Paternal leave tagged onto maternity leave by HR, short 3 days pension service.

[LittleB]

I'm sure what they've done is wrong but would like advice from someone before I speak to HR. I work in local govenment, have worked here for over 8 years. Went off on maternity leave in 2005. I'd booked a couple of weeks annual leave before dd was due and was due to start maternity leave the week she was due, she came early (whilst I was on annual leave) so my maternity leave started on the 12th May, her birthday. I was told my date for returning to work would be the 12th November(Saturday). i did question this as 26weeks would have meant the 10th Novemeber(Thurs). But whichever I wouldn't be due to start until the 14th November which was a Monday as I returned to work part time, working mon-weds. This is what I did and I recently got my pension atatement through, its showing 3 days paternal leave taken at the end of my maternity leave, this is a break in my pension service as I opted in whilst on maternity leave. I don't know whether a 3 day break matters, and can they force on me parental leave without my consent/knowledge? The 3 days in question were non-working days anyway. The person who dealt with it has since left the authority, and I didn't have much faith in her anyway, she miscaluculated my leave entitlement forgetting I had over 5 years and therefore additional leave service until I queried it. So does it matter and can they do that?

I dont know if it matters but its worth getting checked out. They definitely had to start your maternity leave once your baby was born. Your right in that your maternity leave should have run for 26 weeks as opposed to 6 calendar months. I dont work in local government so hope someone comes along who does.

Parental leave (which is normally unpaid unless your employers are very generous) should be taken in week blocks anyway so seems odd that you have 3 days recorded? At least the person who dealt with it has left has left - hopefully whoever deals with maternity leave now knows their stuff!

This sounds like nonsense to me. The point is that you were available to work from the moment your maternity leave finished so there should be no issue of parental leave pr any other kind of leave being taken. Definitely worth getting them to sort this out.

Firstly littleb, if you want to return earlier than 52 weeks, it's for you to tell your company, they don't tell you.

If If 26 weeks ended on 10th November, your first day back would be 11th, but you wouldn't actually be back in work until your next working day after that, which is obviously 14th.

There's no reason you would need to take parental or any other type of leave between those dates if you wouldn't be working normally anyway. And as dramaqueen says, parental leave is taken in week blocks, you can't take days here and there and they certainly can't make you take it either.

Speak to whoever is responsible now and just get your record amended.

Thanks everyone, thats really helpful. You're right flowery I did tell them when I wanted to return which was when my paid maternity leave ran out at 26weeks. I'll speak to them about it and get them to amend my record.