One of the young casuals called in sick a week or so ago. His stated reason was the fact that his Uncle and his Aunt had both perished in the bushfires north of Sydney.

He managed to drag himself into work and told me that he had come to terms with the loss of his relatives then went on to describe in details how they came to be killed. I expressed sympathy and treated him with kid gloves for the rest of the day.

I have searched the internet, recalled every news story I could regarding the fires and spoken with a number of people about if they had read or heard of any deaths during the latest fires. No information about any deaths from fire has come to light, though one man died of a heart attack but he isn`t related to the youngster.

I have been asking him about the funeral arrangements[ which unsurprisingly is being held in far north Queensland so he wont be attending] and how the rest of his family is coping.

I`m 99% sure that he is fabricating the story and have lost any regard I had for him simply because he didn`t come up with a story that was harder to check-up on!

Please, when you make up an excuse for not attending work use commonsense and make the story one that can`t be looked in to by anyone.

Such behaviour will probably cause you to doubt anyone in the future who gives an excuse about bereavment. Not nice to 'kill off' relatives that way.

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Not nice to 'kill off' relatives that way

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Yes Sue, I think it`s absolutely rotten.

When I was working in Personnel, I saw a bloke claim two days off work for 'alopecia'! (Look it up, lol)

Wasn't you was it???

Harrumph!

I used to work with a woman whose grandparents died in rapid succession, trouble was the funerals were in Madiera so she had to take a week off each time, I think she killed off three in about six months. Not sure to this day if it was just bad luck, or pork pies.

"One of the saddest twists of fate is that many women discver too late that few of us face death wishing we'd spent more time at the office."