Shared maternity pay/leave

[ABLDD]

Can anyone explain shared maternity pay/ leave to me? Iv looked on gov.uk and can’t make heads nor tails of it.

I was planning on taking 9 months paid leave with my partner taking the remaining 3 unpaid as he is paid less then me (makes sense financially for us) however I can’t work out if this is allowed? And would he still be entitled to the two weeks paid leave at the start when baby is first born?
I’m waiting on CAB to come back to be but been advised there is a 14 day turn around on enquiries. Tia

If he is not aiming to take paid leave, because presumably you would have used up all that entitlement after 39 weeks, then he could take SPP for two weeks as normal and then could use 8 weeks parental leave (this is unpaid but everyone who is eligible gets 8 weeks per year). This is if nothing else works out.

As far as im aware if you choose to share maternity leave, then its the equivalent of one mat leave split between the two of you. So yes, he would be allowed the do the last 3 months.

I dont think he'd be able to claim 2 weeks paid leave on the birth of the baby though, because then hes essentially having a paternity leave AND sharing the maternity leave. Happy to be proved wrong on this point though....

Yes, he can take 2.weeks paternity leave at the start then later on the unpaid portion of shared parental leave.
This is pretty much what we did with my youngest and I'm so so glad we did. My husband loved that time and I think it made their bond even closer.

Thank you all, I’m so confused with it all. So do we just inform our employer at the earliest stage or wait until nearer the time? Starting to feel overwhelmed with it all if I’m honest. I’m glad he can have the 2 weeks paid paternity and then 3 months unpaid, we will just need to work out dates I guess to ensure it all tally’s up.

Yes he can take the 2 weeks paid paternity and 3 months shared leave (the end of your maternity). As you have already said this would be unpaid as you'd have used up all the entitlement to paid leave.

You have the option to take the leave simultaneously (you'd both be off together) or consecutively (you do 9 months, he does 3 - with him off for 2 weeks paternity at the start).

Me and my husband did this with Ds1 4 years ago.i hope HR awareness has come on a bit since then as we had to tell both of our employers (big public sector organisations) how it works, that it is indeed legal etc etc.

It was really worthwhile and if we could afford to do it with dc3 we absolutely would.

Legally you don't have to inform your employer until the 15th week before the baby is due but if it was me I would mention it earlier because it still isn't very common to share parental leave.

Great idea though and lovely that he will have the extra time with the baby . I wanted to do similar but DH isn't agreeing to it as he works for a small company so reckons they'll just find an excuse to fire him if he tries to take 3 months off .

2 weeks paid pat leave to be taken within 56 days of birth.

Shared parental leave can obviously be shared but if you yourself use 39 weeks in total his bit would be unpaid.