / callbacks as I find that I overthink the task description and this causes anxiety, which has had an effect on the amount of tasks / outbound calls that I make, which in turn effects my stats /targets.
As a result of this I was spoken to by my Manager and coaching sessions were arranged with the aim of trying to improve my stats.
Within the coaching sessions I explained my struggles in completing tasks, and suggestions were made to try and help improve my confidence as it was affecting my stats and overall performance.
As part of the coaching sessions I explained that I struggle with queries that appear complex, and also struggle making outbound calls when it involves the use of an interpreter service (language line) as these calls can be very lengthy and I do find them stressful and very difficult. I explained that I do tend to 'cherry pick' tasks so as to avoid potentially difficult calls and I admitted that this included avoiding calls that I felt may have needed an interpreter.
I also made observations that I did feel that some Clients abused the system and this affected my motivation and willingness to undertake some callbacks (The Organisation is a Charity and we provide financial and other support to those in need).
For context I had experienced a long language line call with a Client previously which I had found particularly challenging and which resulted in me deciding to leave work at lunchtime and not return.
My comments were taken to mean that I think that all clients that require the interpretation service are abusing the service, which is not what I believe or meant. It was just that this call was fresh iny memory and I was recalling my frustrations with that particular call.
In an ill advised attempt to justify myself I did note that the majority of clients on the task lists had non-English names which in hindsight was a clumsy statement to make.
For added context there are no set rules on how many tasks you complete if the phones are quiet, and all team members can pick and choose which callbacks they action.
Also, for further context, in my appraisal I did feel it was important to be honest about my struggles and so I did state, when asked to comment on how I met the value of being inclusive, that I sometimes struggled to remain impartial and that this was an area I was conscious I needed to improve on. This was again a reaction to the call I had taken recently, and an acknowledgement of how frustrating I had found it.
The day after my 3rd coaching session I was informed that I was suspended on full pay due to allegations of discrimination.This was on the 8th July. An investigation meeting was then arranged the following week on the 14th July and this was conducted by my own Manager.
On the 17th I was then invited to a Disciplinary Hearing and was sent an Investigation report that had also been compiled by my Manager. It was alleging gross misconduct and threatened summary dismissal if found proven.
I paid for Union Representation and my Hearing was adjourned due to my rep arguing that the investigation was flawed because it had been conducted by my Manager who had also instigated the disciplinary proceedings, so it wasn't a fair investigation process.
The next day HR agreed to re start the investigation with a new manager with no prior knowledge of the Case. I have since had an investigation meeting with this manager on the 7th August and am awaiting his decision on whether it goes to another disciplinary hearing.
It's been nearly 6 weeks now so I'm just wanting to get some advice or opinions from those experienced in such matters as to what you think the outcome of my Case will be? I have advised my rep that I no longer want to work for the Organisation and he has suggested that we aim for a settlement with the Organisation, so I was also wanting to know what my chances of getting a settlement in this Case are?
Thank you in advance for any comments positive or negative!