Missing holiday pay

Jibber123

I work part time for a small business, just the owner and 2 part time employees' plus a couple of seasonal staff during busy times. I have been there a couple of years and last summer (2019) I took a couple of weeks off for a holiday, which I asked if I could be paid for. The owner was a little confused but asked me to speak to his accountant, who confirmed I would get my normal weekly pay for both weeks, which was fine. I've since spoken to a friend who has told me I should be getting a lot more holiday pay, about 5.6 weeks a year. I've checked this on the gov.uk website and it's correct. So I am still owed 3.6 weeks from 2019-2020. I averaged £162 a week for the year 2019-2020 so I'm owed another £583.20 for last year and based on this year to date I'm owed another £697. I've spoken to him about it and he told me I don't work enough hours to earn holiday pay. I will speak to the accountant in the morning and see if she can help, I don't want to fall out out with him over it as I enjoy working there but I also want to be paid what I'm entitled to. How best can I go forward with this to get it resolved?

Savvy_Sue

The owner is speaking through their posterior: you could work just one hour per week, and still be entitled to 28 5.6 hours paid holiday each year (ie, 5.6 weeks). And all those part-time and seasonal staff also accrue holiday pay at a rate of 12.07% - they work for one hour, they earn 12.07% of an hour's holiday pay. [idiotic typo corrected, my brain was jumping up and down but my fingers weren't listening ...]

However, if you don't TAKE your holiday, your employer doesn't necessarily have to pay you for the time you didn't take and actually is not normally allowed to offer to pay you instead of taking the leave, or to carry that minimum amount of paid leave forward into the next leave year. However, because of Covid there's exceptions to that this year ... up to two weeks can be carried forward into the next leave year. 

I would speak to the accountant, who is hopefully more clued up on these things than the employer, but you are bringing bad news if the owner is this naive. Do you have a written statement of your terms of employment? I'm guessing not. Could be worth your employer looking at the ACAS website, there's a whole heap of sample templates there. https://www.acas.org.uk/templates-for-employers

KatrinaWaves

Savvy_Sue said:

The owner is speaking through their posterior: you could work just one hour per week, and still be entitled to 28 hours paid holiday each year (5.6 weeks). And all those part-time and seasonal staff also accrue holiday pay at a rate of 12.07% - they work for one hour, they earn 12.07% of an hour's holiday pay. 

However, if you don't TAKE your holiday, your employer doesn't necessarily have to pay you for the time you didn't take and actually is not normally allowed to offer to pay you instead of taking the leave, or to carry that minimum amount of paid leave forward into the next leave year. However, because of Covid there's exceptions to that this year ... up to two weeks can be carried forward into the next leave year. 

I would speak to the accountant, who is hopefully more clued up on these things than the employer, but you are bringing bad news if the owner is this naive. Do you have a written statement of your terms of employment? I'm guessing not. Could be worth your employer looking at the ACAS website, there's a whole heap of sample templates there. https://www.acas.org.uk/templates-for-employers

I’m assuming there’s a typos there. Someone working one hour a week wouldn’t get 28 hours holiday. They’d get 5.6 hours (rounded to 6 no doubt)  

Savvy_Sue

KatrinaWaves said:

Savvy_Sue said:

The owner is speaking through their posterior: you could work just one hour per week, and still be entitled to 28 hours paid holiday each year (5.6 weeks). And all those part-time and seasonal staff also accrue holiday pay at a rate of 12.07% - they work for one hour, they earn 12.07% of an hour's holiday pay. 

I’m assuming there’s a typos there. Someone working one hour a week wouldn’t get 28 hours holiday. They’d get 5.6 hours (rounded to 6 no doubt)  

Oh whoops, sorry about that. Yes, might well be rounded up to 6, although that is not essential (as you would know). Just can't be rounded down to 5.5 or less. 

KatrinaWaves

Savvy_Sue said:

KatrinaWaves said:

Savvy_Sue said:

The owner is speaking through their posterior: you could work just one hour per week, and still be entitled to 28 hours paid holiday each year (5.6 weeks). And all those part-time and seasonal staff also accrue holiday pay at a rate of 12.07% - they work for one hour, they earn 12.07% of an hour's holiday pay. 

I’m assuming there’s a typos there. Someone working one hour a week wouldn’t get 28 hours holiday. They’d get 5.6 hours (rounded to 6 no doubt)  

Oh whoops, sorry about that. Yes, might well be rounded up to 6, although that is not essential (as you would know). Just can't be rounded down to 5.5 or less. 

Oh I didn’t know it’s not my area of expertise at all (if I have any at all!)  thanks for that info. 

Thrugelmir

Jibber123 said:

I work part time for a small business, 

How many hours do you work? The figure you quoted would be for a full time worker. This needs to be pro rata'd accordingly. 

General_Grant

Thrugelmir said:

Jibber123 said:

I work part time for a small business, 

How many hours do you work? The figure you quoted would be for a full time worker. This needs to be pro rata'd accordingly. 

The entitlement is still 5.6 week.  For the part-time worker it is 5.6 weeks of whatever their week is.

Jibber123

I was working 9 hours a week this went up to 18 hours a week after a few months then back down to 9, then back to 18. I've looked at my P60 for the year 2019-2020 and taken the total amount earned before tax divided it by my hourly rate, to work out my average weekly hours over the year, which is about 14 hours a week. I earn £9 per hour so he owes me 5.6 x 14 x £9 which is £705.60, but I have already had 2 weeks paid leave in July 2019 for which I was paid £324 (£162 per week) so I'm owed £705.60-£324 which is £381.60. For 2019 I will have to have the money as i can't take the time off, but for this year he can give me the 5.6 weeks off or the money equivalent before April 2021.  I will try the ACAS links to see if I can prove to him he owes me the money or time off.