Catching out a liar
If you caught someone faking an illness after skipping work for 2 days, would you tell HR or your supervisor?
Would I? No. Do I think you should? No. You might feel justified and even good about ratting someone out, but it's really not your business if someone took sick days for a "mental health" reason, or whatever. You don't know if they had a legit problem but no personal or vacation days left, or what. His/her supervisor might have said "Go ahead, take a couple sick days and take care of your situation." You just don't know the whole story even if you think you do. And even if this person isn't really sick, taking sick days isn't illegal. Finally telling on someone has a way of backfiring. Even if your supervisor is okay with you, your co-workers will NOT be okay, and won't trust you more than they have to. No one likes a snitch.
How exactly do you know that this person was faking? I think you need to provide more details before we can answer your question. As for the "no one likes a snitch" comment, I think that sort of comment is generally made by rule-breakers trying to protect other rule-breakers. If you've done something wrong and get caught, don't shoot the messenger!
He plays the victim role and has everyone fooled into feeling sorry for him for starters, had me going too. Supivisor was away for 2 weeks and ofcouse he did not work a full day the first week (leaving at 10.30am for one excuse, 3.30 for another, 1pm etc..., then during the second week he did a no show on one day. We rang twice and then contacted HR for his emergency details. HR must had called him and the knowing he "screwed up" he made some elaborate story of a bad throat infection via sms. We received a text message at lunch stating this and that hopefully he will be in the next day, but of course the next day late afternoon we receive another advising the medical said he would be OK to go to work tomorrow. Comes in the following day with a "lost voice" but then I overhear him on a personal call talking normally. He knows I overheard him because at the end of the call he muttered "s**t". I should have confronted him but I didn't, i was too disgusted at his childish behaviour and don't like confrontation. My boss thinks I would be just picking on him if I told him this (remember he plays the victim VERY well) and HR are not confidential and will tell my boss whcih could make it worse. I really don't care what he does and how much time he takes, just annoyed he thinks he is smart enought to fool us all with such a stupid story. And think he is dangerous with his compulsive lying. Oh so the 2nd week was a total of 2 1/2 days work.
It's tough when someone lies about taking time off for medical reasons. The only way to prove he's lying would be to follow him around to see if he actually goes to the doctor's office (I've heard of employers doing that, although I wouldn't recommend it) or to have someone call his doctor's office to verify the illness (that seems more reasonable, although it would be best if his boss or HR did that, you would probably look bad if you did that). Hopefully his manager is enforcing the sick leave policy, so that if he exceeds it, then he'll need to take unpaid leave if he continues to be "sick". Otherwise he'll keep abusing it. What will it gain you? Why would you do this? Is it your business? Are you affected by this persons behavior? Is your work affected by this persons behavior? Are you forced to do additional work because this person is not at work? Is this person receiving additional benefits that you are not receiving? The fact is that it sounds like you have a case of sour grapes. As much as you may not like your co-worker it really is not your business how they conduct themselves.
I really quite frankly don't understand why you'd be spinning your wheels on this issue. The best philosophy to take is that if you give someone enough rope, they'll eventually hang themselves - thus, there is no need for YOU to hang 'em. It'll all catch up with the individual in the long haul. And the beauty is YOU don't have to do a thing except sit back and watch. I've seen it happen that way time and again, and if it's satisfaction you want, it'll come to you. I've seen more than one person in my day get fired for the same type of thing. Yes, it takes a while - but it comes around eventually, and I didn't have to do a thing but sit on the side lines and watch, absorb, then laugh. So, quit worrying about it. Not to mention it's really not your place to do anything about it....unless, of course, you've recently been dubbed the Attendence Police and you just failed to put that in your original post.
It's not my business and the slacking coworker usually digs his own grave after numerous absences. This is totally none of your business. And he COULD have a hoarse voice, those do come and go. Regardless, HR called the guy at home to track him down, they're certainly on to him.
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