How much maternity leave?

[loulamay]

I work for a small company, just me and 6 guys. I'm pregnant after IVF and as we've all been working remotely no has seen me to know that I'm pregnant yet.

There is no maternity policy written up for our London office (we have offices in Mauritius) and I'm the PA so I also handle our basic HR (although not qualified!) so I need to come up with a kind of ‘pitch’ when I tell them I'm pregnant to guide them as to how we might handle my maternity leave. Ideally I’d like to take six months off (is that wise? Should I take more or less?) with a view to going back after that but there seems to be quite a range of maternity policies and I wondered what you all got and how long you took off work? I know the Govt statutory is six weeks full pay and then some pitiful amount after that but I’m more interested in what an average/decent package might look like that I can try to draft into a maternity policy to them… I've worked there for six years if that makes any difference. Thank you in advance!

The statutory offer enables you to take a year off. Without a policy, they will have to abide by the law - you’re entitled to take the year. Six months is the point at which your return to work rights change so I’d definitely look at that when deciding.

I guess they’ll offer you the minimum in terms of financial package - it seems unlikely they would suddenly want to reach into their pockets to pay you a better maternity package but perhaps I’m being cynical!

I took a year off with my first, and planning 9 months shared parental leave with my second. I breastfed and anything less than a year feels hard in that context. I got 13 weeks full pay, 13 weeks half pay and then 13 weeks statutory pay. My pension contribution was maintained at the pre mat leave levels too. That’s a pretty decent package.

Statutory minimum is your starting point, I got 90% of salary for 6 months.

I'll be getting 26 weeks full pay, 13 weeks statutory and 13 weeks unpaid, I plan on saving as much as possible and taking the full year off. I can also carry all my AL over so can use a lot of that to help during the unpaid period

I’m feeling jealous as I work for a small company and will only get statutory. It’s going to mean I can afford to take 6 months off max.

The nhs does 8 weeks full pay, then 18 weeks half pay

Teaching is similar to NHS. 2 weeks full, 4 weeks 90%, 18 weeks half plus statutory mat pay. Then up to 9 months statutory and 12 months unpaid.

I was overseas and had six weeks fully paid by my employer, which is standard, and anything extra is your annual leave. If I could have chosen, I'd have had six months so your suggestion sounds perfect to me. but as an expat you definitely have to fit in.

My work offers 16 weeks full pay, 10 weeks half pay (+SMP top up at £150pw) then 13weeks at SMP.

I imagine you'll just get the government minimum but I suppose if you don't ask you don't get!

Private company. 6 weeks 90%, 12 weeks 50% including statutory, remainder of leave is statutory pay only.

Previous big employer was 6 months full pay 6 months half pay!

Friends get statutory only.

You might want to draw comparisons with your sick pay policy. It's not comparable in law, but if say sick pay was 6 months full, then the general policy environment would suggest enhanced maternity pay would be in keeping with that compared to if it's statutory ssp only.

Disclaimer, I don't work in hr!

I also get six months full and three months on stat then can carry all holiday and lump on the end. This seems unusual though. Out of my NCT I had the best package, one other was with the NHS. The remaining six ladies were six weeks at 90% then up to 9 months at statutory. Most companies seemed to offer the ability to work 10 KIT days which can help top you up.
In terms of is six months long enough, it wouldn't have been for me but everyone is different. Especially if you have a few weeks off before baby arrives, you then end up going back when baby is only five months old. My son also refused a bottle so there was no way I could have left him at five months, but you just don't know. I had 14 months but was definitely ready to go back at the end. Good luck and congrats!

1 year full pay for me. That’s the absolute gold standard, it does happen. I’m guessing you can’t ask for that but it’s worth knowing some companies do.

Second thought, I suggested comparing to sick pay,.maybe comparing to general employee benefits would be more sensible. E.g. whether there's more than statutory minimum holiday offered, dental care, private healthcare, etc

My workplace offers 6 months full pay, 3 months statutory, then 3 unpaid, and your continue to accrue annual leave while on mat leave (so long as you take it immediately prior to returning). So in practice I didn't take all the unpaid time, and swapped some of it for a/l. I was also able to choose to top up my missed pension contributions from while I was off, and they then paid their element of that.

The fact that my workplace has a really good maternity leave entitlement is one of the things that kept me working there in the long term, even when I had some rougher patches with my job. Maternity leave (as with sick leave, other types of parental leave, etc) is not some favour they're doing you - there's both the legal requirement to offer certain things, and then there's the business case for doing so. In my mind, a workplace that doesn't offer anything over the minimum is... meh. Not somewhere I'd be looking to stay.

In your position i would shoot for the stars. I would look around for really good examples of maternity, paternity and adoption leave, shared parental leave, etc, and hold them up as the ideal to which the company should be aiming. Because they should! If you can find examples from within your industry or local area, that's a bonus. Yes, these things have a financial cost to the company. But they also have real benefits in terms of staff retention, loyalty, and happiness.

You may not get what you propose, of course. But if you go in rather diffidently saying, 'well, legally, you have to give me x' then it's sending one message. 'Here's a vision of how we could write some amazing family-friendly policies for our workplace, and examples of best practice' sends another, and I'd go with that. And including all types of family leave in what you talk to them about navigates any weirdness about being the only woman there.

Congratulations and best of luck!

@loulamay

I work for a small company, just me and 6 guys. I'm pregnant after IVF and as we've all been working remotely no has seen me to know that I'm pregnant yet.

There is no maternity policy written up for our London office (we have offices in Mauritius) and I'm the PA so I also handle our basic HR (although not qualified!) so I need to come up with a kind of ‘pitch’ when I tell them I'm pregnant to guide them as to how we might handle my maternity leave. Ideally I’d like to take six months off (is that wise? Should I take more or less?) with a view to going back after that but there seems to be quite a range of maternity policies and I wondered what you all got and how long you took off work? I know the Govt statutory is six weeks full pay and then some pitiful amount after that but I’m more interested in what an average/decent package might look like that I can try to draft into a maternity policy to them… I've worked there for six years if that makes any difference. Thank you in advance!

If there is no policy, I think that you're deluded if you think they will pay anymore than statutory.

Try all you like, but I wouldn't anticipate it. Such a small organisation wouldn't be able to afford it, I'd imagine given you're having to fulfil multiple roles.

Government statutory is 6 weeks at 90% not 100% unfortunately. We had to draft a maternity policy for our employer when I found out I was pregnant, they refused to consider anything other than statutory. Very annoying given their sick leave policy is full pay for 3 months...

How pregnant are you op?

Thank you all! @Persipan that's exactly the kind of approach I was thinking of taking. They're a lovely, open minded, flexibly styled company so I think I stand a good chance.

@Freebleweeble where do you work???? How fab.

I'm 22 weeks

@HotPotatoHotPotato21 what's a KIT day please? 

@KitchenWarrior hadn't thought of looking at sick pay and will investigate! Thank you!

@BusyLizzie61 thank you for your kind and positive response.

Really interesting to hear all the different scenarios! Wish me luck!

Op you need to tell your employer in writing you are pregnant by 25 weeks or you may not be entitled to anything!

KIT days are keeping in touch days which you are paid for. I just checked and you are entitled up to ten of them so it may help top your pay up if you only receive stat maternityaction.org.uk/advice/keeping-in-touch-days/
I didn't end up using them due to Covid, at that time you couldn't use family for childcare so I had no one to have my son.

I get 12 weeks full pay then 6 weeks half pay then it moves to statutory for 28 weeks then 13 weeks unpaid. I am going to try to take the full year off by saving my keping in touch days to the 13 week unpaid period And using 15 days of holiday that I would have accrued. Saving 11 days holiday for the remaining year- I’ll be returning in October 2022 hopefully.

I get 6 months full pay and the option to take 3 months unpaid which I couldn't afford to do anyway. I'll have 7 weeks worth of annual leave and bank holidays built up from this year too so I'll take those at the end of my maternity leave too so I'll have around 8 months (plus the approx 5 months of vulnerable covid leave on full pay that I'm getting right now, up until the birth)!
Also, since I live in Ireland there is 5 weeks Parents Leave paid at €245 a week from the government but I don't think I could take that drop in income for 5 weeks so will probably leave it off.

It's a bit awkward for you being HR and not having a policy in place until you need it for yourself. I hope they will be receptive to you when it comes to negotiating a policy, the fact that its a small team and you have been working there for 6 years should work in your favour hopefully. Would your company generally be generous when it comes to things like pension, sick leave, health insurance, annual leave etc.?

I feel like 6 months is a good amount of time (although I'm only pregnant with my first now so haven't got experience with it), hopefully you'll have a bit of annual leave and bank holidays to add on at the end. You mentioned that your coworkers are all male, do they have children themselves?

Best of luck with it and let us know how you get on!