o/t - anyone been excused from jury duty?

[jenfirstbaby]

I've been excused. I was summoned when Esther was 7 months old and i was breastfeeding her. I told them this and i was excused. I was then summoned again 6 months later and i was still feeding. As it was only 3 x a day i decided to do the jury service as i didn't want to risk them saying i had to do it anyway.

As you are away i think they will excuse you. Being on Mat leave isn't a good enough excuse. You will get money for childcare for your child so i would advise that if you have to do it at some point then bare that in mind. I was given money for the childminder even though in the end i wasn't needed for the day that the childminder was booked for.

surely if I say im a single mother on maternity leave though? How can they expect you to arrange child care at such short notice? Its not about the money, I know they reimburse you., but they only gave me 3 weeks notice.... I wouldn't know how to go about sourcing a child minder or someone that could take a baby at such short notice and for an unsure amount of time? Child minders have rules about how many under a certain age etc they are allowed to have at one time. I've just put on the form that im on maternity leave and would be unable to arrange child care, and also that im due to travel and sent my flight confirmation

Before I filled it in I called the number and asked the woman who answered about what to put, I didn't mention travelling, I said im on maternity leave and she said just put that. I asked 'is that a reason for excusal?' and she said yes!

 

[RachA]

3 weeks notice isn't long - i'm sure i had a lot more than that. I had childcare for the first week but didn't for the second (well i did for 1 of them but the person couldn't take both) i was able to find a childminder that could take one of mine.

If the woman said its a good enough excuse then i would of thought it would be

 

[jenfirstbaby]

Hope so its just a pain that U have to apply in writing, I sent it back today and im due to be there on 17th September.... So I don't have much time to hear back from them , and if they refuse my excusal then il have even less time to find child care and cancel flights

I'm sure it will be fine tho, if I have 2 reasons im sure they'll favour me

 

[RachA]

The fact you have flights booked means that it's unlikely you'd have to do it. As other's have said - it is really interesting to do. A bit frustrating though. We had a case where it was obvious to us that they'd done it but we couldn't prove it 'beyond reasonable doubt'

 

[kmbabycrazy]

The fact you have flights booked means that it's unlikely you'd have to do it. As other's have said - it is really interesting to do. A bit frustrating though. We had a case where it was obvious to us that they'd done it but we couldn't prove it 'beyond reasonable doubt'

I'm terrified of jury duty after studying juries whilst doing law at a level! We of course were shown stories about jury members on murder trials suffering post traumatic stress, about jury nobbling and all that. In fact I wasn't even the jury member but just the details of some of the cases they had to deal with were disturbing enough that me and a classmate had to leave the room because it was that upsetting.