Can Anyone in HR Assist? Holiday Entitlement for Part Time Employee

[ElatedOliveCrow]

Background for context: I have worked freelance for the last 10 years, and a few years ago I began working for a company 2 short days (10 hours a week) on a consulting basis - I would invoice at the end of each month only for the hours I had worked.

There was a mutual discussion earlier this year surrounding increasing my hours, and I suggested increasing to 2 full days (16 hours a week), but asked if I could do this on an employed basis, as I'd been struggling during the months where I took time off with the irregular income. I understood that my hourly rate would be reduced to account for extra taxes, pensions contributions and holiday entitlement the company would have to pay, which was fine.

My usual working days were Mondays and Thursdays, so I was offered two remuneration packages; one lower value that excluded 5 Mondays per year due to the office being closed on bank holidays, and another of a higher value on the basis that I changed my usual working days to not include Mondays. I asked as a compromise if I could continue working my Mondays during a normal week (as I already had child and dog care in place for those days), but during bank holidays where the office would be closed on the Monday, I would work a different day that week, and this arrangement was agreed and written in to my employment contract.

The company offers 25 days plus bank holidays to full time employees, and so it also says in my contract that I'm entitled to 10 days of annual leave, "plus bank holidays (pro-rata for part time employment)". However, there seems to be some confusion now in relation to these 5 bank holidays and how they affect the number of days leave I'm entitled to.

When calculating my entitlement, my manager is deducting 5 days from the standard bank holiday allowance, and then applying pro-rata, which is leaving me with 2/5ths of 3 days (1.2 days, rounded up to 1.5) instead of 2/5ths of 8 days. He says the bank holidays were sorted separately, and I get paid extra for them, which is why they are taken off first. I'm not sure this is correct - at the time the lower value package was presented more as a reduction for NOT working the Mondays, rather than the other way around. I asked him to clarify - if I'm working 2 days per week, every week, do I not accrue leave entitlement in line with this? I should note that there are no other part time employees at the company, so there is no policy in place surrounding this.

One final bit of info - my manager is also a friend of 20+ years, and is one of three directors at the company, so I don't believe he is trying to short change me - we get on very well both in and out of work and I feel comfortable approaching him about this - I just think he has become genuinely confused with the initial discussions around bank holiday days and I just wanted to gain some perspective from anyone who has worked in HR and has experience with part time employees and how leave entitlement should be calculated? As it stands, he thinks I should have 11.2 days per year (rounded up to 11.5) and I believe I'm entitled to 13.2 days (which would ideally be rounded up to 13.5).

The hours don't matter as her holiday is worked out in days, not hours. One day of holiday equals however many hours she usually works that day (or an average over 52 weeks if variable). It is generally only casual workers or shift workers who get holiday in hours.

If a full timer works 5 days and she works 3 days she gets 2 fifths of holiday entitlement

I agree with all the calculations, but am confused by the lower value/higher value renumeration offer. It seems to me like you want the higher value renumeration package (where you've presumably been paid within the stated wage for the bank holidays) whilst still having the holiday of the lower value package, which doesn't seem right. That said, I can't fathom how they worked it out anyway. Maybe rolled the bank holiday pay into the hourly rate? I don't think you can get extra holiday days for the bank holidays and also benefit from an uplift in salary to compensate you for the fact you don't get to take them.

The higher pay rate was to account for the fact that on a week with a bank holiday Monday OP would swop her days to another day (hence she would be working 260 days per year.)

The lower pay rate was for her to have an unpaid day off that week so she would be working 1 day per week only that week.

Maybe rolled the bank holiday pay into the hourly rate?

Although rolled up holiday pay is now legal is has to be separately itemised on yout payslip and it isn;t on OP's.

If that's the case, she can't then expect to have those days as holiday too in her holiday allowance.

Effectively, the lower rate = those 5 days off (via BH hours added to annual leave or taking them when they fall), the higher rate = you don't get those days off paid. If she wants those days off paid (as BH leave added to her allowance) she's only entitled to the lower rate.

No, thats not how it works. In fact by working more days per year she is entitled to more days holiday.

If full timers work 5 days per week that is 260 days per year, Out of that they are entitled to take 33 days holiday (25 days plus 8 bank holidays)

OP works 2 days per week which is 104 days per year. She is therefore entitled to take 13.2 days holiday (10 days plus 3.2 days bank holidays)

If OP had taken the lower paid contract then she would be working 2 days per week most weeks but 1 day per week for 5 weeks of the year. This is 99 days per year so her salary would be reduced by 5 days to account for that. She would be entitled to 12.6 days holiday as she working less days (averaged out over the year.)

But then why the higher rate?

She wants to work the same number of days (once holiday allowance is taken into account) but be paid a higher rate.

I don't think I agree with your calculation, as on the 'work on Mondays' contract, she'd be contracted for the same hours, but use her bank holiday pay to take the mondays off. She's not working any less days if she's given bank holiday pay for the Mondays she doesn't work on the 'don't work Mondays' contract.

So in both cases, she's contracted to work 2 days a week, 104 days a year.

I updated my post with the calculations. If you work more days, you get more holiday (based on a maximum of a 5 day week)

Sorry, I just updated my comment too.

Basically, she's contracted for 104 days per year, regardless of her work pattern.

On the 'work on Mondays' model, she uses her pro rata BH allowance/ annual leave to take BH Mondays off.

On the 'don't work Mondays model' her extra pro-rata BH allowance is added to her annual leave, and taken at another time.

Net result, same number of days worked.

The only reason for a higher rate would be more days worked. But if she gets the days back as BH leave, she's not working more days, just taking them off at another time. So it foll8ws that the higher rate is to compensate for her not being entitled to those days and therefore working more hours.

She isn't that isn't what the lower offer was. It was to work two days a week most weeks and one day a week on bank holiday weeks. In a Bank Holiday week she wouldn't be using her Bank Holiday entitlement she wouldn't be contracted to work that day.
The offer she took was to work two days a week every week even if there was a Bank Holiday when she would change her working day.
So her holiday entitlement should be 2/5 of the full time holiday entitlement and 2/5 of the Bank Holiday entitlement.
If she had taken the lower offer the holiday entitlement would have been more complicated to work out but it would be lower because she would be working for fewer day's over all.

It’s the same effect as in some companies where you can buy or sell holiday for more or less salary. Lower rate if you buy holiday (and have more days off)