Employee crafts perfect response to boss who tried to cancel their annual leave

If your boss tries to cancel your annual leave, you have every right to be furious.

We all deserve a break from work, and when we book our holidays months in advance, we expect our bosses to keep track of and honour the requests we put in. It doesn’t matter whether you have something big planned for your time off or if you just want to relax at home – you’ve booked it, you’ve earned it, you should be allowed to take it.

But one man was left gobsmacked when his boss sent him an email telling him he’d already gone ahead and cancelled the three-week leave he had booked. The holiday had been booked so that the man could attend a family wedding in Bali and the dates couldn’t be shifted, but his boss didn’t seem to care.

The email exchange between the employee, Noel, and the manager, Nick, was shared on TikTok by a business expert named Michael Sanz (@theoutsourcingexpert), who was sent the screenshots by Nick – who thought people would be sympathetic to his plight.

The messages begin with Nick telling his employee the bad news, as he writes: “Hi Noel, Jenny has resigned so we need to cancel your leave next week – all hands on deck while we try to replace her. We can push back a few months. I’ve advised HR it’s now changed for you. Appreciate your understanding.”

Noel was baffled by the email as he couldn’t believe his boss had “advised HR” about the change to his holiday without ever discussing it with him first. He responded: “Sorry to hear. I totally appreciate how frustrating this would be to management. But what do you mean you already told HR my leave has changed?

“Unfortunately, I can’t cancel my leave as it’s my brother’s wedding in Bali, all flights are paid for and my kids are in the wedding party. I did book this in seven months ago, so cancelling isn’t an option. I can help out more until I leave if that helps, but I can’t change my leave dates.”

That should have been the end of the discussion – but it wasn’t. Nick came back to tell his employee to change his holiday to a “fly in, fly out” deal and “take three days over the weekend” instead of the planned three weeks. He then rudely added: “Not sure what you can do for three weeks in Bali.”

Sticking to his guns, Noel said it was “no one’s business” how he spends his leave and said once again that he “can’t cancel or amend”. He also reiterated he would be more than happy to help out however he can while he’s still in the country before his flight to Bali. This still wasn’t enough for Nick, however, who said: “Mate, can’t stress enough, your leave is cancelled, we just can’t do it. I’m sorry.”

And that was the final straw for Noel, who hit back with the perfect response. He wrote: “I actually don’t want to come back to work now. I’m quite shocked at this email. I’m going to take my leave earlier and will start from today. While away I will think about if working with a company that doesn’t promote boundaries is a place I really want to work at. I’m also sending this as an email to Aaron and HR as it’s totally unreasonable.”

Commenters on the post were firmly on the employee’s side, with many saying they would also hand in their resignation if they were treated in the same way. One person said: “100 per cent I would have resigned on the spot.” While another added: “I’d hand in my resignation,” and a third quipped: “Something tells me this company is now going to have to hire two new people.”

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