Many companies have policies about sick days where an employee might be required to bring in a doctor’s note in order to get paid for a sick day.

In today’s story, the employee who needs to take a sick day goes to a doctor that charges $50 for a doctor’s note. He wasn’t about to pay for that doctor’s note himself, so he called his boss and the malicious compliance escalated quickly from there!

Let’s see how the story plays out…

Sick day

My old company manager would always ask for a sick note from your doctor.

It’s about $50 from my GP.

I was at his office when my boss “Mary” called me to make absolutely sure I had a sick note. I had a two company credit cards one for internal use (tools etc.) and one for external use (billed to clients). Neither would work at my doctors office.

He wasn’t willing to use his own credit card.

I called Mary back:

Me: my company credit cards aren’t working

Mary: use your own and file an expense report

Me: no I’m not here to lend money to a multi million dollar company.

He’s going to use his boss’s credit card.

Mary: fine use mine.

Medical secretary: we can’t take credit cards over the phone.

Mary: them you won’t be paid for today.

Me: send that by email right away please.

He responded to the email…

Mary: sends it.

Me: replies to email I’ll need a union day to file a grievance as you refusing to pay me is against our collective agreement. There is NOTHING in our collective agreement stating that I need a note for one day, it’s for three consecutive days. I’ll also need a second union rep as I can’t represent myself.

Union days for grievance can’t be refused for any reason unless there’s a catastrophic event.

Mary wasn’t expecting the email he sent back to her.

Mary: (calls me back) fine I’ll pay you.

Me: no, the violation has already occurred and the grievance demand filed, we are proceeding with this.

Mary: but

Me: my union rep will be in touch.

For 8 hours pay, and want of a sick note

It would’ve been a lot better if Mary hadn’t tried to enforce her own policy!

Me plus other union rep 4 hours to prepare plus 2 hours travel each. 12 hours unpaid. 4 hours each to present the grievance. Grievance was won at the first stage.

So I got paid my 8 hours, but the company had to pay 20 man hours out of pocket (unbillable to client) because Mary was enforcing her own rules outside the collective agreement, as a “management right”.

I was maliciously complying with our grievance process which I brought up during the presentation.

Mary still tried to argue that he was wrong.

Bonus content: Mary stated that what was written in the collective agreement was open to interpretation and she was correct and I was wrong.

I asked her to flip to the last page of the PDF, she did.

Me: who had signed the contract?

Mary: VP of HR, National Union Rep, VP operations, Matthew, and… YOU the VP of your union accreditation

He put her in her place!

Me: so what you’re saying is you, who wasn’t at all present during the negotiations knows more about the contract I’ve negotiated for the last three renewals?

Mary: this meeting is over I’ll have my answer emailed to you within 7 days.

Me: you have 3 business days as per our collective agreement which you know so well, I’d hate to file yet another grievance for non compliance.

She messed with the wrong employee! It would’ve been so much easier if she hadn’t demanded the doctor’s note.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted…

Unions serve a purpose.

This reader loved how the story played out.

Here’s another great malicious compliance story…

And an even better malicious compliance story…

This doctor sounds great, especially if the doctor’s appointment was on a Monday!

Maybe next time Mary won’t insist on a doctor’s note!

If you thought that was an interesting story, check out what happened when a family gave their in-laws a free place to stay in exchange for babysitting, but things changed when they don’t hold up their end of the bargain.