Take Cover

Two years ago when my office was remodeled to put my desk in the hallway, the then Manager struck a deal with the then Head Lawyer in regards to coverage of my breaks and vacations. Because the Law office was able to eliminate their reception position and have me answer all of their calls and greet all of their guests they would be responsible for providing someone to cover my lunch breaks and my vacations. Pretty good deal right? They don't have to pay me yet their calls still get answered and all they have to deal with is someone losing a small bit of productivity for an hour a day.

That is unless I take a vacation or I'm sick. In that case they have two options. They can all work together to split the time that I'm gone or they can hire a temp. When I went on vacation over the summer and I was gone for a week, they choose to hire a temp.

I am taking a vacation day on Christmas Eve. This is something that I've done every year that I've been here. In the past the coverage time has been split between my boss, three interns and the ladies in the Law office. This year though we only have 2 temps and one of them will also be gone that day. That means that more coverage needs to come from the Law office this year. My boss, realizing this, let their office know so that they could plan a rotation of who would cover.

They decided that they don't want to cover and that we should hire a temp. Um, no. If they don't want to cover and would rather have a temp, that's fine, but they need to be the ones who pay for it. That's the deal.

My boss told me about this all at the end of the day yesterday. She's rather frustrated with it. Mainly because she's having to work with a middle person. The way the Law office is set up is there is the Head Lawyer, Deputy Lawyer and multiple Assistant Lawyers. The Deputy Lawyer is over the office manager who is over the 3 admin ladies who cover my lunch breaks. The office manager is the one my boss is working with, but she is saying that Deputy Lawyer is the one who doesn't want her people to cover and wants us to hire the temp. Hard to say if it is really what the Deputy wants as the office manager has been manipulative in the past. She decides she wants to control or change something and goes to the bosses, tells them that something should be a certain way and manages to get them to go along with it.

I'm really not sure how all of this will play out. My time off will be covered one way or another. My boss says she will probably schedule a meeting with the Deputy Lawyer after the start of the year to talk about it and include the Head Lawyer along with the Manager and Assistant Manger. If they want to change the deal it needs to be discussed. Because if they don't want to cover for me anymore we'll be more than happy to no longer answer their phones. Because really, it isn't just me that answers the phones. When I am already on a call or otherwise indisposed, my boss and the interns are the ones who are back up and answer when I can't. So I'm sure all of them would be more than happy to no longer have to deal with calls that aren't even for our office.