Help... .. issue with leave screw up

[CottonSock]

Hi, can someone help me?
My employer, upon my starting at the company 3 years ago, worked out my leave entitlement and gave me this in writing and into my contract. It was a bit complicated due to new polices and being part time. It seemed possibly a bit wrong in my favour, but as I said they made it complicated.
Now they are saying it's 20 hours less per year. I'm fuming but will probably calm down soon.
What sticks, my contract or their policy?
Will I have to repay?
Can I fight this?

Thanks for reading

I wouldn't expect them to try and claw back excess holiday from previous years, no.

It would be normal for a contract for part timers to say something about holiday being pro rata from the full time amount, rather than just stating literally the number of days/hours you get. Similarly, I would expect their holiday policy to say the same. If the contract and policy are both clear (and the law is clear, and common sense is clear) that holiday for part timers is pro rata the same as full timers, it should be fairly easy for them to demonstrate that the figure in your contract is wrong and not consistent with policy/fairness to other staff/legal requirements.

I wouldn't expect them to continue to give you 20 hours extra holiday a year, that wouldn't be fair on anyone else, but in your shoes I would resist any attempts to claw back payment for the extra days off, or to reduce your entitlement going forward to 'make up the difference'.

When you identified that it was wrong in your favour, did you bring this to their attention, together with your own calculation of what it should be, and if so what was their response?

When I went part time my employer recalculated my leave entitlement and public holiday entitlement. As it is not a simple calculation (to me) I didn't check it and assumed it was correct. Several years later I was in discussion with a colleague who worked exactly the same hours as me and realised that I had extra hours leave. We didn't know whose was correct. Unfortunately for me it was hers and I had been receiving too much! It was recalculated and made correct for that year but was not penalised for previous years or asked to pay anything back. It is unlikely to happen now as it is all done by a fancy computer programme, and I am back to full time which is so much easier to work out.