Bank holidays during maternity leave

[cheesychips15]

I'm hoping someone might have the answer to this as I'm getting confused trying to work out what I should be owed.

My work's maternity policy states that upon returning from maternity leave you will be paid for the bank holidays missed during maternity leave.

I've recently returned and there were 5 bank holidays during my maternity leave. I work 3 days a week (60% of full time). My work have therefore said I'm due to be paid 3 bank holidays.

At first I thought that makes sense, I get paid for 60% of the bank holidays while I was on mat leave. But having thought about it, I'm not sure that's correct as my annual leave is adjusted to reflect the number of bank holidays on my working days, so I'm being short changed (I work Mondays so my annual leave is usually reduced to compensate).

4 of the 5 bank holidays were on my working days, so I believe I should be entitled to 4 days back holiday pay. Is this correct? Or is it 3? Or even 5?

I guess it depends on your contract. Does it stipulate you must take the bank holidays when they fall, or does it state you have an allocation of bank holidays to use as you please? If the former, you are entitled to 4. If the latter it’s 3.

We have to take them when they fall, so 4 is correct. Thanks.

I think you would get 3/5s of each day. So if you work and 8 hour day then it would be 4.8 hors per bank holiday.
On that basis it would be 4.8 x 5 bh giving you 24 hours. Which would equal 3 days at 8 hours

As you work 0.6 FTE you are only entitled to 0.6 payment for bank holidays regardless of whether they fall on your working days. So your annual leave will be adjusted to account for the other 0.4 on your working days and on the days you don’t work you’ll be paid 0.6 off the payment for a full day. Hope this makes sense, it is complicated.

You work part time, so bank holidays are paid pro rata. So I suspect they’ve worked the hours out and converted them into full days.

When I worked M-W, even though nearly every BH takes place on a Monday, I wasn’t entitled to them. I was only entitled to 3/5 of the BHs, so had to use holiday to cover my shortfall.

Otherwise it wouldn’t be fair on the W-F crowd—they would never get any BH entitlements! But no—they get 3/5 too, and can use their entitlements on another day.

@cheesychips15 when you say you work 3 days. Was this 3 days before mat leave? Or have you changed your contract since returning?

I worked full time before maternity leave and took 15 months off so had around 12 bank holidays I think it was. I got the full 12 back. Now I've returned 3 days a week this has changed based on my new contract

If they already adjust your leave then you should get all 5 days. Go back to HR and ask them how they have calculated your leave and the bank holidays owed. They might realise they have made an error.

Same approach in our business assuming you were 3 days prior to mat leave - you'd get 3fifths of the days

I recently enquired about my annual leave entitlement to the new HR lady (been trying for 6 years) and found out I’m actually entitled to most bank holidays on a pro rata basis so maybe speak with acas

i only work 3 days as well

Thanks for the replies. I did work 3 days before this mat leave yes, so that's all fine.

What is confusing me is that I know I'm entitled to 4.8 bank holidays per year (60% of 8). I get 15 days annual leave, but for 24-25 (our leave year runs 1st June - 31st May) 6 bank holidays fell on my working days (just boxing day and Good Friday on my non-working days). Therefore my annual leave allowance was reduced from 15 days to 13.8 to account for the extra 1.2 bank holidays.

4 of those 6 were while I was on maternity leave, so given that my annual leave has been adjusted, shouldn't I be paid for them all? If they're only paying me for 60% of them, should I get some of my annual leave back?

I will ask how this has been calculated but I know our HR department are useless so I want to make sure I'm confident in what I'm asking before I do!

So if you get 4.8 BHs and 15 days of AL, you should get 19.8 days off total. How many days did you have off in the year before you left for Mat Leave (including holidays and bank holidays)? Subtract that number from 19.8–that’s how many days of AL/BH you should be paid for.

Those pointing out I'm due 4.8 BH have really helped actually. I've just tallied up what I've actually got and I think I am a day down:

• 0.6 late May BH 24
• 0.6 August BH 24
• 0.6 Christmas Day 24
• 0.6 Boxing Day 24
• 0.6 NYD 25
• Easter Monday 25
• Early May BH 25

That comes to 5, but I've had 1.2 days deducted from my AL, meaning I've only had 3.8 bank holidays (it doesn't exactly fit into the leave year because of when I took maternity leave but it's still covering a year period, so I think that's fine).

We don't get paid for AL though, we can just carry that over. We just get paid for bank holidays.

I think the issue is that for the two bank holidays that fell on working days they have reduced your annual leave by 0.6 of a day when they should have reduced it by 0.4.

@cheesychips15 to be honest it’s a bonkers process paying for BH but not annual leave.

Legally there is statutory leave and potentially occupational (contractual) leave.

BH are not a defined legal entitlement but a contractual requirement where your employer uses the statutory right to require you to take leave on set days. Treating them differently when you are on mat leave is making it more complicated.

My advice is to convert to hours, I know there are other ways but hours makes it much clearer. 1 hours annual leave = one hours pay.

A) Full time leave entitlement (leave +BH) x full time daily hours = multiply by your weekly hours/full time weekly hours = your gross leave entitlement

B) Number of BH falling on your working day x your daily hours =

A-B = net leave entitlement

Note: In a leave year you are entitled to 8 BH x 0.6 = 4.8 days. However 7 BH fall on your working days 7 BH x 1 (you are paid a full day not 0.6) = 7 days. 7 days - 4.8 days = 2.2 days deducted from annual leave = net leave.