Work & Bereavement leave advice please

bloomin_freezing

Does anyne out there know if bereavement leave at work is paid from work or is it a government payment such as maternity pay, also is there a basic allowence of days off permitted, or is that down to the individual company?

Lastly, which family members does bereavement leave cover? I'm asking all of this on behalf of my mum who recently lost her brother, and she had to travel abroad for his funeral.

Thanks.

cazziebo

There isn't any legal right to bereavement leave, but there may be a contractual right. The person will have to look at their contract or staff handbook to find out what the entitlement is, if any.

3plus1

I agree with cazziebo.

At my company, 'bereavement leave' is as much unpaid leave as you feel you need, at the manager's discretion. I think this is probably common with most employers, but your mum will need to check her contract.

pinkemsy

I work in HR and in the company I work for we allow ten days per year, which is at the discretion of the Manager. It is paid, but any further leave required will be unpaid. The way to get through this is to compromise to use annual leave/time off in lieu/flexi. If the person who has died is a relative, it's normally granted without question, but less tends to be granted for distant relatives etc. Your mum should ask her Manager what the company's bereavement leave policy is and see how much they will offer paid, and how much she can take as annual leave etc. Then, how much unpaid time off if this isn't enough time.

pinkemsy

Forgot to mention, not everyone gets ten days off, in fact this is quite rare and only used for immediate family, including the funeral. Of course there may be a completely different policy where your mum works re paid/unpaid etc.

Hardup_Hester

I work in a school, we get 1 paid week for child or partner, 3 paid days for sibling or step parent 1 paid day for any other relative, nothing if it is a friend, it has to 1 days unpaid leave.
Very precise & I only know because we all received an email reminding us of our entitlement as a work colleague took a day off when her dog died.

dawnybabes

Where I used to work you got nowt at all. Had to break the news to a member of staff after his dad died. In fact the management wanted him to come in on the day of the funeral before the service and do a few hours :-(

sarymclary

It changes from one workplace to another. I would suggest your mother gets in touch with her personnel/HR dept. to ask what their policy is. As mentioned above, you tend to get longer for an immediate/close relative, and it can be more at the discretion of a dept. manager for more distant relatives. If there is any doubt at all, it may be that your mother has to use up her annual leave entitlement in order to be paid, or to take it as unpaid leave.

ailuro2

We get one day off with pay, unless we are chief mourner(name for person who gets extra time off for organising funeral!),

Only one chief mourner is allowed per family - so if two brothers lost their mother , they would have to decide which one was getting the three days off, and which one got one day off.

Paparika

Blimey, I always thought that you got a week and that was it.

But saying that earlier this year my father fell ill and we were not sure what was happening, and yes we thought he might....

i told my boss and she said family is important if you need to go just text me and go, mind you she is a nice boss

SandC

Each company tends to have a set amount of days for close relative (that is parent, child, sibling), but very often this is discretionary. I think ours is 5 days, not per year but per bereavement. All sorts of things can be considered - your overall attendance record for one can make a boss think that if you've asked for more time off than the set days then you really must need it.

Also, for cases of a parent or child, often someone may be too distraught to attend work within the set parameter of time. I know my company and previous companies have been happy to accept a doctor's note for sick leave in these cases. After all, you may well be incapable of working.

Your mum must find out from work what their rules are and what her particular situation will be. There may well be lenience in that she has to travel abroad.

The last person I recall at work who lost a parent was off for a month on a sick note. Again, her company will have rules on paid sick leave which may or may not mean she would be on SSP or could be on full pay according to her contract.