Holiday pay

droene

I started a job which I will be seven months in at the end of this month (December). My contract states that I am not allowed to take any holidays for the first six months of working there and can never take holidays in December (retail... this part is fairly understandable). The holiday year is January to December. My contract also states that all untaken holidays are not allowed to be carried, and cannot be paid out during weeks worked. My question is... how is this allowed? For the entire time I've worked here the holidays I accrue don't really exist as I am unable to avail of them and will not get pay instead.
Is there anything I can do about this?

Loveinapril

What did HR say?

droene

There isn't technically a HR in the business I have access to, but management basically said I shouldn't need holidays anyway given current regulations.

Batgurl

Talk to your manager. Explain that you have 2 weeks annual leave outstanding and you want them to make provisions for you to take it, either by allowing you time off in December or allowing you to carry over to 2021.

Annual leave is legislated and can’t be trumped by contract law, so they will need to sort out the problem.

To be honest, you should have raised this with them earlier in your employment as they likely would have left you take it before December.

a_squirrelman

droene wrote: »

There isn't technically a HR in the business I have access to, but management basically said I shouldn't need holidays anyway given current regulations.

Cheeky buggers, god forbid anyone should have a life like.

dennyk

Yeah, that's not going to fly. Employers can control when employees can take their annual leave (and by extension when they can't), but they must allow you to use it at some point. (They're also supposed to account for your needs when determining when you can take leave, but we all know how that works in the real world, especially in retail...) A policy that has the effect of never allowing you to use your statutory annual leave and which forces you to forfeit it at the end of the year will not be permissible, though.

Talk to your manager and put it to them straight; you have two weeks (or whatever your actual balance is) of annual leave that they need to allow you to use, either before the end of the leave year or within six months after the end of the year. Ask your manager which option they would prefer and let them know you'd be willing to work with them and allow them to carry over your leave entitlement from this year to the next year if taking time off in December would be too difficult for the business (and remember that this is *you* being generous to *them*, not the other way around; it's the employee who must agree to allow that carryover instead of using the leave in the year it was granted).

If they refuse and insist that you cannot use your annual leave from this year at all and it will be forfeit at the end of the year, you can make a complaint to the Workplace Relations Commission.

_Brian

So definitely employers can dictate when you take your holidays.

But they cannot comstruct a system where it is impossible for your intake leave.

It is also incorrect and indeed illegal of them to just take away unused holidays and legislation allows employees carry these over for six months. It’s specifically called out in the Statutory Instrument covering annual leave.

Darc19

I assume that they will either pay you in lieu of the holidays or allow you an extension.

What happens to holiday earned in December?


Simply ask them whether you are paid in lieu or if they will extend them into January.


Very restricted policy imo

Dempo1

droene wrote: »

There isn't technically a HR in the business I have access to, but management basically said I shouldn't need holidays anyway given current regulations.

Rather cheeky and frankly outrageous, sadly this pandemic is bringing out the worst in some employers.

Your situation is quite straightforward, whilst the company is permitted to restrict holidays during a defined probationary period and can dictate peak times for disallowing holiday leave, they can't have their cake and eat it. Holidays accrue automatically wether your employer likes it or not.

Essentially as your probationary period ended just prior to peak season, their own rules essentially forces you to carry holidays forward. Companies can foolishly have rules that don't adhere to fundamental holiday entitlements, but this is not how it works in law. They'll be obliged to permit you take Holidays owed as soon as peak period ends, even if it means carrying forward to 2021, in essence your holiday entitlement will increase in 2021 to reflect what is owed for 2020.

There are a number of organisations that can assist, but initially I'd be advising, writing or email whomever in your job is responsible of what your owed and the companies own rules essentially stops you taking holidays owed and to acknowledge you can (and not out of choice) carry holidays forward.