Boring Follow-up to "Simple? Never"

Just a follow up to Simple? Never. After the employee left on bad terms I received the following emails. People do have their nerves don't they?

Hey David,

I am supposed to be closing on my house at the end of this week. I need a copy of my pay stubs from the last 2 months. Would it be possible to have you email this to me at your earliest convenience I would appreciate it. Thank you

Employee

Another

Thank you David for the paper work, hopefully that is what she needs. I also wanted to quickly ask you about my vacation time. I thought I had been back at the company for over a year. I know M said I have to work to get vacation. That is one reason I didn't come back to work. I may have not always been there but I worked my tail off for your company and I think that I had been there a year then I should be entitled to my vacation pay. let me know what you think, thank you.

Employee

Notice how he didn't bring up vacation until after I had given him the paperwork he needed.

Mr. Employee,

I have avoided talking with you about the way I feel about how you left our company, obviously there would be no point. Since you have decided to ask me about your vacation I will take the time to respond, which is more respect than you gave us when you left. First of all our handbook, that you signed, states

*Vacation* Full time employees will accrue vacation at the rate of 40 hours per year for the first three years of continuous employment. One year is equal to having worked 252 days. Vacation hours will not be issued until 252 days have been worked. A worked day is defined as an employee working more than half a day, is out on a paid holiday or has the sick time or vacation time to cover an absent day. Vacation will accrue at the rate of 80 hours after the employee’s third year of continuous service. An employee must work 252 days each year before any vacation time accrues. Accrued vacation is listed on each employee’s paycheck stub. A SUPERVISOR MUST APPROVE VACATION TIME BEFORE IT MAY BE TAKEN. Earned vacation may be accrued up to a maximum of 80 hours. Employees are compensated for all accrued vacation time, up to the maximum of 80 hours, upon termination from Our Company, Inc. for any reason. Such compensation is based on information from vacation leave records. On December 31, every employee’s leave record is adjusted to show no more than 80 hours accrual.

I checked your records and you missed 24 days of work in the last year. Even if four of those days were paid sick leave you would still be short of the 252 days required to qualify for vacation. If we owed you vacation we would pay you because we have always tried to do what we said but we do not owe you any. As far as not coming back because of something that was said I find that hard to believe. It was obvious on Friday that you had already found a job elsewhere. You seemed to take joy in telling me that you had LIED about being sick the two days before. I know you feel "you worked you tail off for our company" but did you really think we didn't see the time you spent on the phone, the times you disappeared in our service truck and the other stuff?

The 24 days you missed affected our company in a negative way. It honestly came as no surprise that you tried to leave us short handed the way you did. A simple phone call could have saved us the time of having customers sit out by the shop waiting for you to come to work. Somehow I get the feeling that 'sticking it to us' for some imagined slight was your intention. So lets get this straight. You came to us for your job back, you failed a drug test and we took you back and even after all the missed days you still had a job with which to feed your family. You're mad because we wouldn't pay you more but YOU failed to do the one thing we asked you to do and told you was required to get a raise, show up consistently for work.

Despite all of this I do hope you land on your feet and find a good job. You have a family to support and no one here will find any joy in you failing to do that, so good luck to you in the future.

Sincerely,

David

Thank you for a response and thank you for the good wishes. The explanation was good and made sense. Thank you for letting me back to work with your company, not that it will make anything better between you I and your company but I am sorry for the way I left. I wish I had done it different. I never tried to hide from anyone using the phone or leaving in the service truck. Truth be known a lot of the time I was on the phone I would be on the phone with a customer, or the parts house. It got to the point where it was easier to call the parts house and get what I wanted rather then try to explain it to the parts runner but I'm not writing to argue. I just wanted to say thank you for your blessing.

Employee

Of course the other employees where mad at me for helping him with his paper work and being respectful to him in my reply. They all wanted me to answer the employee with the shop foreman's suggestion. It was shorter and fitting but "Fuck You!" just ain't my style, but I did give it some thought, I really did.