Stress in the workplace!

[dr strange]

My mother-in-law works part time in her local Co-op pricing down near out of date products. Although she should be retired, It's only for a few hours a week, and it keeps her busy for a bit, and also she kind of enjoys the chit chat! She has a little medical history with high blood pressure and cholesterol but keeps it under control through medication. The real issue she has though is with stress...she gets stressed quite easy which does cause issues with her blood pressure.
Recently the manager at her store has informed her she needs to be trained on the checkouts and the stress with this is driving her crazy. Yeah it might not sound like a big deal, however she hates the thought of going on them, but she hates the thought of leaving even more! Is she within any medical rights of not doing the checkouts? I did hear that a manager should offer a healthy environment where possible, so is it possible to go down the health route to exclude her (with all the medical notes included?) Or has she got to lump it?
I don't know what she can do...I just don't want the poor dears head exploding!!!

[evedawn]

I don't know where she stands legally but I do sympathise with her alot

[HowardKennitby]

Is the manager suggesting she should do more hours or is this checkout work instead of what she does now?

[ubasses]

A lot will depend on her contract but as it is a large Company they will probably have it covered. She must ask to speak to the relevant Manager and may be get a sympathetic hearing.

[EDDIE51]

I know that in Tesco EVERYONE on the shop floor must be trained to work a till. There are no 'shelf stackers' any more apart from temps at Christmas. Possibly the Co-op is the same.

[boxtops]

Unless there is a medical reason why she can't use a till (manual dexterity, for example) it's perfectly reasonable that they ask her to do it. There may well be something in her contract of employment about "other tasks as management require". She needs to check with the management whether this might just be an occasional task in times of great busyness, or if they are changing her job description - if it's the latter, she should be consulted.

[jw47]

Tell her not to be afraid of training on the checkout, she will enjoy it when she knows how and she can still have a chat with the customers. It will do her health better if she stays at work and if like most supermarkets she will only need to go on checkouts if they are really busy or short staffed. My husband was a mechanic before he retired but is now part time at a major supermarket. We laughed when he said he had been trained on checkouts but he managed it okay and quite likes it the times he does have to go on.

[grffindoor2011]

I would imagine it falls under other duties (most contracts will have this so anyone can be made to do another job in the event of staff shortages etc). She works in a shop, they are asking her to go on the till.

It is sad she suffers from high blood pressure etc and as you say 'she should be retired'. Maybe she needs to find something else or retire. It seems to me that they will be better options than the former in the longterm.

This is another example of what will happen to us all with the ever increasing retirement age. The future vision of us working until we die to save millions may sound good, but having 70,80,90 year olds doing all manner of jobs will not work in practice. None of us can cheat nature.

For the record, when I was a teenager I worked in a shop in the goods inwards area. They decided to spread my job across the whole workforce which meant I had to go on the till. I told them my job must be made redundant then and threatened them with a solicitor. They made my job redundant and paid me off.