Employment/Being Fired

The Director of my Department advised I could not take Oct 31st, Nov 1 and Nov 2nd off, I h ad requested these as vacation days and was not notified for 3 days that I could not have them, I arranged for a flight and Hotel reservations, as I was not refused in any of the normal ways I would have been, cost of $500 for the reservations, non refundable, I advised I would not be at work on those three days. He said I would work or he would fire me.
Is their any recourse for me?

That is horrible that he would do that to you.

I have to say that he def should have informed you that your vacation time was not approved, but as I have learned in the past you also have to take some responsibility for this as you should have double checked that your days off had been approved before assuming they had been and booking your flight.

Now I am not saying what the director of your department did was right and if it was me I would give myself time to calm down reaproach the situation with him and if still I didn't get anywhere I would go over his head and take it to his boss. Make sure before you do that, that everything that you may need to do is covered so that there is no reason for them not to approve the time off and explain your side and the way that you feel you were treated.

It was not appropriate for him to say that to you and he apparently doesn't value you as an employee if he would treat you in that manner.

You can ask a senior manager to intervene but unless you were given specific approval and relied on that approval, it will be hard to make them (legally) pay any costs you incurred.

Sound Like you work for ENTERPRISE RENT A CAR. They always did this to their employees, we just went to their boss and had our ducks in a row to show we could take off without too much work interuption. It works.