military wife needs help w/ time off

What is the name of your state? Georgia I am a flight attendant for a a major commercial airline and my husband (who's in the air force reserves) just received his orders for a 1 year deployment in Iraq. He'll be leaving in less than 1 month and I am trying to get some time off to spend with him and prepare ourselves emotionally, financially, and legally for his absence. My employer is telling me that I cannot have time off b/c it is over xmas. I did not plan for him to leave and cannot help the timing. I have a job in which I am gone for days at a time...I do not come home in the evening like a normal job. We have a lot to take care of and I want to be with him before he leaves. Do I have any rights?? Please help...thanks!

Do I have any rights?? Please help...thanks!

Click to expand...

Of course you do. You can quit.

Quit....that's great advice. Unfortunately I have a mortgage, bills, need to eat, and, oh yeah.... I'm pregnant. If I quit every time a challenge came up I would have a new job every month. Thanks for the great advice.

While it would be nice if your employer is able to grant you some time off, they don't have to. There are no laws that compel an employer to grant leave time because an employee's spouse is in the military and is being deployed.

I assume from your screen name that you are a FA on a 767? If so you must be fairly senior in your company. Call in sick. Your Union contract should have some provision for how much you can call in sick during a rolling period.

D8D

Oh yeah, dash, calling in sick when you aren't is real ethical.
Didn't your mother every tell you two wrongs don't make a right?

Dash, just as an FYI, an employee who asks for particular time off, is denied, and then calls in sick on the exact same days, is not invisible to the employer, and most of them are smart enough to figure it out. Unless the union contract specifically gives her the right to call in sick after being denied time off, I suspect this would put her in line to be disciplined or even fired.

Well my union contract allows for 4 sick calls, regardless of lenght of duration in a 12 month period. Anything longer than 4 days requires a call to the chief pilots office to update your status and simply stating unfit to fly is sufficient.

That may not be the OP contract but it may be close, and I find most people don't know what the limits of their contracts are.

To patty, you want to debate ethics when this multi billion dollar a year airline can't afford time off to an employee to spend time with a loved one who is going to WAR over the hollidays. The argument doesn't hold water.

In the airline world, sick time is your time to use as you want to use it. You are entitled to it by your contract and it is your to use. Since most airlines won't cash out your sick time, or if they do it is usually at 50% of the value, it is yours to use when needed.

Her employer should have a sufficient reserve system in place as well to cover sick calls of this nature, if they don't that is simply bad business.

D8D