Am I getting the right amount of holidays? Help!

[Gxoxo]

Hi,

I've just come back to work after maternity leave

I now work 2.5 days a week (Wednesday afternoon 3 hours, full days Thursday & Fridays)

My question is how many days holiday should I get? I've been assigned 14 & told that when I book a Wednesday off I need to use a full days holiday not half a holiday. This means in reality I only get 4.2 weeks off holidays a year? Surely this isn't right or is it?

(Full time staff get 21 days (if worked there under 2 years) & 25 days holiday (if worked there over 2 years) plus every bank holiday off)

Thanks!

@Kissmycousinkate no they mean I can't use half a holiday to take a Wednesday off (meaning my 3.5 hours I work)

That’s what I meant. It IS a ‘full working day’ for you on a Wednesday cos you only work 3.5 hours that day / are only paid for 3.5 hours. They can’t make you take the other 3.5 as leave cos they don’t pay for for it.

If their ‘rules’ are right how can you ever have leave that spans 2 weeks?

I think they’ve got it very wrong. Are there other part time staff? Can you speak to any of them to see what they do with days they only work / get paid for half?

You shouldn't be taking days off on the basis of days but hours. If you take a Wednesday off, you count it as 3.5h. If Thur or Friday, you count it as 7h. If a bank holiday falls on Wed, you take it as 3.5h, if Th or Frid, you count it as 7h, even though you only get 4 days BH in the year.

Do they use a computerised system for booking leave?

I work similar hours to you and if I'm booking a Wednesday off I am booking a full day on the booking system. But it's a full day for me, not a full day in comparison to other staff. So I tick the box saying 'full day' and the system logs that as 3.5 hours leave. On the days when I work two hours, a full day is two hours. And on the days that I work 9 to 5, a full day is 7.5 hours. But each of those is a full day to me, for the purpose of leave.

Is it possible that this is what they mean? That it's not about what's a full day to another employee but about what is a full day to you? As in, you can't book a half day on your short working day because that's only 1 hour 45 minutes, and they don't allow people to take leave in such small chunks?

We overcome this by allocating holiday in hours for part time staff.
So your 14 days would be converted into hours. People take the correct number of hours for each day.
It's pretty common. Done that in quite a few places.

Suggest ask for your holiday to be worked out in hours, mine is. So if I want 2 hours off I can. That will assist you with the day that you work less hours too. People who work shifts use this system.

You're entitled to 0.5 of the annual leave allocation for the year, plus 0.5 of the bank holiday allocation. Add these together, then deduct whatever you need when you want to be away from work on what would otherwise be normal working time for you. If Bank Holidays fall on your normal working days, you have to take this from your allocation.

Ask them to manage your annual leave in hours rather than days. They can determine when you take your leave ultimately, but they shouldn't require to to take annual leave during what would ordinarily be your non-working time.

Oh and don't forget, you can take whatever leave you accrued but haven't taken during your maternity leave upon your return.