Does an employer have to honour booked holidays if you mentioned it at interview?

[user1498031991]

Hello,

I've recently been offered a new job & accepted starting 11th July.

In my interview I was asked if I had any upcoming holidays in which I replied 2 weeks in Aug and 1 week in Sept

I have accepted the offer of the job, and before hand I sent this email and I've pasted the response too:

Me: I do have one question I would just like to clarify before handing my notice in.

In the interview, I was asked about any upcoming holidays which I replied to that I have a 2 week holiday booked in Aug and 1 week in Sept.

Really, I just wanted to double check this would be ok as I realised that I will be only with for 3 weeks before the holiday. The dates are 31st July to 14th Aug as if it were to be a problem I am happy to start after my holiday in Aug.

If you could just confirm if this would be an issue or not that would be great.

Then here is the reply

Hi Fern

I have spoken with * and he advised that his preference would be for you to start on the agreed date.

He has advised that on starting you will be entitled to 16 days paid leave in the 2017/18 cycle if we retain the agreed start date (our annual leave period is from 1st March to the 28th February). If your booked holidays exceed this then some days may have to be taken unpaid which we are happy to accommodate.

Am I just overthinking all of this or am I correct??

It just seems so unlikely a company is going to let me take all that annual leave 3 weeks into a new job please someone offer me advice who works in the field as I'm not sure if I can even refuse the job now due to signing the contract and may not be able to retract handing my notice in, I'm really worried as this is thousands of pound of financial loss if they turn around and say no to the holidays...help?

They're saying you can take the holidays but some days will be unpaid leave. I don't see a problem?

They haven't suggested they are saying no to holidays. Just that only 16 days will be paid, the rest you can take unpaid.

I know what you're saying, I just feel like it's too good to be true and that they could turn around and say actually you can't have them

I read that reply as saying they are happy for you to take the annual leave, but if it's more than 16 days then you will need to take some of it as unpaid. I don't see anything in that reply that says that you will need to cancel the holiday.

Easiest thing to do is to send an email back saying - please confirm that if I start on 1 July then I will be able to take my pre-booked holiday from 31 July to 14 August as planned.

No they don't have to agree to the annual leave. Their response seems reasonable. Be aware that they might well decline any requests for time off (even unpaid) until the next leave year.

It's quite straightforward. They are saying you can have the holidays but if you go over your holiday entitlement then it will be unpaid time off.

I read it the same as SingingTunelessly. They are happy for you to take the holiday but some of it will be unpaid.

I have a similar arrangement at work - I take extra leave (to help with childcare) unpaid.

I think they're being pretty tolerant actually. That's quite a lot of holiday close together at a peak holiday time so I think it's quite nice of them to allow it. All they're saying is that if you exceed your paid holiday allowance the remaining days you take as holiday will be unpaid.

When I was a manager we would often have people start who had a holiday booked in the first month of their new employment. It was a pain but I would never have demanded for them to cancel it.

Crossposted.

If they are taking you on then they want you. They are taking a punt on you that you won't let them down. Sounds like they could be excellent to be work for

Thanks, everyone, put my mind a bit more at rest and yes I am completely happy to take unpaid as long as I can go! I just really wondered if anyone has ever been in a similar position, I wouldn't normally ever have holidays so close together but it's just one of those years...

Perfectly standard where I work - we'd rather have you in sooner than delay your start date until after your leave.

Agreed perfectly standard with us too.

In fact, it's often preferable as you use up all of your annual leave/a big chunk of it, before you're fully bedded in (and therefore useful).

It will be tough going on you to not having any annual leave for 6 months though!