Handling Absence Over the Holiday Season: An Essential Guide For Employers

Many businesses operate an annual leave year that runs from January to December. Whether this applies to you or not, employers have a duty to proactively manage their staff’s annual leave entitlement throughout the year.

Employees must ensure they book their annual leave, otherwise, any accrued annual leave that has not been booked by the end of the holiday year will be lost.

However, employers have a duty to diligently remind staff throughout the year that unless they book their leave within the leave year, their entitlement to annual leave AND pay will be lost. *This is explained further below.

REMEMBER!

The purpose of annual leave is to take time off work to rest, and it is a legal right as set out under the Working Time Regulations. This means that employees should not be discouraged from taking their annual leave with a promise of payment instead.

The only time an employee is paid in lieu of their annual leave entitlement is when their employment ends. Under those circumstances, any annual leave accrued at their time of leaving is paid to them with their final salary.

This also means that employees must not save up their leave until the end of the year and then insist that they are paid for it.

*Excluding those who have not been able to book their leave due to long-term sick leave or family-friendly leave entitlements such as maternity or adoption leave.

The holiday season at this time of year coincides with the Christian celebration of Christmas and the Jewish Festival of Hanukkah.

Both are key events in the calendars of each religion, and employees will want to ensure they can attend religious services and spend time with loved ones.

There is no automatic right to take time off work to observe any religious festival at any time of year.

However, if you receive an annual leave request for religious observance that cannot be accommodated, to avoid the risk of allegations of discrimination, there must be a valid business reason for turning down the request, such as already having too many employees off at the same time.

Please ensure you seek advice from our experts before turning down a request for annual leave for religious observance.

This is one of the most common queries we receive from our clients this time of year.

It’s important to note that not all instances of sickness following holiday refusal are ‘sickies’, so each case will need to be dealt with on its own merits.

The best thing to do is to get ahead. If a request for leave cannot be accommodated, confirm this in writing, making it clear that the employee is expected to attend work on the dates requested as annual leave.

The employer can also make clear in writing that if the employee subsequently reports that they are sick, this may give rise to their sickness absence being investigated as a potential unauthorised absence.  Avensure can assist with wording for this type of letter and any letters relating to annual leave.

Added caution should be applied where employees are absent due to health conditions, likely to be classed as disabilities or who have absences related to pregnancy.

It is also vital that advice is sought before withholding sick pay or taking formal disciplinary action.

It’s an all-too-familiar scenario: an employee rings in sick and posts photos on social media of themselves at a Christmas party. Where does the employer stand?

If you have reason to believe that the photos were taken when the employee should have been at work, for example, you run a pub, and your employee was due to work on New Year’s Eve. Yet, their photos or videos clearly show them at a New Year’s Eve party, this could be investigated as an allegation of falsely reporting to be sick when they are not.

Likewise, if they were off work on New Year’s Eve, but were due to work on New Year’s Day and have called in sick, they are not prevented from socialising the evening before, but they must ensure they are not too unwell to attend work the following day.

If they failed to attend work for their shift, claiming to be unwell, they may be telling the truth, but a hangover or suspected hangover is not an acceptable reason to be absent from work.

Whatever the circumstances, seek advice from us, and we will advise you on setting up an investigation meeting with the employee, with a view to taking formal disciplinary action.

Again, it is a good idea to get ahead of the message. If employees are expected to be at work during the holiday season, employers should remind them that any socialising outside of work does not impair their ability to attend work.

In addition to this, it is important that where employees operate machinery, drive vehicles, or are required to care for vulnerable persons, they are reminded of their duties with respect to ensure they are present for work and can work safely.

If employees are due to attend work after the work Christmas party, remind them they must make safe transport arrangements both on the evening of the party and the day after.

Employers should not allow employees to work if they suspect it is not safe for them to do so. Please call our experts if you feel you need to take action to remove someone from their duties temporarily.

No one wants to be accused of being a bit of a Grinch, but effective and proactive communication is the key to managing the usual festive absence headaches. Call our experts, who will advise you on managing absence and all your other HR needs. Contact us today!