Saturday, March 12, 2016

Where We Solve the Big Life&Death Issues


It's getting harder and harder to decide which funerals you can take time off work for and still legitimately get paid and which funerals you have to take a holiday day for.

It's not as easy as it seems.

For instance, some funerals--immediate family comes to mind--you should get a day off with pay for.  Any boss who docks you for attending a funeral of a family member will not go to heaven.
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But  it gets tricky. For one thing, the definition of family varies. Is your girlfriend family? She is if you live with her, I guess.

Or try this. If my pal John died today (Saturday) I would would definitely take time from work to attend the funeral next week come what may.

How should the HR department log that time off?   Bereavement leave? I'd think something as official as Bereavement Leave  you'd save for a dead, say, spouse.

That means you'd have to take your pal's funeral as a holiday day.

Seems like the wrong word. Then again, John would want me to have fun at his sendoff.  (Here's a signal funerals are getting trendy. Spell check did not put a little squiggly line under "sendoffs". What does that tell you?)

Still. A holiday?

Very recently, we traveled about 300 km and stayed one night in a hotel in Sudbury to attend the wake and funeral of  my sister-in-law Brenda's late mom Doris Urso.

A sister-in-law's mom? In retrospect, I know attending Doris' farewell was the right thing to do but what manager in the universe is going to let me have a day (or two in this case!) to make that date?

People attend funerals for different reasons. Some you go just because it's the right thing to do. You want to show your support for the living. Sometimes your spouse makes you go. I've gone to some funerals knowing they would be fun. I've attended some funerals because I knew I'd meet up with people I hadn't seen in a long time.

Sometimes you go to funerals  just to make sure the person's dead.

What's an HR person supposed to do?

See what I mean? This is way more complicated than you thought.

That's why I'm presenting the Pete's Blog&Grille Guide  to Determining which Funerals You Can Attend and Still Get Paid and Which Funerals Don't Count.

Funerals Companies Should Cut You Slack For

1) Your own;
2) Immediate family's;
3) Immediate inlaws'. (I'm not saying you HAVE to attend these; only that if you do attend an inlaw's service, it should get the same respect as family.)
4) Your boss's. (What's she going to do? Fire you? Ha.)
5) Three others of your choosing. More than three? Take the day off. Just do yourself a favour and don't tell anybody which you've chosen to use company days for. Somebody will take offence.

Funerals You Definitely Take a Holiday Day For

1) Services for people you know only from playing Farmville online;
2) Celebrities whose funerals are televised;
2) Anybody that you are glad is dead;
3) Your pet hamster.
5) Victor Newman's. On second thought, maybe the boss should spring for this one. But never mind. You know what I mean.






3 comments:

  1. Peter you would enjoy funeral. It's going to be a party.My ex wife will dance on my casket. There may be others who would do same. There will be balloons, music refreshments and herbs.And then into the flames I go and then I will join my brother and two sisters in Sudbury.

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  3. I'm sure my wife will throw herself onto my funeral pyre, but she says if I don`t go soon she`ll be unable to jump

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