Bank holidays and ordinary maternity leave.

[motherhoodrocks]

Hi,

Does anyone know if bank holidays accrue during OML? 8 days of B/h and concessionary days fell during OML and I informed my ex boss that I wanted this added on to a/l entitlement, which pushed my maternity leave start date back by the 8 days, he agreed.

I recently decided that I did not want to return to work and luckly a redundancy situation arose and I was given voluntary redundancy. I was a bit dubious about my pay in June last year and had a feeling that my b/h and concessionary days had not been added on to end of a/l, I contacted wages dept recently who confirmed that my M/L began 8 days earlier than agreed.

I am sending an email to the finance dept and my ex manager regarding this but don't want to make a fool of myself by demanding something I may not be entitled to. Also could my ex boss decide not to pay me for those days (if i am entitled to them)as I no longer work there?

Any advice gratefully received.

I was certinly entitled to PH days ecrued during matty leave, took them as added on days off though not payment sorry

Hi dizzy,

Thanks for your reply.

I had originally asked for b/h to be added on to end of a/l entitlement before m/l began, but as I no longer work there I will have to ask for pay in lieu.

Ex boss is a bit thick, im a bit peeved that I have to run around working all this out when he is paid to do it, but if you don't ask you don't get, the man is clueless.

Time off on bank holidays arent a right as such, so your bosses could, if they wanted, say that your a/l covers those days.

It depends what your contract of employment says about bank holidays. It also depends on when you went on M/L due to the change last october in holiday entitlement.

do you not have an HR dept?
we do but ours is hopeless, am not sure exactly why they bother to have one

am in all sorts of arguments with them at the moment & its a PITA

am too lazt to find out about employment law/terms/conditions etc

good luck tomorrow - no harm in asking and then he has to give you a good reason why NOT if you see what I mean

Hi VVVQV

I have no idea where my contract of employment is but on our leave card it states we get 30 days a/l plus the 11 days bank holidays and concessionary days, thefore 41 days off in total for the year.

Thanks for the reply by the way.

No HR dept, only a smallish company. There were two other girls who went on maternity leave last year and will contact them through an ex work colleague if I find out i should have accrued them because i bet they didn't get their b/h either.

In which case you should be paid them.

You were very lucky though - many companies were getting away with the statutory 20 days, and including the 8 b/h days in that too! This is why the government have upped the statutory to 24 as of october, and then 28 as of april 09.

I know VVVQV I have been very very lucky with the a/l entitlement it builds up according to length of service and i reached maximum entitlement.

DH wasn't that keen on me following this up as i received the redundancy out the blue, was planning on handing in my notice anyway, so redundancy pay was a bonus, but I'm not asking for anything extra just what im entitled to.

Will compose a very polite email to ex boss and await outcome.

it depends on the policy of your company - it isn't a legal entitlement.

Smittenkitten, thanks for reply.

Ive googled this query to death this evening and their are some sites that state during OML normal holiday entitlement accures including bank holidays if thats included in leave entitlement (which it is in my case), and other sites that state it's not that clear cut re bank holidays.

I'm very confused to say the least (not that it takes much )

I didn't get bank holidays during maternity leave, but I did get my annual leave entitlement and the "statutory/privilege" days which I assume is what you get as "concessionary days" - we get a day in lieu of May Day, a Christmas and Easter privilege day and two statutory days which are linked to the late May and end of August bank holidays.

If you have confirmation in writing of something you agreed to that they haven't stuck to, this is probably more useful than the legal required minimum (as it sounds like you may well have done better on what you agreed).

As for making a fool of yourself, you're not going back to the job so perhaps you've not much to lose by asking.

only thing is elkidee he agreed to my request verbally, not in writing, he didn't even respond to my letter setting out when i want my m/l to begin and when i had intended to return before i began m/l.