Been refused any annual leave this year.

[HolidayNotAvailable]

§Name changed as I don’t want my name to be associated as I know some people who work for the same company are on here.

I am entitled to 25 days annual leave, which increases every year after two years.

If you don’t take all your annual leave you can carry over 35 hours but if you don’t take the rest then you lose it.

Things are made more complicated by the fact that people are allowed to buy additional annual leave, and this means that a lot of people have up to 35 days.

The upshot of this is that there isn’t enough quota in the calendar to allow all annual leave requests.

Our annual leave system is digital, we book annual leave and receive a message to say it is either declined or accepted.

And the annual leave is based on how many people are available in the department not the team.

Most people end up booking all their annual leave at the beginning of the year, including their extra two weeks which most people have bought.

Which means that if you haven’t booked any annual leave for the next year by the end of December when the annual leave is released on to the system you pretty much don’t stand a chance.

I didn’t book as soon as the leave was released not least because I didn’t have any specific plans, but even when I started to try a couple of days in all my requests were declined.

To date I have attempted to book several weeks in every month of the year, and apart from one week in December, and one day which I know I will get over Christmas because those are booked separately, every one of my requests has been declined.

So this means that by the end of the year I am going to have about four weeks annual leave left, and I can only carry over one week.
I am certain that this is made worse by the fact that people are able to buy extra leave and that realistically we don’t have enough quota in the department to accommodate existing annual leave as wel as essentially several months worth when you take into account all that has been bought.

Some people have 6/7 weeks booked in, and I can’t even get one.

I’m sure there’s no way I can get the time off, so I’ve resigned myself to not taking any annual leave this year apart from that one week in December.

But would it be reasonable to approach my employer and request that, given I’ve been declined any leave, they buy it back off me? I don’t know what else to do.

Your line manager is useless. She should be resolving this situation for you to ensure that you get your holiday entitlement and that your company doesn't break the law.

It sounds like a dreadful system and a toxic working environment tbh.

As people have suggested get an email out stating you have tried to book holiday and been denied can they let you know what weeks you can take off. And forward on email till you get a reply in writing not verbal so when you have had enough of working for free which you will be the you can use to say they forced you out not allowing you time off.

This is from Acas, they have to allow you to take your full entitlement.
They've shot themselves in the foot tbh by allowing people to buy holidays.

You just need to speak to someone about it - if not your line manager then another manager or HR. You can’t not take holidays.

I'm really curious, how does a two week block of leave reduce fraud in a bank? I know nothing of how banks work, so I'm just intrigued.

I'm Interested in this too, this is the first I've heard of it. I'm guessing that if fraudulent activity was happening and then it paused when someone was off for 2 weeks it would be easy to have an idea who is doing it. I could be wrong though.

Ah yes, if that is the reason it makes sense @Sk8erboi

Internal safeguarding as it will help flag if an employee is covering anything untoward, and risk management to show that the company could function without this employee should they quit in the morning.

Thanks @loropianalover

If there's no time left, it's not. It's a law problem. They don't have enough coverage to meet their legal obligations. Someone was always getting screwed, just happens to be OP.

I have nothing to say except this is fucking nuts and you should all strike.

There is no legislation on how / when this is taken nor any right to get it in 1 or 2 week blocks.

It was much more likely when people did their banking at branches and there was cash involved. I believe there have been cases where staff forged the passbooks or similar but didn't deposit the money.

i said where i am.
i am not in the uk.

FFS mate - stop getting your knickers in a twist about the 2 weeks. I wrote "where i am".

I am not in the UK. And where i am (which isn't the UK) there is a legal obligation for an employee to be allowed 2 weeks in one go (you are not obliged to take that, but the company is not allowed to refuse it)

tbh you lot in the UK could do with better labour laws.

OP, you’re not seriously going to carry on working all year without any annual leave, don’t be daft. If you’re doing the work, they need to find a solution to ensure you get your legal holiday entitlement.

By law you are entitled to a minimum number of days of holiday.

Tell your line manager that if you aren't allowed to take it they are breaking the law.

I agree with the pp who said those who have any extra leave should only be agreed once everyone has their statutory leave.

What a shit show.

I would quit, and make it so that they have to pay you your accrued leave at a time that you would like to be off on holiday.

Then go and work somewhere non-insane.

It's something to do with, if you're regularly skimming a few pence off transactions, the pattern (or lack of it,) is more likely to show up.

I worked for an investment bank which had no high street banking over here, so there was rarely an actual cash, so it was also about computer transactions. There were also limitations on which roles you could move to within the organisation - separation of duties, so no one person should have had in-depth knowledge of the processes all the way through, so IT staff shouldn't have a detailed understanding of the business processes and vice versa.

This sounds like Canada Life or LV= both equally terrible companies to work for.

As a starting point tell them they need to give you a list of all available weeks of the year when you can take leave so the responsibility is on them. If they can’t do this because it’s not available ask them how this works legally and how they can justify some employees having different treatment to others, and tell them you want the explanation in writing.

I believe it was brought in after the Nick Leeson baring bank collapse. He didn’t take holiday so no one could find out what he was up to

Screen shot from ACAS website.

I don't think they are obliged to give OP full weeks. They will probably offer her random Wednesdays in November, but it's still better than losing it and working for free.