Shielding and holidays

linpen · Post by **linpen** » 11 Jul 2020, 18:52

The union have informed me that any holiday that I would have had during my 14 weeks of shielding, is to be included and I will not get those weeks back. Is this correct?

Woody Guthrie · Post by **Woody Guthrie** » 11 Jul 2020, 19:28

linpen wrote:The union have informed me that any holiday that I would have had during my 14 weeks of shielding, is to be included and I will not get those weeks back. Is this correct?

It is at the moment a grey area but as far as I'm aware although the business may not want to credit holidays back since they've decided to put people on sick pay whilst shielding they may be legally obliged to.

It could take an employment tribunal judgement to force them though.

As for the union, find some courage from somewhere and remember who pays the bills is my polite response to them meekly accepting this position.

frankieboy · Post by **frankieboy** » 12 Jul 2020, 07:05

I don't understand why you would think you would get your holidays back, I've been working and had to take 4 weeks of my booked allocation having been told I couldn't change them and take them at another date. In the same boat as everyone else not being able to go anywhere or do much.

Woody Guthrie · Post by **Woody Guthrie** » 12 Jul 2020, 08:58

frankieboy wrote:I don't understand why you would think you would get your holidays back, I've been working and had to take 4 weeks of my booked allocation having been told I couldn't change them and take them at another date. In the same boat as everyone else not being able to go anywhere or do much.

I think to be fair you need to have been shielding for the past 14 weeks to understand the difference between that and being bored for a couple of weeks.

I would imagine it was a lot of things but one thing it probably wasn't was a holiday.

frankieboy · Post by **frankieboy** » 12 Jul 2020, 10:06

Woody Guthrie wrote:
frankieboy wrote:I don't understand why you would think you would get your holidays back, I've been working and had to take 4 weeks of my booked allocation having been told I couldn't change them and take them at another date. In the same boat as everyone else not being able to go anywhere or do much.
I think to be fair you need to have been shielding for the past 14 weeks to understand the difference between that and being bored for a couple of weeks.

I would imagine it was a lot of things but one thing it probably wasn't was a holiday.

I totally understand the situation some people are in. My 80 year old mother has been battling cancer for the last 3 years and lives alone. She has had to cancel her chemo for the last 5 months and I have has been caring for her every day, even though under the government guidelines I wasn't supposed to. But because she doesn't live with me I wasn't able to shield for 14 weeks. Every persons situation is different but I've had to put my and my mothers health at risk throughout this time.

Celtic warrior · Post by **Celtic warrior** » 12 Jul 2020, 15:18

Woody Guthrie wrote:
frankieboy wrote:I don't understand why you would think you would get your holidays back, I've been working and had to take 4 weeks of my booked allocation having been told I couldn't change them and take them at another date. In the same boat as everyone else not being able to go anywhere or do much.
I think to be fair you need to have been shielding for the past 14 weeks to understand the difference between that and being bored for a couple of weeks.

I would imagine it was a lot of things but one thing it probably wasn't was a holiday.

Working through it wasn't a holiday either but we had to use our holiday allocation.

wf · Post by wf » 12 Jul 2020, 20:44

The union as a collective for all shielding ,should be chasing all the leave lost for shielders
I would like to think they will get to the bottom of it
I assumed you would get any leave back ,once you had used all your carried over leave and two weeks of this years
How can they take your leave ,I’m assuming your furloughed
Even the furlough agreement was totally against what happened in most non unionised organisations
If you can’t work due to health and safety ,how can they take your leave lawfully

postslippete · Post by **postslippete** » 12 Jul 2020, 21:12

linpen wrote:The union have informed me that any holiday that I would have had during my 14 weeks of shielding, is to be included and I will not get those weeks back. Is this correct?

Just seen this article. Its on the government site

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/rule ... take%20it.

Royal Mail may feed you bull about losing your annual leave entitlement because of Covid19 and staffing issues but the government said that they would allow annual leave to be relaxed to support "key industries". Under measures introduced by Alok Sharma on the 27th March they allowed workers who have not taken all of their statutory annual leave entitlement due to covid19 to carry it over into the next 2 years.

There is an obligation on employers to ensure their workers take their statutory entitlement in any one year otherwise they may incur a financial penalty. This is why the government has modified it due to coronavirus. They have already been fined by OfCom again; they might not want another one so soon after. Might be well worth mentioning all this not to your DOM - but to Royal Mail's coronavirus team.

Ignore all the naysayers on here. Just imagine how much money Royal Mail would be losing if all of us were furloughed. Maybe just a few million a day perhaps??

goddard7 · Post by **goddard7** » 13 Jul 2020, 07:20

linpen wrote:The union have informed me that any holiday that I would have had during my 14 weeks of shielding, is to be included and I will not get those weeks back. Is this correct?

Submit a grievance.Royal Mail seem to think they can treat this sick absence differently to others and compel people to take AL whilst off sick.CWU HQ have been poor supplying no rational answer for such action.Colleagues have found Carl Maden in particular unhelpful.

frankieboy · Post by **frankieboy** » 13 Jul 2020, 09:22

What happens when there is second bigger wave like they are predicting? Do people shield for another 5 months and get their holidays back? I know someone at our office who is shielding went on holiday abroad last week.

Post by **POSTMAN** » 13 Jul 2020, 11:54

The business steer is that any annual leave that is due to take place during shielding would still be taken

The government has passed new emergency legislation to ensure businesses have the flexibility they need to respond to the coronavirus pandemic and to protect workers from losing their statutory holiday entitlement (The Working Time (Coronavirus) (Amendment) Regulations 2020, laid before Parliament on 27 March 2020). These regulations enable workers to carry holiday forward where the impact of coronavirus means that it has not been reasonably practicable to take it in the leave year to which it relates.

This therefore only applies to businesses who are not able to allocate all statutory annual leave to employees. As we are able to allocate all contractual leave then we would only allow a maximum of 5 days to be carried over as per our normal policy.

goddard7 · Post by **goddard7** » 13 Jul 2020, 12:22

POSTMAN wrote:
The business steer is that any annual leave that is due to take place during shielding would still be taken

The government has passed new emergency legislation to ensure businesses have the flexibility they need to respond to the coronavirus pandemic and to protect workers from losing their statutory holiday entitlement (The Working Time (Coronavirus) (Amendment) Regulations 2020, laid before Parliament on 27 March 2020). These regulations enable workers to carry holiday forward where the impact of coronavirus means that it has not been reasonably practicable to take it in the leave year to which it relates.

This therefore only applies to businesses who are not able to allocate all statutory annual leave to employees. As we are able to allocate all contractual leave then we would only allow a maximum of 5 days to be carried over as per our normal policy.

The government have said knowhere about businesses compelling people to take AL whilst shielding(categorised as sick absence by R.M).The law says you cannot be compelled to take AL whilst sick. Be nice to hear a formal response from CWU HQ or even our own Martin Walsh.Where does it end!

Woody Guthrie · Post by **Woody Guthrie** » 13 Jul 2020, 13:19

It is the technical legal point that's important.
If the people shielding are classed by the business as sick absence which all of the comms seems to suggest then they cannot unilaterally decide that members should take annual leave.

If they're not classed as sick absence then this throws up another issue, some members will have been on half pay or even no sick pay by now. How can you be on half sick pay if you're not classed as sick absence?

They can't have it both ways and the union should know this, it's not the first time HQ has got it wrong though is it?

linpen · Post by **linpen** » 13 Jul 2020, 14:03

Woody Guthrie,thank you for your sensible replies. I’ve just contacted ACAS, who have informed me that Royal Mail should have informed me that they were going to take my leave and as they didn’t, I have a case. I shall be starting the grievance procedure when I return to work in two weeks.

Post by **POSTMAN** » 13 Jul 2020, 15:45

For reference, if interested.

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2020/365/made" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The Working Time (Coronavirus) (Amendment) Regulations 2020

Citation and commencement
1. These Regulations may be cited as the Working Time (Coronavirus) (Amendment) Regulations 2020 and come into force immediately after they are made.

Amendment to the Working Time Regulations 1998
2. The Working Time Regulations 1998(3) are amended as follows.

3. In regulation 13—

(a)at the beginning of paragraph (9)(a) insert “subject to the exception in paragraphs (10) and (11),”;
(b)after paragraph (9) insert—
“(10) Where in any leave year it was not reasonably practicable for a worker to take some or all of the leave to which the worker was entitled under this regulation as a result of the effects of coronavirus (including on the worker, the employer or the wider economy or society), the worker shall be entitled to carry forward such untaken leave as provided for in paragraph (11).

(11) Leave to which paragraph (10) applies may be carried forward and taken in the two leave years immediately following the leave year in respect of which it was due.

(12) An employer may only require a worker not to take leave to which paragraph (10) applies on particular days as provided for in regulation 15(2) where the employer has good reason to do so.

(13) For the purpose of this regulation “coronavirus” means severe acute respiratory syndrome corona-virus 2 (SARS-CoV-2).”.

4. In regulation 14—

(a)in paragraph (1) for the introductory text substitute “Paragraphs (1) to (4) of this regulation apply where—”;
(b)after paragraph (4) insert—
“(5) Where a worker’s employment is terminated and on the termination date the worker remains entitled to leave in respect of any previous leave year which carried forward under regulation 13(10) and (11), the employer shall make the worker a payment in lieu of leave equal to the sum due under regulation 16 for the period of untaken leave.”.

5. In regulation 15(2)(b) after “leave” insert “(subject, where it applies, to the requirement in regulation 13(12))”.