Closing half day, should it be taken our of your leave?

ironlady2022

The Boss has kindly said we are able to leave at 1pm today (Fri 23rd Dec) without it affecting our annual leave entitilement. The thing is me and my colleagues work different hours such as;

• 7-3pm (a)
• 8-4pm (b)
• 9-5pm (c)
• 1-7pm (d)
• 2.30-8.30pm (e)

We have told colleague 'd' that he does not have to come in, essentially a day off. But colleague 'e' had already booking yesterday through to 8th Jan 2012. Now should colleague 'e' have that day for 'free' aswell or should he get his annual 'day' back? It was only decided this week.

tizerbelle

No, they shouldn't. Colleague (e) booked the day off to guarantee they wouldn't have to work today. Any other colleague could have done the same but they were all prepared to work their normal shift (it is just a normal day after all, it's not even xmas eve)

That the boss has decided to let people leave early today is a goodwill gesture to those that are working today. There is no entitlement to any one who has booked the day off (and therefore guaranteed the time off) to be given the time back.

scheming_gypsy

it's down to the discretion of the company. What happens if somebody doesn't have any leave left to take? what if somebody doesn't want to lose a days holiday, yet the office is still going to be closed? That would mean some would lose a holiday, some would take an unpaid holiday and some would have to be given a free holiday because they don't have holidays or won't use them.

Where I'm working we do a 39 hour week (8,8,8,8,7) and the site closes at 12:30 today. Everybody works flexi so we just had to make sure our hours were covered before the end of today. Luckily I do a 7am start so I only had to make up 90 minutes during the week

asparagusnextleft

I used to work for a large energy company and they always used to close at 2.00pm on the last day before Christmas. That applied to everyone and you didn't have to use annual leave. Some did better out of it than others, depending on shift patterns. They always made it very clear that anyone who had booked annual leave would not get it back due to the early closure as this was a goodwill gesture to those working that day.

ironlady2022

tizerbelle - I'm inclined to agree with you. It's a goodwill gesture and people already booked off should not be 'given this holiday for free'.

My Boss has decided that colleague 'e' can have the day off and he will get 1 day annual leave back. I fall in category 'b'. I'm just happy to finish early. We don't open over the weekend so essentially today is our last day before the holidays.

ironlady2022

asparagusnextleft - What you're saying makes perfect sense except the Boss did not make this clear and it was a last minute decision. We only work for a small company in the social enterprise sector. I will take note for next year.

LadyMissA

At my last job it was only a half day to be worked (every year and was knowledge to everyone) on Xmas Eve or last day before Xmas, but if you booked the day off you would have to lose a full days holiday where as if you worked 9-12 you get the 1pm to 5pm off for free.
I normally had to book it to go food shopping as pay day was 25th so would have no chance to get much at 2pm when i got home if I stayed to 12pm.

Sambucus_Nigra

I learnt a long long time ago, never book the last day off as normally, the bosses need to go and get their wives pressies so usually give everyone a free half day on them.

scheming_gypsy

Sambucus_Nigra wrote: »

I learnt a long long time ago, never book the last day off as normally, the bosses need to go and get their wives pressies so usually give everyone a free half day on them.

Same for new year as well I've found. In a previous job there were 3 of us and obviously 3 days between Christmas and New Year, so we all booked two days off and worked one day. I'd always book the first day back off and work the last day of the year but the other two thought I was stupid as they'd book the last day off so they had a long New Year weekend. What they didn't realise was they'd do an 8 hour day for their shift whereas I'd go in at 10am and be out for 1pm

DVardysShadow

While there is apparent unfairness in this, the last thing anyone should do is turn it into earache for the bosses over he booked this and got nothing back but she didn't book anything and got the afternoon off. Because they might not do it next year.

ironlady2022

Really interesting to see everyone's responses. I worked in retail before and we always had to open til said time decided by Head Office so have had no experience of this.