Part Time Work Bank Holiday Entitlement

[LOVENLIGHT]

Hello all, I am new to Mumsnet.

I have just returned to work, quite an emotional time as i am sure many will understand. I would like advice from other part time employed Mums on how they manage bank holiday issues.

I work the beginning half of the week and due to the fact that our office is closed bank holidays, I am only entitled to half day leave but cannot go into work because we are closed.

Before returning to work I was already owed 7 hours. they calculate this on a year by year basis and a quick glance ahead at 2011, there are 7 bank hols that fall on a Monday, meaning come January I will owe 23 1/2 hours overtime (3 1/2 days).

The days I work are already far too hectic running between work and childcare and I cannot get any childcare for Thursday and Fridays. The thought of owing so much and not being able to make the hours up or just running myself so ragged as to make myself ill and being so tired that I am not emotionally fully present and responsive to baby, is making me very anxious.

Any advice or support would be hugely appreciated.

Just realised the my error in the message above. I meant to type that I was already owing 7 hours before returning to work. Ooops

I'm confused as to how you've ended up owing them time?!

As a part timer you get exactly pro rata what full timers get. If you work 3 days a week you will get 8/5x3= 4.8 bank holidays a year which you would expect to round up to 5. As you work Mondays it's likely that most years more than 5 bank holidays will naturally fall on your normal working days, so just take them out of your normal annual leave entitlement. You shouldn't need to work more hours.

Even easier way of doing it is rolling it all up. If full timers get a total of 28 days paid leave including bank holidays, someone working 3 days should get a total of 17 days paid leave. Where a bank holiday falls on a working day for you, you take it out of your total entitlement and the rest is your to book as normal.

FLOWERY!!!!!!!!

Sorry for hijack. I hate this question. The HR person in me is shuddering.

PJ! Helloooooo! How you doing? Long time no see and all that!

I hate this question too although I feel there's a tendency of people (including HR people) to make it much more complicated than it needs to be!

I feel writing it all down when trying to explain it helps me, and them!

I'm good, I'm good. Second week back at work now, Lucas is 10mo, can't believe it! Are your lot OK?

Yep we're all good. DS1 at nursery 5 mornings now (I cried - how pathetic!), and loving it. DS2 will be 1 in a couple of weeks, which is ridiculous!

Business going well, as a result the house is a tip but you can't have it all, eh?!

How's it going being back at work?

I still don't get it. I work Mondays, my job share doesn't. So as I work the first half of the week, I end up having to 'pay' for half the bank hols out of my annual leave while my job share gets extra hols that she doesn't 'need' because one, maybe two bank hols fall on a Friday...

We're having a fuss at my work about this.

HR have decided the part-timers that work mondays need to be deducted some leave as it means they are effectively getting a higher hourly wage than the part timers who don't work on a monday .

Will start my own thread about it soon I think. It seems very unfair, I don't work on a monday but I coudn't care less if the monday staff get a few pence more an hour for working a monday and keeping their annual leave.

How are they getting paid a higher hourly rate? That seems weird.

Rockbat you and your job share should get the same amount of paid leave. Because you work Mondays you will need to use a couple more days of your total on bank holidays than your colleague will, but she's not getting extra holiday.

I work 3 days a week (was previously full time) for a very large Quango (for the moment at least). This is what we do for part timers re: Bank Hols.

8 extra days added to annual leave entitlement.
Whenever a BH falls on one of "your" working days, you have to take that day as leave. Eg: Annual leave (pro rata) = 22 days + 8 = 30 days; I work Wed-Fri, so on Good Friday I took a day's leave.

This does not necessarily work against people who work Mondays, as there are many non-Monday BHs - Christmas,Boxing Day and New Year's Day are often not Mondays, and Good Friday definitely isn't.

I also job share. My job share gets more annual leave than me, as she has been working for the orginisation longer, and leave is associated with length of service.

I jobshare and work Monday and Tuesday, I get 2/5 of my bank holiday entitlement in hours but have to cover the remainder of bank holidays from the rest of my annual leave hours. It's really complicated!

I'm on mat leave at the moment, which is a good job, as I was going to have to use loads of annual leave to cover b/h. Because Christmas Day and Boxing Day are at the weekend this year the following Mon and Tue are b/h, and the same for New Year's Day the next week. It's a nightmare!

So how come I have to cover he extra bank hols out of my annual leave when I didn't have to three years ago when I worked f/t?

Because when you worked full time you didn't have 'extra' bank holidays over your entitlement and it's easy when full time to separate out bank holidays and 'normal' holidays.

As a part timer you are entitled to pro rata the same leave as a full timer, so you won't be getting any less, just that because more bank holidays than you are entitled to fall on your normal working days, they have to come out of your 'normal' leave. You are not getting any less paid leave.

It really is easier to think of it all rolled up, rather than separate holiday and bank holiday entitlement.

So as in my first post, if full timers where you work get 20 days plus 8 bank holidays, a total of 28, employees who work 3 days a week should get a total of 17, some of which will be used on bank holidays, just as some of the 28 full timers get are used on bank holidays.

We do the same as BikeRunSki at my work - so you get the bank holidays added to your entitlement and then have to book them off as normal holiday iyswim.

I am glad I am not the only one out there confused ,thanks Rockbat for sharing my confusion! No one had actually explained it to me, it was just stated in writing that I owed these hours due to bank hols and I should make an arrangement with my boss as to how I will work to make up these owed hours.

THanks for the advice, I will e-mail HR for details of leave entitlement next year and make arrangements to deduct from leave if the situation is as simple as Bikerunski's, but because this wasn't offered as a solution in the letter I mentioned so I imagine it may be a little more complicated but we will see.

Meglet I will certainly be keeping an eye out for the thread you start on about same issue.

So if I have to choose my working day pattern for 3 days between Mon, tues, wed or tues wed, thurs, which leave me better off in terms of time with my children or doesn't it make a difference? Or is it down to company policy?

In my old job as a part timer you got additional hours added to your annual leave entitlement, which then came off when you had to take a bank holiday.

So you work 5 hours a day, 25 hours a week.

It would be full time allowance (25 days) /5 x hours worked = hours of annual leave (so 125 hours)
plus the bank holidays
8 bank holidays/5 x hours (40 hours)

so your annual leave entitlement would be 165 hours over the year. Any bank holidays have to come out of this entitlement, but if you didnt work one (e.g. good friday) you would get the time in your annual leave for another time.

(the exact calculation here might be slightly wrong, I left a wee while ago)

history it also depends on schools when picking your working week. I choose to not work Mondays, simply as the vast majority of school training days happen to be on Mondays and are a PITA to arrange care for. DS1 & 2 both have hospital appointments often too, which have clinics on Mondays.

When the DSs were in nursery though I worked Monday/Tues/Wed as I like getting the working week over with

I think what you have to remember is that your employer is entitled to dictate when you take your holiday so they can say you have x amount of holidays per year but we are closed on X, x and x days so anyone due to work those days has to save holiday to cove them.

Where I work we have a 2 week shutdown at Christmas plus so we have to save holiday for those weeks. I work Mon, wed & Thurs so I have to cover any bank holidays that fall on those days too.