I am not sure if I am being thick here, so I am asking for help (and no doubt piss taking).

My Mrs works recently started a part time job Mon-Fri (big company with shops all over) and her Manager has said she has to take Bank Holidays as leave (the place isn’t open on them).
Her contracts says (slightly shortened)

Holiday Entitlement

Holiday year is Jan-Dec. You are entitled to 21 days holiday per year. Part-time employees will be entitled to a pro-rata number of holidays.

Bank Holidays

In addition to your basic holiday entitlement, you may take and be paid for Bank Holidays. Part-time employees will receive a pro-rated amount of Bank Holidays

Now to me, that reads as you get your standard leave entitlement plus Bank Holidays, as it says in addition.

Am I right or, is the manager right?

Cheers.

It’s a bit semantics here but the relevant information is that anyone working full time in the UK is entitled to 28 days leave as a minimum, including Bank Holidays. So if your employer is giving you only 21, then it is assumed that the Bank Holidays are on top of that and therefore will be counted in the leave total to bring you up to 28.

I could be wrong, so check, but my understanding is that if the place of work is not open on Bank Holidays, then it is allowable for those Bank Holidays to be counted in the 28 days given (and therefore taken).

The complicating factor is that your partner is working part time so the holiday allowance is pro-rated. That gets tricky when the Bank Holidays are compulsory and I honestly don’t know how that is worked around.

Working 5 days a week allows you 28 days minimum annual leave, pro-rata for part time, your wife employer does not work bank holidays so 7 of those are taken for those leaving 21 for her to use elsewhere

How many days per week does she normally work?

Her leave allowance will be 21+7 public holidays = 28 if she worked full time.
If she works 3 days per week she’ll be entitled to 3/5 * 28 = 16.8 days.
If she normally works when the public holiday is and the office/shop is closed then she will either have to swap her days off or take it as leave out of her 16.8 days allowance depending on what is agreed with her employer.

*at least this if how Mrs J’s part time leave entitlement works – although being a work shy civil servant, she starts off with 35 days plus public holidays 😆

Um, there are 8 bank holiday days.

Presumably a FTE there would get 29 days total.

The intention of that contract seems very much like she’d get 29 days pro rata for everything, but be obliged to use a proportion of them for bank holidays. That’s fair and legal afaik.

Maybe they are open one of the bank holidays or they don’t count Xmas.

I also get 7 days bank hols allowance to take when I like, but also always have counted 8 days?. Maybe one of them just isn’t considered an official ‘bank holiday’, not sure which one tho. Might be the most obvious or least obvious, I don’t know. I’ve never questioned it tbh because 7 weeks hols a year has always been enough for me (no kids).

Um, there are 8 bank holiday days.

Depends on where you are. 8 in England and Wales, 9 in Scotland and 10 in Northern Ireland.

The intention of that contract seems very much like she’d get 29 days pro rata for everything, but be obliged to use a proportion of them for bank holidays. That’s fair and legal afaik.

That’s how I read it. Her manager however, was saying she had to take Bank Holidays from her 21 days???

I told her to ring HR on Monday, but I wanted to get a sanity check first 🙂 Thanks all.

The bank holiday are separate the way is is written up top. So she would have them off and then however many days of leave she gets for being part time

That’s how I read it. Her manager however, was saying she had to take Bank Holidays from her 21 days???

Pro-rata she may have 21 days and 7 of those are then used for bank holidays. That’s maybe what he meant.

https://www.gov.uk/calculate-your-holiday-entitlement/

That’s how I read it. Her manager however, was saying she had to take Bank Holidays from her 21 days???

If she’s part time, then she doesn’t get 21 days
That’s for full time staff.

I read that as holiday + BH not least because the law requires at least 28 days

However I work 4 days per week so each BH i have 1.5 hours less entitlement i need to make up for a full day off

Part of this is done because they get Good friday – I am off anyway- and part by flexi time “overtime”.

they may mean this on BH – ie take leave to accommodate the reduced time] and perhaps work it out by hours – as they do at mine even though its really days.

if they mean take BH from your 21 then that is illegal but would not be if you got 28 days

If she is part time she isn’t entitled to 28 days so we would need to know how many days holiday she gets. But yes it’s fair and legal that she will have to take the bank holidays out of her entitled amount.

its not fair to give the bare legal minimum but obvs it is legal

its not fair to give the bare legal minimum

How many people do you know that get anything significant above the legal 28 days ?

How many people do you know that get anything significant above the legal 28 days ?

Loads. Everyone I’ve ever worked with. Old company (10K employees in the UK) was 28 + bank holidays, though I was up to 31 + BH due to long service.

Current company (6K in the UK?) is 25 + BH.

How many people do you know that get anything significant above the legal 28 days ?

Personally or numerical?

Thousands well 10s of thousands well more like 100s of thousands.

its not fair to give the bare legal minimum but obvs it is legal

Yeah ok. Tell that to all the small business owners and self employed. I think working for 11 months out of 12 and getting paid all year is very fair and anything more is a bonus.

Do you miss the 19 the century labour laws?

i think getting all the money your employer makes from your labour is actually fair.

Whilst I have not surveyed all my friends on their contractual holiday entitlement the majority certainly get more than that even the factory workers.

Pretty common in retail to get the legal minimum

All this talk of legal min is missing the point. The contract is clear: BHs are in addition to holiday, all pro-rata for part time.