Calculating holiday allowances
Just been working through some examples of calculating holiday allowances with the owner of a small business. Why does something potentially simple end up being so confusing?
To get your head around the regs take a look at my friends from ACAS who once again get it right with their leaflet Holidays and Holiday pay. Another good site is Business Link who have a holiday allowance calculator.
If you're really not sure where to start then take advice from an HR pro but to get you going here are the basics:
- An employee has a right to 5.6 weeks (28 days) paid leave each year which can include public holidays.
- If employees get public holidays above their entitlement that equates to 4 weeks (20 days).
Some examples:
An employee works 2 days per week. They are entitled to 5.6 x their normal working week. 2 x 5.6 = 11.2 days or, to put it another way, 28 x (2/5) = 11.2 days
An employee works 20 hours per week. In this case you need to calculate in hours. Assuming the standard day is 7.5 hours (37.5 per week) then the calculation is as follows:
- Full time entitlement 28 x 7.5 hours = 210 hours.
- 210 x 20/37.5 = 112 hours.
Our advice is to keep it simple - If you don't understand how it's calculated then your employees wont have a chance. But as ever the devil is in the detail so it's always best to get your calculations checked out.