Maternity and annual leave help

[Danielle95lab]

Hey! So I’m starting maternity 6th October.
Anyway, I have 13 days annual leave to use (holiday year ends in December). As far as I’m aware, I can take those 13 days before maternity if I want to.

However HR have said to me, I can only take what’s accrued in holidays from January until October 6th and then the rest I’m owed would be paid to be in Decembers pay.

Everything I’ve read points to the fact I should be able to just take the 13 days before no issue. But they’re basically saying I can take for example 5 of the 13, then the remaining 8 days would be paid alongside my SMP in December.

I’m not sure who’s right here, does anyone know?😂 all I want to do is take those extra days before my official maternity and it’s such a pain in the arse.

Have a look at the maternity policy. I work for the NHS and their rules vary slightly. Ie some trusts let you take the rest of that years allowance before mat leave ( I think this might be rarer) most will only let you take what you have accrued so far and then what you accrue whilst on mat leave is added on the end. They cannot just pay you those days unless you agree to it.
Hope that helps.

Can you carry them over and add to the end of your maternity leave? So you'll have 'earned them' by then? Then you could start mat leave 13 days early (or 8 days early) and have the other days afterwards?

Like other posters said this will vary from company to company. But what would have happened if someone used up all their holiday allowance by September, would have they not be allowed to take them in ordinary circumstances if not going on mat leave. Because if they are I am not sure why you are not?

Thanks ladies I found my policy and it states I can use them before my maternity. So I'm really not sure why I'm getting told something else 🤦🏻‍♀️.

My interpretation of this is that you can take your accrued leave before mat leave, but they're suggesting your mat leave has to start on your due date 6th Oct so you need to take your leave before then. (Legally the latest date you can start mat leave is the day your baby is born).

So perhaps it's that you can't start your 13 days accrued leave on 6th Oct and delay your mat leave 'clock' until 22nd Oct. You can start your annual leave on 17th Sept (if I've counted that right) and then your official mat leave starts on 6th Oct but you're essentially just starting your time off work earlier anyway.

I've taken the rest of the year's annual leave before my mat leave, however my mat leave start date is well before my due date so there was no chance of the start date needing to be earlier because of baby coming early.

My due date is 27th October, so that's definitely not the problem. I feel like I'm talking to a brick wall with work haha. I'll just have to go to citizen advice if they're going to argue with me😂

Probably should have added I'm only taking maternity early at 37 weeks cause I'm likely to be induced then or I'd be working until 27th haha.

I have a pretty standard policy in my work & i have to take all remaining holidays for this year prior to going on mat leave.

Definitely contact citizens advice or acas as getting holidays while on maternity leave could affect any benefits you receive plus might be seen as working like kit days instead of maternity

You are defo entitled to use them before you go off as your not leaving the company, just going on mat leave so they're yours to use