Are you required to pay your employees for an extra public holiday?
People all over the world were thrilled to hear about Prince William and Kate Middleton’s recent engagement to be married; even more so when it was announced that the date would be a designated public holiday.
The royal wedding will take place on the 29th April 2011 and although the event will be great news for many, it is likely to leave some employers confused.
In 2011, the number of public holidays in England and Wales is set to rise from the normal eight days, to nine. This may be good news for most but many small business owners are concerned about the impact that it might have on their company.
Whether or not your employee’s are entitled to paid time off is entirely down to their contracts of employment. All employees are entitled to a minimum of 5.6 working weeks annual leave but this does not automatically give them the right to paid time off during a bank or public holiday, although most employers choose to include them as part of their holiday entitlement.
If a contract of employment states that an employee is allowed 5.6 working weeks annual leave to take as and when they choose, then the employee is not entitled to paid time off for the royal wedding. Similarly, if they are given the bank and public holidays as paid time off and the contract lists the dates that the company recognises as those holidays, then the employee is not entitled to a day off.
If a contract reads that an employee is entitled to 5.6 working weeks including all bank and public holidays then the employee will be allowed the time off and must be taken as holiday.
If the policy is broken down as 20 days holiday plus all bank and public holidays, then the company may have to foot the cost of an extra paid day off work this April and it is likely that they will face the same issues for the Queens diamond jubilee. Think carefully about how you manage the extra time off this year as you may be setting a precedent for June 2012.
There are companies that rely on laws set in statute when a contract does not exist or cannot be found. In these cases the employer will need to think carefully about how they have managed bank and public holidays previously.
