Do any parents use 4 weeks unpaid parental leave each year when returning to full time work?

[ThePoisedOpalBird]

I am potentially getting a full time job. I wont lie I am really struggling emotionally with this as I have only worked 2 days a week since ds1 was born but life is expensive and my partner is keen for me to earn more now my mat leave from ds2 is due to end so we can save to buy a house.

I have been looking at holiday allowance, bank holidays etc to see how to optimise my time with the kids.

Has anyone used a large amount of their unpaid parental leave to take extra time off each year?

I am thinking of using 4 weeks a year to boost my holiday total and increase the amount of time I get with the kids.

Does anyone else do this? Do your employers mind? I figured with holiday allowance of 5 weeks and 4 weeks of unpaid parental leave I would be almost doubling the time I get off with the kids which might help alleviate some of the sadness I feel about leaving them.

Well it depends how good you are at your job but tbh taking four weeks a year for several years in a row is massively taking the piss. Yes they can’t legally stop you but they’ll probably find other ways to get rid of you. This on top of annual leave, sick leave etc is a LOT of time they need to cover. We would not look kindly upon this in my company especially as it’s just to spend more time with your kids rather than a genuine emergency, something all working parents would like but imagine if every parent used the full entitlement every year, there would be no one left to do the work you’re being paid to do.

Your partners job has the exact same parental leave rights as your potential new job might. You just are choosing not to use it because that is better, financially, for you.
If you are joining a small business op, then I think you need to be honest. They need a full time employee, you don’t want to work full time. This isn’t the job for you.
And, you are supremely naive if you think your employer not liking you “isn’t an issue”.

It's always the way that the ? male partners job is inflexible and/ or higher earning be very careful here OP especially as he is DP not DH.

When mine were little in the 90s I basically used all my annual leave for child sickness.
There was no parental leave entitlement but my employer ( civil service) allowed part year contracts. So I worked part time and part year once they were in school. I used to get ten weeks unpaid holidays a year and had to give the dates at the start of the year.
It was great, my DC never had to go to a holiday club. Obviously cost a large loss of earnings but it suited us.
DH was more flexible on a day to day basis and did nursery/ school drop offs.

But it is an entitlement so why shouldn't parents use it if they can afford to?

He can take the same leave yes although he doesn't want to use it at the moment. I was asked if he had flexibility and that is different. Flexibility is WFH, 4 day week etc.

They aren't a small company just a small team.

I take six weeks unpaid per year, not strictly under this scheme but it added weight to my request. My boss was absolutely fine with it, no bother at all, but I'd been at my job for a long while before I requested it and had built up a lot of goodwill. Plus I would be expensive to replace which I guess helps!

It is what it is. His job pays more than double a day what I will be earning on min wage buy the drawback is he has no flexibility.

I’ve taken 3 weeks for the past few years and it’s really not an issue. It’s definitely becoming much more common for employees to use their entitlement (if they want to and if they can afford to do it). Why on earth would you feel bad about taking something you’re entitled to. Surely part of an employer’s role is to manage leave, including any sort of leave whether it’s annual leave, sickness, maternity or parental.

I worked in HR and have certainly known people to take parental leave like the op is proposing. Some parents do save it for potential emergencies but other use it for childcare during school holidays.

The pint is that you’re placing yourself at a great financial disadvantage compared with your DP.

Discuss with him how your financial positions can be made more equal. Think how you and he would be placed if you ever split up or if he died.

@ThePoisedOpalBird I echo others who have expressed concerns that you are being supremely naive in thinking that it doesn't matter one hoot to you how the people you are going to have to work alongside for 40 hours every week feel about you. I don't know how much experience you've had of workplaces, but since you're going back to an entry-level job, I suspect not much. But having to function in a workplace with people who really dislike how you're taking the mick (because it's "your legal right") and causing chaos and extra expense for the employer can very quickly become toxic. There are also a multitude of ways for line managers to arrange for it to become even more toxic for you when you're in work, that is if they haven't figured out a way to manage you out. I think you should come back to this thread once you've got your job and have taken a few of these parental leave weeks to let us know how receptive your employers and colleagues have been to your approach to work-life balance.

You might be perfectly ok with colleagues not liking you , although I suspect that it would start to feel uncomfortable at some stage for most people . If you are only happy working part time , I’m a little confused as to why you want to take on a full time role and expect others to pick up the slack for you .

Assuming you wouldn’t bring this up until after you have passed your probation period ,as I can seeing it meaning them replacing you quite quickly, no reason needed.

It certainly isn’t something that I’ve ever known anyone in my industry use , but we rely on the team all working together quite heavily , and although we happily cover sickness , family emergencies and the like , someone just taking big chunks of time out would make life difficult for everyone else .

It is definitely a thing. It is on the government website. You are mixing it up with emergency time off for dependants. They are two completely different things.

Well I can only get a minimum wage job at the moment so not a lot I can do about that. I would also rather have time with my kids than earn more.

I actually have a retail store management background prior to having my kids so I have plenty of experience in the workplace.

I don't care about what people think. I am there to do my job on the days I am paid. But I feel I should be able to take something I am legally entitled to which allows me to spend more time with my children.

Then get a part time job? Don’t join a new company already planning to push more of your work onto your colleagues. Also, what will you do if the other team members also do this? Your employer will be quite within their rights to delay your leave to a time to suit them.

I don't 'want' to work full time. But the world is expensive and I really need to work full time no matter how much I don't want to.

Probation is 12 weeks so once I had passed that I would request my parental leave.

I have a part time job. But I need a full time job otherwise I wouldn't have this issue 🙈

No issue with them delaying the leave. As long as I get the extra weeks to spend with my kids I don't care when. They aren't at school so no issue with when I have it as long as I get the extra time.

Was this a long time ago? I know you buy buy 1 week of annual leave. Which I do each year. I didnt know you could do what OP is saying per child its very generous.

Have you sat down with your partner OP and ran the figures? Will you have 2 small DC in nursery? If so wouldn't you be better working 3 days a week till they start school? When DC start school its even worse (sorry to be negative) there are 13 weeks of school hols to cover, inset days and sick days!

You sounds very entitled and naive tbh. Yes it’s a legal entitlement but in reality it’s very difficult for employers to manage on top of all the other entitlements and your colleagues will bear the brunt of insufficient coverage so it’s a bit selfish. If you were in my team I would find a way to manage you out for doing this unless you were an absolute superstar (unlikely as entitled employees rarely are). Taking it after many years of service for a good reason (wanting to support kids in their GCSE year for example as one person said upthread, or if you have a sick child, or childcare falls through one summer) is very different to taking the entire yearly allowance in your first year of employment, just to spend more time with your kids, and then planning to do that again the following year. It sounds like you’re not going to be a very responsible employee.

We get free childcare hours plus partner has a day off during the week and childminder isn't very expensive so I am almost £600 better off working full time.

If employers and colleagues would make life so difficult for someone taking what they're entitled to it's already a toxic workplace. Someone on my team takes parental leave, no one complains, she is a respected member of the team. People are on flexi hours to pick up their DC, I've previously worked with someone on a term time contract. There's never been any issues. It's accepted that they are taking unpaid leave, they're getting paid less than FT staff working year round so are obviously going to do less work.

If I am recruiting for a five day a week permanent role then that’s what I need to make my business work properly. Regardless of what you are legally entitled to, that’s what I am recruiting for so that’s what I need. What if I turned around and gave you 21 days notice to take a week off unpaid. And then did it another three times in the same year. That’s not what you signed up to is it?

My business has people reliant on my team members being there at the same time and day each week (think along the lines of a carer role but it’s not). Rotas are carefully planned to provide flexible working where possible at least one day a week for each employee on an informal, not contracted basis. They appreciate this and make non urgent doctors appointments, use it to do school drop offs or attend school plays etc on their flexible days and other employees are happy to cover because they are afforded the same flexibility.

If you came into my business, used our family friendly policies and then took another four weeks off, I can tell you now you would not be popular in the team. As your boss I would have to suck it up, but your colleagues would stop helping cover your flexible days and really wouldn’t see you as a team player. You would actually come across as difficult to work with - not by your request for parental leave but by your approach that you are entitled to it and don’t care if it screws anyone else over.

I want to hire someone who really wants and / or needs the job, not someone who acts like they are doing me a favour by even showing up.

Can I suggest you work on how you might deliver this wonderful news to your new employer in a slightly more eloquent way?

Are you going to be paying for childcare OP?
If so you will still be paying for full time care while you’re off unpaid.
Will it not be just as cost effective to look for a 4 day a week job all year round and only pay for 4 days childcare.