starting maternity leave early and sick leave

[Reallytired]

I work in a lovely school with really nice people. I am 30 weeks pregnant and I am having really bad back problems. I have been struggling to walk. At the moment I plan to start my maternity leave at 34 weeks.

I work as an ICT technician and the work is fairly streneous. My GP wants to do just light duties, but I am not sure how practical this is. Alternatively he is prepared to sign me off for four weeks.

The local authority only allows support staff with less than five years service 10 fully paid sick days a year. After that I would only get satuorary sick pay. Also to make matters worst they want 28 days notice of changing the start date of maternity leave.

Would the amount I get paid for maternity pay be reduced by having satuorary sick pay for a few weeks at the end of pregnancy?

Your SMP is worked out based on your average pay over weeks 17 - 25 of your pregnancy, so reducing hours now won't change it.

If you get more than SMP, you will need to check your maternity policy to see how they work it out.

You can give less than 28 days' notice if it was not 'reasonably practicable' to give the full notice. The legislation makes this clear.

Deciding to start maternity leave earlier because of health reasons is often one where you cannot give the notice. One option would be to take two weeks' sick leave and then bring your start date forward two weeks. You could even get your GP to write a note stating that he has recommended that you consider this, if you think that your employer will be awkward. They are normally pretty understanding about not wanting to be on unpaid sick leave at such an expensive time (if it's your first!). Obviously remember that that's two weeks less after the baby is born though.

Hi Ribena, long time no see!

Indeed. I have been lurking a bit, but soooo busy at work I didn't feel I could get sucked into any posting. I always feel bad if I start commenting and then can't answer follow up questions...