p/t nanny- can i make her take the BH days as paid leave?

[oopsagain]

If i make my nanny take the BH out of her (5.6 times normal days work) holiday entitlement this will mean that she has 11 days holiday left this year.
This doesn't seem so much- there are 8 BHs this yr and we work p/t mon, tue and fri.. so all of them are covered this yr!

i also want her to coincide our hols with hers if poss, so in the contract have written 1/2 of the remaining 11 days to be taken whn we take ours.
but it all seems a bit restrictive, and I'm worried it sounds a bit tight.
i can't afford much else tbh.
I don't earn alot more than her during the holidays as she has both kids 10 hrs when they are off school. during school hours she works doing just after school care so it's affordable then.
grrrrr, i don't want to be mean, but I have to survive too.

TIA
going to put this in nanny section too so can get both sides' opinion

[flowerybeanbag]

What does her contract say? When specifying the number of days holiday I would expect the contract to state whether that number includes bank holiday or not, and if not, whether they are paid on top.

If the contract doesn't say anything about it, then yes technically you can make her take any bank holidays which happen to fall on her normal working days as holiday. But that is a bit tight, and that would mean that you were specifying when she can take almost all of her holiday, which is also tight.

Most nanny contracts say that they can choose half their holiday and their employer chooses half. If you are choosing all the bank holidays and half of the rest, that's an awful lot, and not much freedom for her.

Do you have to work bank holidays then, and therefore have to find alternative childcare if you give her them off?

[oopsagain]

I'm writing the contract- adapting anothr one that isn't quite appropriate..

she is basically employed for 9 hours a week, in school weeks these are 3 days worth of after school.
But we have put a clause in that during holidays she will do ad hoc pre arranged extra hours- ie to cover the days that both DH and I have to work.

And there are the BHs too- atm dh gets paid for BH as he's on a salary but I don't as I'm on a zero hours contract.
so we are in a deficit everytime a BH comes along, and duriing school hols I break even pretty much.

such are the perils of going back to work!

[oopsagain]

ok having re read your post, FB, I see that maybe I just psecify her BH dates and then let her take the other 11 days (which is pretty much 3 weeks as she works 3 days a week) when she likes.

Our finances are on a knife edge just now and a couple of weeks paying her full wack would seriously troubel us, that's the problem.
we'll end up taking holiday when kids are off school and staying home whilst she goes off on holiday somewhere sunny and exotic and we'll be paying her

grrr, the lo is too young to go to scholl holiday clubs so can't even spread the cost like this..

[flowerybeanbag]

I think that sounds a bit more reasonable.

With regards to your contract, just because it is zero hours doesn't mean you don't get holiday - you should get pro rata holiday the same as a full time employee, which is usually worked out as a percentage of average hours worked over the previous 12 weeks iyswim? So if full time employees get bank holidays where you work, that ought to be taken into account when calculating your own holiday entitlement.

[oopsagain]

ok , the way it works is that i get a low basic rate and then they top it up with an extra payment for holiday pay.

In my industry the usual minimum day rate is £xxx per day pay for a locum

the place i work for pays £xxx pounds, but this is made up of £A basic (and it wouldn't be acceptible if this was all they paid) with £B added as hol pay, so they pay the same as most other places, but the hol pay is in the total.

Locums are usually self employed so choose what they agree. i have a long relationship with this organisation and do enjoy working there- at the moment i am coverning some maternity leave.
hopefully i will get acontract with the next lot of mat leave I'm going to cover- but atm i am on zero hours...

[oopsagain]

Sorry, my prev post shoule have said- "pretty much 4 weeks", not 3 weeks