Part time workers and bank holidays. Fair or unfair?

[crunchiesnuts]

I know that it’s completely legal and up to the employer, but I’m just curious about what people think about this.

I’m part of a small team (there are 7 of us in total). Everyone works full time, 5 days a week, except for one person who is part time, working 3 days a week. This person works Monday-Wednesday. When there’s a bank holiday, they switch their days and work from Tuesday to Thursday instead. Like I said, I know this is all above board and our manager is fine with it, but the rest of the team feels it’s a bit unfair since they don’t have a say and have to use their annual leave regardless.

I’m kind of torn on it. I know this person asked to work Mondays when she took the job, so it feels a bit like having the best of both worlds, but I also get not wanting to burn through almost all your annual leave just for the bank holidays. Recently, this person has mentioned how she doesn’t complain about the fact that the rest of us get more holidays and better pay (which is a bit confusing since we work more hours, so naturally, we would), but it’s stirred up some tension in the office, and I guess, some people think she’s rubbing it in their face. I’m just interested in hearing what others think. Even though it’s legal, do you see it as fair or unfair?

Of course she gets less pay she works less hours.
@viques The part timer started the conversation no one was talking behind anyone's back. Honestly you are all making stuff up its bizarre.

Well maybe the full time staff can go part time and get the same imagined benefits shes getting, or alternatively they can educate themselves about part time leave entitlement or thirdly, keep their noses out of other peoples business.

I think you are the full time staff and you are bitter about the perceived advantage

Why are you using annual leave for bank holidays?

Yesss this!

So when are you going to make up the time that you want to take off at another time? If your job is Monday-Friday 9-5 and theirs is Monday-Wednesday 9-5 so they swap to work Tues - Thursday when it’s a bank holiday they’re still working their 21 hour week and you’re working 28 hours instead on 35 so how are they winning here? The take the day extra that they’ve worked another time. I honestly don’t understand what the problem is. The only way those complaining could benefit is by condensing full time hours into 4 days. The part timer is gaining nothing except flexibility which comes at the expense of them not earning a full time wage. Just because someone benefits from something doesn’t automatically mean that others are losing out.

Tough shit 🤣

I’m sorry but you sound pathetic.

You’re ’part timers’ with full time pay if you have the time to bang on about something so banal

Yes but that’s annual leave. I also get 3/5 bank holiday allowance added to my A/L that I can take any time. The person OP is referring to works an extra day to make up for having the BH. I get 30 days A/L plus 10 days BH pro rata.

OP receives 28 days annual holiday which includes the bank holidays.

There's no legal requirement to treat bank holidays differently to any other day

I’m not sure why some people are getting nasty or hurling insults at me. Is that how you get your point across? Can’t you have a normal conversation without swearing or calling someone names? I’ve happily taken onboard comments, advice , etc, and said multiple times it’s obviously standard for part time workers to do this, and that’s absolutely fair enough. No need to get nasty and call me a bitch, cunt, or pathetic 🤷🏼‍♀️

Am I not allowed to be annoyed about something in my own workplace? Obviously I would never say anything to this colleague but if you have set days you should work them. I would HAPPILY work the public holidays and take my annual leave at a time of my choosing but we are not allowed, so yes it is annoying for me personally that this person gets all her holidays to use when she likes and also all of the public holidays as days off. I know it's not illegal but it does cause bad feeling in a workplace.

I don't know if I could get too worked up about it but yes, this is technically unfair. It's allowing the part time worker to pool their total leave allowance to use whenever they wish, while everyone else must take 8 of the days when the bank holidays fall, no flexibility.

If the employer allows everyone else to choose to work on the bank holiday and adds those hours into their annual leave allowance to use whenever they see fit then there's no problem. But I'm assuming that isn't the case here.

Way to miss the point. Many employees get Bank Holidays as part of their overall package. OP gets the minimum 28 days of which 20 are annual leave which she can take when she wants.

Do you really not understand that many workers don't get public holidays on top of "annual leave"? I get 30 days annual leave plus 8 public holidays plus a "birthday day" but many sectors only give 20 days plus public holidays.

Not sure how popular this 'if you have set days you should work them' would be with those employers of part time workers who value being able to ask employees to come in on a different day sometimes. Not all part time workers can offer this flexibility, of course. But lots can. For emergency cover, training days, important events and other things that often benefit the employer.

Yeah of course & I understand this, as I said not illegal but annoying for me personally, I know others feel differently. This employee is extremely problematic in other ways so maybe my judgement is clouded by that.

My experience when I was a partner, now I'm an employed consultant is that the flexibility only goes one way.

It’s not illegal at all 😂
They absolutely can, provided it is written into the contract - and this is a very standard clause in most employment contracts. Most employers designate days they will be closed, whether due to bank hols or other reasons, as pre booked staff holiday so it’ll come out of your holiday entitlement automatically. If they wanted they could make her use 8 of her days off on bank hols.

Having said that the advantage of part timers is potential flexibility from both parties so she may be asked to change her days from time to time when it suits them and it makes sense for them to give her some flexibility too,

OP - Resenting her because her hours mean she has a tiny bit more flexibility as to when she takes her days off (simply because of the nature of her hours) seems really petty. YABU.

I used to work part time Monday to wed. If there was a bank holiday I was off like everyone else. I didn’t have to move work days or take holiday. I was just told a bank holiday is a bank holiday regardless of how many days or when I was working.

The flexibility is the whole point-they have it while others don't. They aren't owed it because they don't earn a full-time wage, that's absurd - no one has made them be part-time!

Pooling all your leave allowance effectively means you get more whole weeks off, that's just maths. Bank holiday hours amount to nearly a week and half - that's very nice to be able to take whenever you want on top of your annual leave as well!

Presumably you don't expect that to be replicated across the entirety of the labour market though?

The benefit of flexibility that they have comes at the cost that they don’t earn a full time wage.
Seesaws and slides.

Threads like this make me so thankful I don't work in a team like this. Honestly who cares? If they worked Tues-Thurs they would get hours added to their annual leave even for bank holidays that fall on their non working days (i.e. Mondays) that they could use whenever.

And I've no problem with criticism of one particular employee who you know better than anyone else on here. But I do think it's worth being clear that rigid rules about this kind of thing won't necessarily suit employers. It may not suit OPs, even if that does irritate some of the team.

They don't get a full time wage because they don't work full time.

The first two sentences are not questions and you should not have used question marks.