Maternity Leave and Holiday

[Tee2072]

I hope someone can help me with this. I know I continue to accrue my holiday while I am on maternity leave. However, I will be off on leave for almost the whole holiday year. I have asked my boss (who is the head of HR!) if I can take it all at the beginning of the year so I don't lose it all. He's thinking about it.

If he says no, does the company have to pay me for those days, or do I just lose them forever with no compensation?

Thanks!

Have you got a copy of your company's Maternity Policy and Procedures - they should have given you a copy when you applied for maternity leave. It should say in there about the leave policy. Generally, can employees carry over leave from one year to another? I know at my company staff can't carry over leave - use it or lose it - but we try to accommodate ladies going on maternity leave (provided they ask us in good time to tag it on the front of their Maternity Leave) so they don't lose out.

I'd also consult your employee handbook and/or union rep.

Well, we don't have a Maternity Policy or a union rep, as we are not union and only have 10 staff members.

We can roll over up to 5 days from year to year. And there is noting in Handbook about maternity other than that we get the minimum leave as allowed by law.

Sounds like you're dependant on your manager's goodwill then but as you probably know, you can't be on leave and maternity leave at the same time (ie paid twice). Is there a minimum amount of time you have to give to request leave? We ask for twice as much notice as the leave asked for. Don't know if this helps?

Hopefully someone else a bit more knowledgeable will come along soon.

The last 3 months of your year off are unpaid anyway. I would suggest you 'come back' to work 4 or 5 weeks before the year is up and just be on holiday for that time.

Other than that, you can't be paid in lieu of holiday, no, you must take it. But there's no reason you can't take it at the end of your maternity leave and still take it within the holiday year.

I also suggested that to him also flowery but in order to do that I'd have to come back 3 months early, as our holiday year ends 31st March and my maternity leave won't be over until about 30th May, so I'd have to return the beginning of March, with March as holiday. So that cuts 2 months off my maternity leave.

So you are starting maternity leave at the end of May? If your holiday year starts 1st April you can take it all or most of it before your maternity leave starts.

Your employer doesn't technically have to agree to your holiday requests but they can't deny you the opportunity to take holiday. If those weeks are the only opportunity you will have to take holiday and the alternative is you losing it, they must let you take it.