Part time holiday entitlement

leannehartwell6985

I have 2 colleagues that share a full time job. Colleague 1 works on a Monday and Tuesday and colleague 2 works Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.   Colleague 1 is entitled to 9 holidays a year (not including bank holidays) and colleague 2 is entitled to 14 days holiday a year (not including bank holidays).  Colleague 1’s full entitlement is 9 days holiday plus 7 bank holiday Mondays.  Total of 16 days paid holiday.  Colleague 2’s full entitlement is 14 days holiday plus 1 bank holiday (Good Friday).  Total of 15 days paid holiday.  So even though colleague 1 works 2 days a week and colleague 2 works 3 days a week, colleague 1 still get more paid holiday.   Surely this can’t be right. From what I can see online colleague 2 should get 16.8 holidays a year.  Colleague 1 should get the 9 days holiday plus some of the bank holidays and some bank holidays should come out of 9 days entitlement. I think it worked out about  11 to 12 days! 

Can anyone let me know if colleague 2 has received less entitlement and if colleague 2 has been given too many days. Just doesn’t seems fair that you work one more day a week than someone else but yet they got more holidays!! Really would like to get some answers for my colleague cuz so far her employers are telling her that’s it’s right that she only gets 14 plus good Friday! 

Myself currently received 23 days holiday plus 7 bank holidays plus Good Friday. Total of 31. I’ve read that I should get 28 days plus bank holidays but I’ve also read that employers can include bank holidays within your entitlement. 

Anyway my main objective here is to find out if colleague 2 has been missing out on 1.8 days holiday a year! Also whether colleague 1 has received more holidays that she should. Just doesn’t seem right that you can work 2 days a week and get more holiday leave that someone who works 1 more day a week! Apologies if I have confused you. Everything I look at online I am not sure what’s correct.  

HampshireH

They aren't getting more holiday. They get a pro rata holiday allowance based on the hours they work plus bank holidays.

Presumably colleague 2 would get 2 more bank holidays should christmas or new year fall on a Friday too.

Torry_Quine

Part time workers should get entitlement to holidays pro rata what a full time worker gets.  The minimum is 28 days including bank holidays.

General_Grant

A quick reply and may return later to give detailed breakdown (unless someone else does so in the meantime) -

the employer is wrong - they should work out holiday entitlement proportionate to the days worked (assuming days are of equal length) compared with a full-time person in similar job and length of service (if they give more holiday for longer service).

Then they tell each person that they deduct any bank holiday on which they would otherwise work and give them the flexibility on the balance.

General_Grant

HampshireH said:

They aren't getting more holiday. They get a pro rata holiday allowance based on the hours they work plus bank holidays.

Presumably colleague 2 would get 2 more bank holidays should christmas or new year fall on a Friday too.

Wrong.  
The bank holidays form part of the total holiday entitlement and it is the total holiday entitlement which has to be pro rata.

General_Grant

Here goes with calculations:

A 5-day a week employee with statutory-only holiday entitlement would have 28 days (actually 5.6 weeks).  Bank Holidays which are taken are included when checking that minimum, statutory, entitlement is given.

So someone working 2 days (Monday and Tuesday) is entitled to 28/5 x 2 = 11.2 days (which cannot be rounded down to 11 days).
Working 3 days a week (Wednesday to Friday) gives an entitlement of 28/5 x 3 = 16.8 days

If full-time staff (at the same seniority and length of service) were to receive more than 28 days holiday in a year, then the calculation would need to use the extra days as it is not lawful to treat part-time staff less favourably simply because they are part-time.

If the employees are required to take bank holidays off, then the person who works Mondays will inevitably have more bank holidays than someone who doesn't.  Proportionately they get the same holiday but the second person gets more flexibility as they don't give up so much of their entitlement to BHs.

The employer may have made problems for themselves by saying an entitlement is so many days plus bank holidays.  That needs to be understood.

[As an historical aside:  When statutory leave entitlement was introduced it was for 4 weeks.  However the Government of the day had expected that employers would give bank holidays in addition.  Many employers did not do that as the law did not require it.  So there was an amendment to add the equivalent of the usual 8 bank holidays a year and hence 28 days which is original 4 weeks plus 8 BHs.]

Andy_L

General_Grant said:

[As an historical aside:  When statutory leave entitlement was introduced it was for 4 weeks.  However the Government of the day had expected that employers would give bank holidays in addition.  Many employers did not do that as the law did not require it.  So there was an amendment to add the equivalent of the usual 8 bank holidays a year and hence 28 days which is original 4 weeks plus 8 BHs.]

as a further aside getting the extra bank holidays given for, eg Royal weddings & coronations comes down to the wording of your contract. is it 28 days, 20 days plus 8 BHs or 20 days plus BHs. Only with the latter is it guaranteed, otherwise it depends on the generosity of your employer