Dd17 holiday been turned down from work

Good grief that's awful. As my old manager said, who even knows if you'll be working for them then! So glad I've never worked anywhere like that. I haven't even thought about holiday for half term this year yet!

I’d say it’s not really fair that all
her leave requests have been turned down. Can she speak to her boss about the October trip? Annual leave does need to be taken at convenient times but also it’s fair for everyone to get some of their first choice leave time and for not only parents to have dibs on school holidays. Employers have to have a ‘good reason’ for refusing leave and ‘someone else might need school hols more’ is not a valid business reason.

I was replying to a poster who said that parents took priority. Not sure why you felt you needed to explain all that to me as I never mentioned anything about peak times or term time patterns?

Well I'm going to disagree with everyone and say that's really mean of her employers to decline every one of her holidays!

I think she should speak politely to her boss and see if there is any flexibility.

Sounds to me like her workplace gives parents first dibs on leave

Can you take the other kids out of school for a holiday if your daughter can't get school holiday leave? If it's not a crucial time for them of course. But don't stop your other kids from having a holiday, go without her if you need to.
I'd try to move to a more accommodating employer if I was her, they sound very inflexible.

That's ridiculous - where does she work? Its a bit tricky if she's already full time at that age. I would have changed jobs as she's only 17, they sound extremely inflexible and not somewhere I'd want to work. I mean October is months away!

I remember working at a supermarket at that age and the managers just accepted that the 16-18 year olds would have holidays booked by parents and they would be going regardless.

But by the same token, nor is OP's DD's family holiday anyone else's concern. All we know is that she was given one of the three requests she put in. We don't know who else got those slots or why. It may also be that availability for leave is just lower in school holidays, either because it's a peak time for the employer or because there are staff with agreed term-time only work patterns, which do take priority over AL requests.

The purpose of parental leave has to be to spend time with the child so how does this work if the leave is deferred until a school aged child is back at school?
It does sound like an absolutely unsolvable nightmare for companies that employee lots of people with school-aged children (and their colleagues who want to take leave with their families). I don't know what the solution is.

Are either of your other 2 in exam years? If so could you eg go after GCSEs in June. British weather is normally the best then! (taking the other out of school for the week) .Could your daughter book some of the days off and WFH the others from your holiday? My DS had to work until Xmas eve while we were on holiday (his leave request was turned down and so he WFH while we were away.)

I'm really sorry this has happened OP. However your daughter has been invited to go on holiday its not as if you would be going on holiday with the other DC because you don't want her to come. I would still go on holiday with them, its not fair on your other DC not to go away because their sister's job is so inflexible. And your DD is still getting a holiday with their friend.

The only other thing you could possibly consider is maybe just a little mummy daughter city break in Feb when she has a bit of annual leave? Just the 2 of you?

They don’t take priority at all. Other people’s childcare is not other employees responsibility or concern.

its not how it goes

That’s a real shame and I can understand why you’re upset. Out of interest, could you immediately see on the system that her colleagues had already booked their leave? If so, they must have been at their station at midnight - what an unpleasant system. Hopefully she’ll be better prepared for next year and in the meantime, she could keep her war to the ground for any cancellations. Unlikely but you never know.

She should ask her boss how the process works if all summer slots are booked within 90 minutes of the holiday calander being opened.. speak to her colleagues... see how they feel.. maybe they all wait up at midnight ... but this seems either unlikely or incredibly difficult for all of them.. maybe if there is a lot of dissatisfaction about it, things might change.

Not helpful for you, I know... and yes, change and disappointment are challenging.

Do you also work? Do you have a partner / husband? Could you split the holidays?

October: Dad and youngest kids
Summer: Mum, Dad, youngest kids
Some other time when eldest DD can get a few days off.. You and eldest DD.

If she's feeling brave, she could challenge that she has not had any leave during school holidays approved. As a youngster they're assuming she doesnt have any family responsibilities - which is true. But she does have family and that's when she gets to see them. Leave should be fairly available at any time of year regardless of whether you have children or not. She might not be brave enough to have that conversation yet as shes in her first role, but its something for her to wake up to.

To be denied one or two specific weeks maybe, but to be denied every single request looks very suspicious if she has definitely requested it.

One of my employers had a rule that you could only book one week per rolling 4 week period until everyone had booked at least one weeks annual leave in (or put in writing they don’t want to for whatever reason). Then you could book more in. That way holiday allocation was fairer and you don’t have people booking multiple weeks in school holidays immediately.

Businesses can't refuse but they can absolutely delay. Having to deny other staff annual leave during a popular time would be a good reason to delay someone's parental leave. There is nothing stopping your organisations from telling parents they can have the parental leave but in September

Some companies limit the amount of leave staff can take at the most popular times. For example, I wouldn't be allowed to take all six weeks of the summer holidays as annual leave. I could take about two weeks maximum. I also had a to work a few days over Christmas and New Year.

It helps that workloads tend to be a bit lower in August, as some of the people who give us work will also be away. And that colleagues without school-age children relish the chance to go away outside the school holidays, when destinations are cheaper and less crowded.

Can she take unpaid leave at short notice? I may have done this when I was young and refused time off. In the longer term, she needs to look for a job with better annual leave policies.

Unfortunately, your daughter is now in full-time employment, and it stands to reason she may not necessarily be granted leave. I think you have to accept that your daughter is nearly an adult and with that comes changes and responsibilities. She is extremely lucky to have employment, there are many youngsters looking for work, in an unstable job market. Of course, you feeling sad that she can't come is valid, but it's part and parcel of life too.

But what about parental leave, or the right to request flexible working on caregiving grounds? Maybe this is some parents’ flexible working arrangement?

How else can leave be allocated? As pp has pointed out, if it’s first come first served that’s not fair on newer staff members who can’t get the dates they want because they weren’t there two years previously; if you do it by who has dependents to care for that might impact someone like OP’s dd. The chances are that some points in the leave year will be oversubscribed and not everyone will get their requests. How are companies meant to manage this? Genuine question.

How do you know this? Literally the only thing we know is that dd has told OP that she can't get the time off. We don't know why. We don't know who else has leave booked or requested. We don't know what their usual policy is on allocating leave. We don't even know if she's truthfully asked for the time off.

For how many weeks is she going away with her friend in late May / early June? As others have mentioned think about alternatives, some weekends / long weekends away, and / or what about October half term?

My guess is that it's the parental leave that complicates things. Businesses can't refuse that without reasonable grounds to do so. It was a minefield navigating it when I worked in healthcare managing patient facing teams. In practice, it did mean parents got the lion's share of school holidays. Although patient need and safety sometimes meant we did have to refuse parental leave requests, we couldn't cite unfairness to other staff as a business reason to refuse them.