Checked my contract and as I expected there is nothing about my query. Will have to ask HR about it.
Unfortunately its down, I think, to my boss, who has given leave to one person in the last six months and refused someone else, who then quit. So we are left with a post we have difficulty filling and the prospect of retraining someone else when we do fill it. Where I work has a history of giving leave,then advertising and filling the job, and when the person comes back to work they are given the next available job. In my field this doesnt happen everywhere, have worked in places where the job is filled by a locum.
I am in a slightly specialised position and there is only me doing the job, so if they do that to me, I am never going to get the job I do now back, because someone else will have been given the post permanently while I am away. I would then be eventually given a job in the general area that I originally trained for, and I am not happy with that and would stick it for a while and then look elsewhere.
Have I any chance of persuading them to hold my job for me and only filling it on a temporary basis while I am away?? I just dont know, and I will only find out by asking. Thanks for listening to/reading my rant!!
Beckster