To ask for successful examples of shared parental leave?

[Movingsoon21]

DH and I are expecting our first child and want to use shared parental leave. Our first thought was that I would take the first nine months and he would take the final 3. He would also take the first two weeks as paternity leave and weeks 3-4 as annual leave so we would have the first month off together.

We don’t know many people who have used SPL but have heard through friends of friends / friends of colleagues about more interesting arrangements where both parents use their annual leave cleverly so they get a month off together around months 6-9 to go away together or similar.

Looking to hear from people who have successfully/ happily used SPL, in particular anyone who has done anything interesting or clever to get more time by using accrued annual leave? E.g. could I use accrued leave during my 9 months off to get 3 weeks off with DH during his first month off?

Both our HR departments seem pretty clueless on this so any help or advice would be appreciated! TIA.

Disclaimer: not in the UK and it was 20+ years ago.

At the time in Germany you could have 3 years of parental leave. First 2 years you had a means-tested payment, last year nothing. I had first DC and stayed home but because i didn't have a job to go back to, we decided to have DC2 quite closely. There are 18 months between them. I stayed home for 3 years - so either all the 3 years for DC1 or 18 months for DC1 and 18 months for DC2. In any case - i got a job when DC1 was 3, so for the 2nd lot of 18 months for DC2 DH took over the parental leave.

it worked really well, and although money did get tight, it was excellent for all of us. However. During my leave i taught EFL some evenings, to give me a break from being home. During his leave DH worked very part-time doing his trade, as it lends itself to that. So we were sure to have contact with people outside the home. That was really important to me.

Also important was the clear discussion about expectations at every step of the way (for eg when he took over, and when DC1 went to kindergarten etc etc)

For DS I took 10 months and my DH 2 months while I went back to work.

Both DH and DS and our marital relationship really benefited from this. They got bonding time but on top of this DH started to understand what life was like at me for the previous 10 months. He became more confident with DS, took on more at home, did all the nursery settling in and I think this contributed to us being more equal at home once all returned.

I would recommend not taking it at the same time. Other friends whose husbands had time
off with them -it just seemed like an extended family holiday which is fine if that is what you want. Plus their husbands (because they had someone else at home) seemed to come out of it with the view that mat leave had been some kind of charm.

I know this is off tangent a bit because you're asking about practicalities but I think that it is worth bearing in mind if you're keen to have an equal set up at home

We are basically doing exactly as you describe!

My husband has a generous paternity leave and annual leave policy from his employer, so between annual leave, paternity leave and bank holidays he was able to take six weeks off when our baby was born (in December).

I had 9 months of maternity leave which finished at the end of august. My husband’s SPL began then. I had accrued around 6 weeks of annual leave through a combination of AL, bank holidays and a couple of KIT days. So I’ve only just gone back to work with him having been on SPL since august 30th. He’s on SPL until the end of November.

It has worked brilliantly for us. We had an amazing 6 weeks off together where we really made the most of the time to do family things. And now these final 3 months of SPL have both of us on our full salaries, whereas I wouldn’t have been paid anything if I had been off. My husband is also just loving getting to be with our baby all day.

I would recommend it to anyone, it worked so, so well for us.

I don't see how you can be on annual leave when you are on maternity leave. You can take blocks of shared parental leave which you could take at the same time as your dh if you timed right.

Or do you mean taking the annual leave just before returning to work? That's something you'd need to discuss with your employer

Following as DH and I are wanting SPL when baby is born in April-22.

Had my baby at the start of 2020. DH used SPL to extend his initial period of paternity leave from 2 weeks to 4 which was so good because me and baby spent the first week in hospital. Then he took a month off with me at the 8 month mark and we just spent time as a family, it was fantastic and really good for his bonding with baby and my mental health. Originally the plan was also for him to take a month off at the 5 month mark as we had family coming from abroad to visit and wanted lots of time with them, but as Covid meant they couldn't travel, in the end we decided I would take an extra month maternity leave at the end of the period instead.

It was absolutely brilliant and I'm completely baffled that more people don't take advantage of it!

First time I had first 9m, he had last 3m. I had terrible PND and was a relief to get back to work.
I was a bit bitter, by 8/9m old things were getting more interesting/less hard with DD and I was back to work.

Second time we both had first 3m, then I used the rest of the leave and also used SPLIT days to go back to work a couple of days a month.

We had 2 under 2 (age gap not planned) and I desperately needed his support for the newborn with a toddler stage.

Overall it was a lifesaver for me, and DH and children have a wonderful bond. We have a proper partnership and now I work FT and he does school hours as we know we’re all happier that way.

My best friends did exactly that

He had the usual 2 weeks paternity leave, plus 2 weeks annual leave when baby first born. She had 9m maternity leave.

At the end of her maternity leave, she went in annual leave for 4/5 weeks to use up her accrued leave. He started on paternity leave at the point for 3 months, so we're both off together for about a month, then he took the 3m accrued leave (about 2 weeks) annual leave at the end.

They LOVED it, and he is the most hands on dad I know, as she wasn't there to pack the bag to go out each day, or choose what to wear, or look after when sick so he did the primary care role for 3-4 months, so when they were both back in work it's been very fair in terms of the mental load, sickness cover etc.

His company didn't have a shared parental leave policy so he worked with HR to devise it and it's been quite successful.

We would have loved to do it, but financially my husband earns way more than me so didn't work!

Good luck!

We've done it three times! It's been brilliant every time but (and this is a BIG disclaimer in terms of the admin side) for the first two times DH and I worked at the same place and were on the same salary. It was obviously so much easier to do the forms and work out the financial side and we only had one HR department to deal with. That said, we did it again a third time and it was fine but there was a bit more more back and forth with the HR stuff.

The first two times we did it concurrently - DH took 12 weeks leave when the baby was born. It was amazing and I would hugely recommend this if you can make the finances work. It does cut a chunk off the end of your leave but between annual leave accrued and I took three weeks unpaid leave each time too, I had almost a year off anyway with each baby. I will never forget those months we spent as a family and DH is way more hands on with the babies than a lot of my friends husbands who were only able to take two weeks, it really built his confidence (and mine).

The third time we did a mixture, he took four weeks SPL after the birth and then another two periods of two weeks SPL which he piggy-backed on to annual leave to get an extra week on top. These weeks were to coincide with our eldest starting school and a holiday, so it was good to get a bit more time. This time he took the pay because he moved jobs and earns more so it was a bit more complicated but it worked out. We couldn't afford the unpaid leave this time and I'm part time at work now so I went back when the baby was 10 months old.

My advice is, don't let HR departments put you off. Our third set was pretty complicated to work out, but we got there in the end and it worked out great. We were a bit of a 'test case' the first time we did it, our employer is massive but they had never used the legislation before. Since then lots of people have done it and a friend of mine (male) took the whole of the leave himself and was supported to do so.

I honestly think SPL is a really valuable thing to do, but for me it was about us spending the time as a family (rather than him taking over when I went back to work) and that can be financially a bit more complicated to work out.

Yes perfectly possible if you manage your leave… but it does have to be annual leave. The rules are that you both cannot be on SPL at the same time - strictly no overlap - and it must be consecutive - so no gaps between one leave finishing and other starting. But what most people do if they split it is, for example, mum finishes SPL on Friday 31st June, but books annual leave from the Monday for the next XX weeks (so in practice doesn’t go back to work until 1st August or whatever). Dad might finish work on leave from 15th June but doesn’t start SPL until 1st July is off work until the end.

But highly recommend it. I definitely agree it makes a big difference in terms of equitable division going forward. Stops mum being the default as dad is just as involved and in charge of the routine for that period.

@dementedpixie

I don't see how you can be on annual leave when you are on maternity leave. You can take blocks of shared parental leave which you could take at the same time as your dh if you timed right.

Or do you mean taking the annual leave just before returning to work? That's something you'd need to discuss with your employer

She wouldn't be on maternity leave. You come off mat leave and go on to SPL after the first two weeks (which are statutory mat leave). On SPL you can take annual leave to break the time up and revert back to full pay. It's complicated and HR don't usually like it but you can.

@Buzztothemoon

Yes perfectly possible if you manage your leave… but it does have to be annual leave. The rules are that you both cannot be on SPL at the same time - strictly no overlap - and it must be consecutive - so no gaps between one leave finishing and other starting. But what most people do if they split it is, for example, mum finishes SPL on Friday 31st June, but books annual leave from the Monday for the next XX weeks (so in practice doesn’t go back to work until 1st August or whatever). Dad might finish work on leave from 15th June but doesn’t start SPL until 1st July is off work until the end.

But highly recommend it. I definitely agree it makes a big difference in terms of equitable division going forward. Stops mum being the default as dad is just as involved and in charge of the routine for that period.

This isn't true at all. You can absolutely both be on SPL at the same time, it's part of the point of it.

@Buzztothemoon

Yes perfectly possible if you manage your leave… but it does have to be annual leave. The rules are that you both cannot be on SPL at the same time - strictly no overlap - and it must be consecutive - so no gaps between one leave finishing and other starting. But what most people do if they split it is, for example, mum finishes SPL on Friday 31st June, but books annual leave from the Monday for the next XX weeks (so in practice doesn’t go back to work until 1st August or whatever). Dad might finish work on leave from 15th June but doesn’t start SPL until 1st July is off work until the end.

But highly recommend it. I definitely agree it makes a big difference in terms of equitable division going forward. Stops mum being the default as dad is just as involved and in charge of the routine for that period.

You are wrong You absolutely can be on shared leave together and you can take it in blocks of leave too; up to 3 blocks can be taken rather than all at once

@mistermagpie you can actually stay on maternity leave rather than switch to shared leave even if your partner/dh is taking shared leave.

@Buzztothemoon

Yes perfectly possible if you manage your leave… but it does have to be annual leave. The rules are that you both cannot be on SPL at the same time - strictly no overlap - and it must be consecutive - so no gaps between one leave finishing and other starting. But what most people do if they split it is, for example, mum finishes SPL on Friday 31st June, but books annual leave from the Monday for the next XX weeks (so in practice doesn’t go back to work until 1st August or whatever). Dad might finish work on leave from 15th June but doesn’t start SPL until 1st July is off work until the end.

But highly recommend it. I definitely agree it makes a big difference in terms of equitable division going forward. Stops mum being the default as dad is just as involved and in charge of the routine for that period.

This isn't true, you can both be on SPL at the same time. Our HR department wasn't sure about at first but we printed out the legislation lol - there are rules about what each parent can do individually, but no rules preventing overlap :)

[quote dementedpixie]@mistermagpie you can actually stay on maternity leave rather than switch to shared leave even if your partner/dh is taking shared leave.[/quote]
I'm sure you can, but I'm not sure why anyone would do that? Might be to do with maternity allowance or something? Anyway, my main point was that if you are on SPL you can take it in chunks broken up with annual leave, which means you revert to full pay (if you get paid annual leave obviously) and that can be useful.

Pressed send too soon! Just to note that while you can both be on SPL together, if you do it that way then your mat leave ends so you won't be entitled to mat pay which is usually better paid than SPL if you have a company scheme. The way we did it was with me on maternity leave the whole time and DH on SPL to overlap with me because it worked out better financially.

DH took months 11 and 12, while I went back to work doing 2 days a week using annual leave.

It was over the Christmas lockdown, so we escaped to Portugal (better weather, fewer restrictions), and basically had a lovely long holiday while I ‘worked from villa’ two days a week.

Was good!

We have done this twice.

You can both be on SPL at the same time but obviously that means you have less time in total - you have 52 weeks and the mother must take the first two weeks. So if you are off for four weeks together, that means one or both of you will be at home for 48 weeks in total - does that make sense?

His two weeks of paternity leave is calculated separately from SPL.

My understanding is that SPL can be taken in more than one block but it must all be consecutive (eg within the 52 week period) and in blocks of at least 2 weeks.

With DC1 we did what you plan to do: I took the first nine months and DH took the last three. Overall, this worked quite well. In hindsight, I would rather have had a bit longer and he would have been happier with less.

Despite having been very involved with DC1, DH found it a HUGE shock to the system to be flying solo for three months and also found it very isolating. Despite being in a very progressive part of London, he was generally the only dad at groups and so on, which made him feel uncomfortable so tended to stick to parks and soft play. But overall we’re glad we did it as it set a good precedent for equal parenting.

Second time round (2020, this is relevant), we decided DH would take four weeks of SPL in the summer to coincide with DC1’s school holidays, when DC2 would be around 7 months. In hindsight, we should have cancelled this as Covid and lockdowns meant we were all sick of the sight of each other and DH had enough annual leave to have covered a fair whack of the summer holidays anyway.

I would probably recommend you have an overlap followed by some time for DH/DP to fly solo. But you are right to say you would have annual leave to use up after SPL so could be on annual leave concurrently with DH being on SPL before you return to work.

Also bear in mind that you can sometimes split the pay as well as the leave - in our case, we chose for me to take the unpaid stretch of the year and DH to take the paid entitlement as he earned more. This was how it worked with our employer.

What made the biggest difference for us with DC2 was having DH work from home from around 8 weeks. For building a strong relationship this was “better” than SPL. If we were having a third, I’d do everything I could to make sure DH was a part of DC3’s daily life, every day (which didn’t happen with DC1).

@RealMermaid

Pressed send too soon! Just to note that while you can both be on SPL together, if you do it that way then your mat leave ends so you won't be entitled to mat pay which is usually better paid than SPL if you have a company scheme. The way we did it was with me on maternity leave the whole time and DH on SPL to overlap with me because it worked out better financially.

Ah I didn't know this, at my company the pay is the same for both so I just moved to SPL as it made no difference.

We used SPL twice in the last 2 years.

For us it worked best to have extra time off together, so both DH and I were at home for the first 12 weeks with DC1 and 10 weeks with DC2. DH then went back to work and I carried on with my maternity leave.

DH’s job is long hours, shifts so we felt I would need more support and stability those first few weeks. It worked well I would recommend!

My brother and his wife live in a country where you can take 12 months between you and split it how you like. She took the first 6 months and he months 6-12.

She had a month's annual leave to take and he wanted her to not take it during his time so he could be alone with the baby and do all the parenting (yes, he is the opposite of 99% of MN men). I think she ended up taking it towards the end of his leave. He didn't take any of his leave during this time as when she started nursery he used the days whenever she needed to stay home sick/had appts.

Wow so many great examples, thanks everyone. Looks like there’s lots of different options to think about.

I earn more than DH so makes sense for him to take the unearned bit. But his hours can be quite long so keen for him to be off a fair bit at the start so I’m not on my own.

Those of you that took longer periods concurrently, did you use nursery from 10/11 months? And did you go back full time?

After my first baby (DH took 12 weeks SPL when baby was born) I went back to work full time. After my second I reduced my hours and condensed to three days which I still do now.

First two kids went to nursery from 11 months ish and the third from 10 months. The third actually settled the best but she's very easy going anyway!

We used it and it was so good for so many reasons. DH got 4 weeks paternity leave once the baby was born and added 2 weeks annual leave so, the first 6 weeks after baby was born we were together.

He then did three months of 4 day weeks using annual leave so we had a long weekend together and I got a bit of a break!

When DD was 8.5 months he took another 2 weeks annual leave which was our baby handover period (in hindsight we didn’t actually need this as he knew her routine etc) but we did go on holiday which was lovely!

I then returned to work, using annual leave to do 4 day weeks and DH did 3 months with DD. DH did all the nursery settling in sessions, baby groups, swimming etc.

DD doesn’t care who cuddles her when she hurts herself, does her food, puts her to bed, we 100% share parenting and both work full time.

HR were awful at understanding all of the above and we work at the same place, same grade and same pay! I can only imagine the nightmare if this wasn’t the case so make sure you work out exactly what you want and what the pay position would be.