r/AskHRUK

So I recently applied for an internal job for the company I work at it’s more of a sister company, went through the interview stage, completed DISC assessments and chatted to multiple managers and directors of HR, Operations and Health and Wellbeing. Job was 15k more and a vehicle, so I handed my notice in once I received verbal confirmation and signed a contract of employment.

I was due to start in 9 days time but received a call last Monday from the Ops Manager asking my experience and made a few faces when I answered. The next day I received another call from the Ops manager stating she’d spoke to the director and didn’t think it was very fair to put me in the role as they both believed I didn’t have the experience. This is the same director that interviewed and was part of the recruitment process from start to finish. She stated HR would be in contact to give me more roles suited to me and my pay bracket.

The Wednesday I sent quite a length email raising my concerns and asking would they be resending my job offer as clearly they’d no trust in me.

In the emails that followed from the director he said I was to ignore the conversation and proceed with the planned start date. Raising my concerns again about the conversation that the Ops manager and himself had, he said it was a mistake communication and I was too proceed as planned unless I want to confirm in writing I’m not taking the job.

I have no rescinded my notice of resignation currently. The pay bump would have helped massively. However have I made the right decision and can I take this forward to a solicitor as I feel pushed out of a job?

First proper appraisal round I'm running on my own (small company, ~40 people, I'm the only one in HR currently), so apologies if this is a solved problem everyone cracked years ago.

The bit doing my head in is the self-assessment section. I send the form out and it comes back one of two ways: completely blank, or people have basically pasted their job description back at me. Almost nobody can write down what they're actually good at or where they've grown. And when I sit in on the one-to-ones the line managers hit the same wall. They know this employee is great, but ask them to put it into words for a development plan and it's usually "reliable, good team player" and that's it.

I redid the template again last week thinking it was a wording problem. It's not. I think people genuinely can't describe their own strengths cold and a nicer form isn't going to fix that.

So how do you actually handle this? Do you scrap the self-assessment bit entirely? Give managers a competency framework to work off instead? Run a session first so people have some language before they fill it in? Anything that gets people past the blank-page thing would be a massive help.

Not trying to overhaul the whole process this cycle. I just want the development conversations to be worth having.

I am a fresher .I am going to take a company straight out of campus.But it has 90 days notice period.And I came to know the company is very strict in matters of serving their notice period. So I am tensed that such things should not hinder my growth for the upcoming future.Please give me some advice how to manage this.

I work in an admin/legal secretary role for a UK council. I started as a casual employee and was later offered a permanent role because my manager was happy with my performance. I've been here for about two years and had a good performance review only a few months ago.

Around a year ago I went through domestic abuse during my marriage. I made the mistake of confiding in one colleague and asked her to keep it private, but she told the whole team, including my manager.

Initially my manager was supportive, but over time she started suggesting my personal life was affecting my work, even though I'd never taken time off because of it and continued meeting deadlines.

The colleague who shared my situation has a reputation as the team bully. Recently, I trained a new starter and we got on well until she started telling him I was training him incorrectly. After that he became rude and dismissive towards me.

I raised this with my manager and showed screenshots. At first she agreed the messages were inappropriate and said she'd speak to him. After speaking to him and the other colleague, everything changed. I was told I'm probably misinterpreting things because of my domestic abuse, that the team isn't happy with my performance, and that my work will now be monitored more closely.

I've since been told by another colleague that a tracker has been created to build a case that I'm slow and a bad performer, and that management have decided they want me gone and will highlight every minor mistake until I quit or get dismissed.

My manager is heavily influenced by the work bully and relies on her for any decision. I work very hard as I know this job is my only way to survive, I have no access to benefits, no friends or family in this country.

Last week my manager shouted at me when I tried to explain the bullying, saying, "WTF, sort your shit out. This is playground stuff and I'm not your referee." I ended up having a panic attack at work and a first aider had to help me.

I'm an immigrant living alone, so losing my job would have huge consequences for me.

I am really devastated and my mental health has deteriorated a lot. Please advice.

Aside from the obvious bad answers, what are the subtle things that make you instantly write someone off?

Coworker called me and ask for my pc password while i am on sick leave what piss me off is i have my social media account logged in that pc but i cant ignore when he asked for password i gave it

Hi everyone,

I work for a very well known UK-wide retail company and have worked there for almost 2 and a half years now. When I started the job, I let my manager know that I have multiple complex mental health conditions that fluctuate in severity and that I am managing as well as possible whilst awaiting psychotherapy. As far as I was aware, this meant that I should be allowed more sick days if they’re related to my long-term health condition. Nothing formal was put into place at this stage.

I don’t have the exact numbers right this second but an attendance meeting was held due to me having several days off as I was physically unwell as a result of my mental health being poor for several consecutive days leading to physical symptoms. Myself and my manager had a reasonable adjustments meeting and discussed what actions we could take to improve things at work - I said that I would need 2-4 consecutive days off each week rather than day on-day off pattern, and stepping back from more social elements of the role on days when I’m feeling particularly unwell. She wrote in the document ‘When possible, we will carry out these reasonable adjustments for OP’.

Since this meeting, I’m lucky if my reasonable adjustments are met at least one week out of each month. I have had to be signed off work once as I was overwhelmed with it and wasn’t being heard when I asked for fewer shifts at work and was scared to phone in sick due to the attendance meeting. As soon as I got back to work after being signed off, I was made to attend another meeting about absences. We reiterated the reasonable adjustments and my manager just said ‘I’m doing what I can’.

Since this I have been very careful with my absences and have only had one further day off due to having to go to hospital with severe abdominal pain that had me physically doubled over and struggling to walk. My area manager visited our store around a week or two after this final absence and came to verbally reprimand me due to not attending two disciplinary meetings with the regional manager and that I had been notified via email about the meeting and then the rescheduled meeting with plenty of notice. I had zero emails from the company and have manually searched every email in case it had been sent from an external source. I relayed this to her and she basically assumed I was lying and said that they definitely sent the emails and I’ve now been issued an official warning for non-attendance of the meetings that I had zero notification of. I did not receive a single email in relation to these meetings so how am I supposed to attend?? I also have not received any form of letter or email related to any official warning either. Area manager let me know I have 2 more sick days until I’m terminated. I have not called in sick since but have been told off at work multiple times for being ‘rude/snappy’ with colleagues as I’ve been overworked and my reasonable adjustments have barely ever been followed which is making it hard to manage emotionally whilst on shift.

To add: This same area manager has said disgusting things about mental health before - for instance she asked me what I was going to study at uni as I’d put in a student transfer request, I said psychology and she said ‘That’s what my daughter studied, you’ll have to learn about those ‘nutters who slice up their own arms’ - I have visible self-harm scars all over my arms. It was just myself and her in the room at the time but I let a colleague know about this after it happened as it upset me a lot, so there is some kind of evidence this happened if a colleagues verbal confirmation counts.

I just feel that the lack of understanding around mental health is not okay, and that if my reasonable adjustments had been followed correctly every week then I might be managing better at work, and that it’s unfair I should be scared of losing my job due to the negligence of my management.

Can anyone please let me know where I stand and any actions I could take, if any?

I have tried my best to make sense but please ask any questions if you need clarity or further info.

I've worked in my current company for over seven years and got promoted to my current role five years ago. Although I'm in general good standing and complete my work well , I've only been given raises in line with NMW increase to be paid slightly more than the entry level position that I joined at, and over the years there have been various additions to responsibilities.

Now that I have handed in my notice, they are advertising my role as an internal promotion for a much higher salary and removed some responsibilities from the role. I have repeatedly requested raises and been told they can only give these within strict parameters at annual increments despite a large increase in workload.

Naturally, I'm really frustrated and feel like kicking off, however I do really like my team and direct manager and I'm keen to leave on a high note despite all this. I've been so upset that it's really distracted me from completing my duties to the usual standard.

What I would really like at a bare minimum is either a raise for my notice period or to drop an hour each day to bring my hourly rate in line with what they've now decided the role is worth, is it worth asking for this? I realise HR or senior management are unlikely to change their minds just out of kindness but is there an argument to be made that this could put the company at risk, particularly as even though I'm an IC I have access to a lot of documents and reporting others don't and admin access to systems? Although there is no legal recourse as it's within their legal rights (albeit really shit), is there any other action I can really take other than do the bare minimum for now and look forward to starting my new role?

I am seeking clarification regarding my current employment situation and how it may affect future references.

I am currently employed as a Band 6 in NHS and have been informed that I have not passed my probation period. I am now awaiting a panel meeting, which may potentially result in termination of employment. HR has advised me that resigning before the panel decision may be preferable, as a formal dismissal following a failed probation could be viewed negatively by future employers.

Before making any decision, I would like guidance on the following:

• Will my current employer disclose information such as “failed probation”, “formal process following probation concerns”, or “performance concerns” when providing a reference?

• If this information is disclosed, what implications should I be aware of?

• Could a future employer withdraw a job offer after learning this information?

• What steps can I take to avoid complications, especially as I am actively interviewing and may be asked for references at any time?

I am worried about how this situation may affect my future roles, and I would appreciate clear written guidance so I can make an informed decision.

Thank you

I am discussing possible maternity packages with my company. I am not pregnant but I am planning ahead and as my company is small and has no official policy I wanted to get as much info as possible so I can work out whether the maternity period is financially viable. I had an initial conversation with my line manager ‘M’ and when I explained to him what statutory pay is in the UK (6 weeks 90% pay and weeks 7-39 at £194.30/week) his response was ‘well that’s not enough!” We discussed my future plans and I made clear I am returning to work after 9 months, may need some flexibility with WFH adjustments but no drop in hours. As our company had recently been acquired by a large global company he had to discuss with their HR. From the conversations it seemed as if the company would be very supportive and offer a generous package. Wording such as ‘give her what she wants’ was thrown around. M has left the business and conversations have been taken over by another manager D.
I have received the proposal put forward by global companies HR department and I can’t help but be disappointed. 12 weeks full pay and remaining 27 weeks on statutory £194.30/week. Although the 12 weeks is amazing, the drop to statutory is significant and wouldn’t even cover my half of the household bills/mortgage let alone a baby.
I am going to see if there’s room for negotiation but does anyone have advice at all?

Hi Guys! I work as a Registered Manager covering multiple supported living services - I’m looking to find a new role but I have a 3 month notice period

All of my prospective employers expect a 1 month notice period so far and are asking me to negotiate a 3 month notice period

For context, my current company is a bit toxic - we’ve had managers (including senior managers) sacked with no notice and around a year ago a few managers just left with no notice at all and walked out

I don’t want to do that at all - don’t feel comfortable with it

I asked the lady who worked as a HR advisor with the company before - she had a 3 month notice period but her new employer was willing to wait the 3 months - and she said that although it says 3 months in the contract, the company are not going to waste time and money going after me for leaving 2 months earlier

She advised to simply say that due to the role starting in a month, I will be leaving in a month and I am committed to a smooth transition

What do you think?

Like if somebody have a job and after probation period company said him to sign the nda whivh says you cannot work anywhere else this company or if you leave you cannot go to competitors you have to go in health etc department. so when giving new interviews mostly happen they ask why you that company so what can be the possible answer for that?

Currently going through the ‘at risk’ process whilst 3 months post partum. I have this overwhelming stress that if I ask any questions, it will go against me.

I want to ask about suitable alternative roles and I want to ask about fairness throughout the process.

Honestly, do you think this will go against me, my girlfriend seems to think I should just shut up and get on with it as I don’t want to rock the boat.

Hi!

31f, 10 weeks pregnant.

I’ve just received a verbal offer for a new role. I’ve had to move - despite stat mat implications - because my current role is FTC only and requires a LOT of 3hr + travel which is eating up budget and time. My new salary is a great increase and my commute will be 8 mins door to door and my working hours are perfect.

At the moment I’ve not had a 12week scan - that’s mid July - and I’ve not told anyone yet. As such, I didn’t say anything during the process. I guess I wanted to see if all was well at the scan first.

I received a verbal offer today, and a contract to follow tomorrow. I plan to sign the contract, hand my notice in and then start the new role in 3/4 weeks.

My question is - in the UK - what would you do about telling your new employer? They have great policies, are extremely family friendly and literally make baby products but I do not want to be naive.

I feel a bit uncomfy about it even though I 100% know it’s the right role for me. I don’t want them to think I’m a bad person, or put myself at risk!

What do you all recommend? Thank you so much x

Hi everyone,

I’m looking for advice on whether my situation sounds like potential maternity discrimination / sex discrimination / reasonable adjustment issues, and what next steps I should take.

I returned from maternity leave in January 2026 after working for the company for almost 4 years. Before maternity leave, I had a broad e-commerce/operations role covering marketplaces, fulfilment, customer service support, European operations, logistics and commercial work. I also had a long-standing remote-working arrangement for around 18–20 months before maternity leave, with no formal performance concerns raised.
Since returning, several things have happened that concern me:

My role has become much narrower and mainly focused on blogs/social media.

Many of my previous responsibilities appear to have been absorbed by another colleague.

I have not been given a clear written contract, updated duties or agreed job description despite asking. I only have an employment letter given to me in March 2025 which states my job title, full time permanent employee and payment terms.

My hours and pay have become reduced/variable, without a clear written agreement permanently changing my terms. My employer says they “accommodated” part-time work, but I never agreed to a permanent reduced role, reduced pay or only doing content. I asked to return to my full time hours and work remotely which was refused. I initially only agreed to work part time, because they were making office attendance a requirement.

My employer says I was given plenty of notice before maternity leave that the role would return to the office, but I disagree that there was any meaningful consultation. While I was still on maternity leave, I received an email saying the role had “returned” to being fully office-based, with proposed hours, telephone cover and desk allocation already set out. My boss also proposed I’d work 08:30-17:30, whereas before I was doing 09:00 -17:00. Considering I was remote before and now have a baby, and then expect me to commute 2-3h a day is extremely inconsiderate. Wouldn’t you expect your employer to consult you first before proposing anything? Anyways, we ended up on reduced hours, because I couldn’t arrange childcare for those long hours.

During my mat leave my employer changed from 2-weekly to monthly payroll, because the usual person who did it for years went on mat leave. To my surprise, I only found out by not getting paid on time. I was never given notice of the change. A company-wide payroll/HR email was sent during the end of my maternity leave but I was not included. Every single person included but me. I only saw it because a colleague forwarded it to me. In that email my employer explained the changes to payroll and some other hr related things (months later after the change).

My annual leave accrued during maternity leave was not added promptly after I returned. I had to chase repeatedly and did not know how much leave I had available until the end of holiday cycle. Honestly, I didn’t even know you accrue annual leave I was told after my return but then it took another month and a half for my employer to add it on the system.

My employer has repeatedly referred to my “remaining time” and assumed I may not be able to continue because I am to relocate end of July, even though I have not resigned or said I intend to leave. I told my employer about moving months ago. In one of the emails where I requested remote work last month my boss told me that I had previously told him about moving in April and he thanked me for extending it till end of July. I should tell him my schedule so we could plan my ‘remaining time’.

After consulting my union, I submitted a statutory flexible-working request and a reasonable-adjustment request due to ADHD, work-related neck pain and work related stress. I didn’t disclose my adhd diagnosis, until now because I felt like I was already not being taken serious anymore despite the fact I always did a good job.

Remote working has been repeatedly rejected as “not viable,” apparently before Occupational Health has assessed me. After I submitted my sick note last week my employer agreed to an occupational health assessment but outright rejected remote working as an option, because of business-critical face to face collaboration. Remote/hybrid working is used elsewhere in the business and my role before and now can 100% be performed remotely. He keeps stating that the business needs have changed. Operationally nothing has changed since my maternity leave. His collaboration is in reference to my colleague who’s in charge of customer service. I have collaborated with said colleague for 18+ months remotely with no issues.

Here’s the kicker though: my employer also suggested possible contractor work for his European company involving calls/sales/service (duties which he wants me to perform in the office), which makes me question why similar duties are now said to require permanent office attendance. I am employed by his UK company but perform duties for said European company. He essentially offered as ‘my remaining time’ is approaching I could work as a contractor and should tell him about my day rate. ‘There might be scope down the line to do contractor work’.

I have raised a formal grievance. My employer replied straight away and claimed that my remote work was a pregnancy accommodation and because I had transport issues. This is inherently false, I was a remote worker for atleast 18 months prior to being pregnant. Furthermore, I requested remote working 2 months into my employment stating that I have a long commute and think my productivity be affected. Initially my employer agreed to once a week then 3 times and later fully remote. During my time commuting to work full time I was never late or had any transport issues. There were some other questionable remarks in the reply, but I’ll leave it out.

The company has no internal HR department and has said an external HR consultant will now be involved. Occupational Health has been mentioned but not arranged yet. These are recent developments and ongoing.

Following my return, I became aware that negative comments had allegedly been made about me by my boss to colleagues regarding my work and commitment while I was absent on maternity leave. I heard this from multiple people. I was blamed for a situation that occurred in the weeks leading up to my mat leave. My boss mishandled said situation himself and used me as a scapegoat. I was told directly by my boss not to make any decisions and let him handle everything a month prior to my mat leave. Email trail shows I did exactly that.

Not sure if it’s worth mentioning. Since I started this job, every Christmas I’d be invited to the Xmas party and receive a Christmas voucher signed by my boss. These are send out via email. Every year without a fail, but nothing when I was on mat leave. Didn’t even reach out to check on me or congratulate me.

Emotionally, I feel like I have been looked at differently since having a baby, in terms of trust, commitment, responsibility and flexibility. I know that feeling is not proof by itself, but the timing and pattern concern me.

I am still employed and trying to follow the internal grievance, flexible working and OH processes, but I am also job hunting because my hours/pay feel unpredictable and I need financial stability.

I’ve contacted ACAS and my union, I’m worried about tribunal time limits because some events started around maternity leave/return, but the treatment feels ongoing. My union won’t help me with past issues prior to my membership since I only joined February, 2026. So getting legal help through them is problematic. I had really bad post partum depression and didn’t recognise signs and felt emotionally unable to cope with going through grievance procedure. I’ve done therapy and looked for help even prior to returning to work. I am in a much better headspace to deal with this. I don’t want to just walk away and find another job and regret not having escalated this.

I appreciate this was long and thank anyone reading this. Does this sound like something worth getting employment solicitor advice on? Any advice is appreciated!!

I had a final interview two weeks ago and the hiring manager rang me the next day to say I got the job and they were sorting the paperwork. I was over the moon. I emailed a week later just to check in and got no reply. Tried calling today and it went straight to voicemail. I have not handed notice in at my current place yet thank goodness, but is it normal for HR to ghost you after an offer?

**Obviously, not sure if post is proper here, but shooting my shot...

I'm a male Chartered CIPD member (MCIPD) and looking to gauge the vibe before I start applying heavily in the UK (or Scotland in particular) as a skilled worker / HPI.

Are employers pretty neutral or inclusive these days, or are there specific sectors where guys in senior HR thrive better? I have 12+yrs solid background in HR, general accounting and commercial FP&A (dual profession).

Appreciate any insights!

Context: I’m currently in an onboarding process with a new company. But my manager is taking so long to provide reference even after multiple nudges in person and via teams and email. They said they will do it but nothing after 9 days now.

We are currently in an organisational change process with my current employer and looking at the landscape and my personal situation, I know I will be at the risk of redundancy due to new role proposed not meeting the new skill worker visa threshold. I’ve now secured a new role with a competitor and I told my line manager about it and they went on and on about how they see me in the new roles and I told them the salary doesn’t meet the threshold and it’s not something I want to do anyway. They kept saying it will be good for my professional development. However delaying my onboarding process with the new company.

The new company emailed me and said can I nudge my manager yesterday again to provide the reference as it’s delaying the onboarding process when it has been 8days now since the first nudge and they are not on holiday and this is a quiet period for us at work.

My previous employer too did not provide reference early as they were on holiday. I got to know quickly and I had to send an alternative referee.

My question now is can I skip my manager completely and provide the employee relations email for confirmation of employment or the HRs normally expect the reference from Line manager or how can I get them to do the reference on time. Do I keep emailing them.

I’m also skeptical about being that employee people don’t want to provide reference for even though it has nothing to do with me. I don’t know if that have a bad connotation in hr culture. And I don’t want to loose the offer due to delay. Given that the new employer will still apply for Certificate of sponsorship and all the processes delays start date.

I work a very busy IT support job. Recently handed in my notice in due to a lack of proper pay rises in two years despite there being tons of work to do all the time.

I have to work this week and next week, then my notice period is over.

It's extremely stressful. Every day it's constantly busy, there's always too much to do, constant task switching, it's hard to think straight.

I feel pretty wrecked by the work, completely drains the life out of me. Constantly feels like I'm fighting to keep my head above water with the insane ticket volume. I barely have the energy to do anything in the evenings. I'm really dreading tomorrow as it looks like I'll have even more to do than I had today, and God knows what else I'll have been assigned on top of that when I log in.

Coasting for the remaining days isn't really an option as we just get assigned tickets and have to complete them. We can escalate stuff but need to work on it for a certain amount of time first. I can't really just let things pile up and ignore the customers chasing me, it'd get out of hand really quickly.

Luckily I'm able to afford taking a break for a while after this job to recover from burnout and think about next steps. I don't know if I'd do another IT job, maybe it's worth trying another one but right now I can't even read IT job descriptions without feeling some dread.

On the one hand, the company should hire more staff. It doesn't need to be this chaotic and busy, it's a by-product of their greed.

On the other hand, I don't want to make things even busier for the others on my team, who are all really nice people.

I don't know if the company is going to replace me when I've left, but I know that they haven't been replacing leavers in the last year or two, so probably not.

I really don't want to do this job anymore but I'm torn about taking sick leave and making things harder for others on the team.

My grievance was partially upheld - the two most serious points — the points I actually had the strongest evidence for — were rejected. These were around unfair process, lack of consultation, and demotion, plus inappropriate conduct from colleagues.

Have now appealed, and am being asked what resolution / outcome I want. Is this code for “do you want us to offer you a settlement package” and if so how do I negotiate this to ensure I get the maximum possible compensation available to me? I have tried speaking to my union they are useless and take weeks to respond.

I’m nervous about saying I want a settlement offer, what if this is a trick?