Shared Adoption/Parental Leave

[PaintedLadyWBB]

Has anyone done this and how does it work? We thought we had it sussed but when informing our employers, they all seem to be a bit clueless about it all. We’ve spoken to them but I’m not sure they understand. We want to take 4 months off together to begin with and when OH goes back to work then I would carry on with whatever adoption leave is left

No, not done it but I work in HR and its pretty rare for anyone to take SPL mainly because its so complicated!
You can't swop between adoption leave and shared parental leave so effectively the 'main' adopter ie whoever is taking adoption leave needs to give their employer notice to curtail this then give a notice of entitlement to take shared parental leave. Your partner also needs to give notice to their employer they intend to take shared parental leave. You then remain on shared parental leave till the 50 weeks have run out either by using them together or one of you being off. You can't go back onto adoption leave.
Just to be aware though, a lot of companies don't do enhanced pay for shared parental leave but will for adoption leave so if you would get enhanced adoption pay, just make sure you're not going to be worse off if doing SPL. If you'd only get statutory pay then it's no different.
There are some forms on acas website that might help if your employer is struggling with it all or doesn't have a policy www.acas.org.uk/shared-parental-leave-forms
Hope that helps

I don't know anyone whose taken SPL because of the hit on their finances and most adopters I know discounted it because many agencies like the main carer to be off for a year which you can't do if you share it.

I do agree that it is a massive headache. My employer has no information on SPL and my partner’s employer has very little and is needing to research everything pretty much like what we are doing. It seems like a great idea at the time but it is made so complicated.
@organicapricot thank you for the link. I shall have a wade through that later. I’m glad it’s not just me that can see how difficult it is

I feel your pain. We looked in to this and out employers were clueless. Told us we couldn't take it together (not true), that we couldn't get paid (also not true), it was a huge headache. We even contacted ACAS for some advice and they were able to give us some basic info. We haven't had to use it (yet) but the bottom line is it's there, it can be used but the detail all came down to our employers policy. In our case that is a local authority which turned out to add to the confusion. I hope you get it all sorted. Even if you only takes a couple of months together and one of you then takes the rest I think it's a great way to start your family.

Hi, we took shared parental leave, both taking 6 months off together. Best thing we did as it allowed us all to have time together to bond. However, we had a nightmare with my employer who did not understand it. They were adamant that we could not take time off together. Luckily I am in a union and was able to get them to liaise for me which worked. Stick with what you want to do, good luck!

Yes, we are currently doing this - my husband is having 7 weeks of SPL at the start of placement (plus two weeks' paternity and some annual leave), at the same time as me and I am taking the rest as adoption leave. With annual leave at the end I effectively still have a year at home. Agree it was a nightmare to sort out - and I work for a central government department who are heavily promoting SPL and really should have their act together. Feel free to PM me if it would be helpful to share some specifics, happy to help you work through it if useful! If you can afford it I would really recommend it, it's been invaluable for us starting our family life together. It is worth the endless emails to HR trying to get everything sorted in the end!