A US company has locked its social media profiles after facing a barrage of hate for firing an employee who asked for leave after his mother’s death. Social media users rallied in support of the unnamed employee who was sacked by Koroseal after he asked for an extension of his bereavement leave.
The incident came to light after the employee posted about it on Reddit. He said that Koroseal, a wallcoverings manufacturing firm, fired him after he asked for an extension on his return date. In the post, the former Koroseal employee explained that he was given three days of unpaid bereavement leave after his mother died.
“[I] was given 3 bereavement leave days to travel all the way to Florida, bury my mom and hurry back home – no time to rest, grieve, anything,” the Reddit user wrote. “I honestly haven’t even had time to grieve as it’s all been a blur.”
When the man emailed HR to request an extension of four days on his unpaid leave, he was fired unceremoniously.
“She said they’ve been gracious enough by offering me bereavement and basically fired me over email telling me they’ll mail my final check,” the man reported.
On Reddit, the former employee also explained that he worked as a machinist on a machine which had at least five to six other operators, so the company could have easily given him the time off he asked for.
He also said that Koroseal asked him to take down his Reddit post after being bombarded with criticism as he thanked Reddit users for coming together to support him. “Reddit actually came through for me in a huge way! They forced the offending company to scrub all social media, lock down their page and delete literally hundreds upon hundreds of comments on Twitter/X,” the user said.
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