This May, not only are we planning for the usual spring bank holidays, but across the United Kingdom we have an additional Monday to factor in, for the Coronation of the King. Inevitably, questions about annual leave entitlements and how bank holidays are calculated will be raised by members of your team!

As many practice managers will remember from the Queen’s Jubilee and funeral last year, managing non-standard bank holidays can be complicated. But don’t worry; to help you out, we’ve written this blog to summarise the law around annual leave and to provide practical guidance on managing this extra bank holiday using Holiday Manager, which is free to use in the HUB.

Are my team legally entitled to a day off for the Coronation – or not?

When working this out, you need to remember that there are two relevant forms of law here. There’s statute (i.e., Acts of Parliament and Government regulations) and contract law (the wording of individual contracts). As an employer, you have to comply with both.

First, let’s look at statutory law relating to annual leave. This is contained within the Working Time Regulations 1998, which give each worker the right to 5.6 weeks of paid annual leave at a minimum. For someone working five days a week, that’s the equivalent of 28 days, and it doesn’t matter whether those days fall on bank holidays or not. An extra bank holiday – whether for the Coronation or any other reason – makes no difference to that 5.6 weeks / 28 days of statutory entitlement. Therefore, under statute, people are not legally entitled to the extra day off.

However, remember you also have to comply with whatever it says in your employee contracts. Many of these will specifically reference bank holiday entitlements, and such entitlements are therefore legally binding. That means that the exact wording of your employees’ contracts will determine, A) whether they’re entitled to 8^th May off work, and B) whether that means an extra day’s paid holiday above their usual amount. Here are some typical contract examples to explain how this works:

Example 1 – no bank holiday entitlement mentioned

If your contracts just give an overall number of holiday days/hours without any mention of bank holidays then it’s up to you as a GP practice whether you stay open for the day and require people to work, whether you shut and require people to use a day of holiday from their standard entitlement, or whether you shut and grant everyone an extra day’s discretionary holiday.

Example 2 – bank holidays mentioned in the contract, but are included within overall holiday entitlement

If your contracts give an overall number of holiday days/hours but state that bank holidays are included in this, then check the exact wording carefully. Does it imply that employees are expected to be off on bank holidays, and if so, will that mean all bank holidays (so including extra ones like the Coronation) or just a set number each year? If the contract implies that employees will be off for all bank holidays then your practice probably needs to close for the day, but you can deduct that day from everyone’s standard holiday entitlement if you wish.

Example 3 – the contract includes a separate entitlement to bank holidays (but only a set number of them)

Many contracts will say something along the lines of ‘you are entitled to 25 days plus up to 8 bank holidays per year pro rata’. In this case, the contract doesn’t give people any entitlement to taking a day off for the Coronation (as that would take the annual number of bank holidays above eight), but if your practice is closing that day, you could either instruct people to take the day from their regular holiday entitlement or offer the extra day on a discretionary basis.

Example 4 – the contract includes a separate entitlement to all bank holidays

In this case, the contract will say something along the lines of ‘you are entitled to 25 days plus bank holidays pro rata’. This says, or strongly implies, that any day designated as an official bank holiday is included. Employees under a contract like this will be entitled to an additional paid day off work for the Coronation.

How does this affect part-time staff?

If you’re giving staff an additional day’s paid holiday, then to ensure no worker is disadvantaged, you should apply this to everyone (on a pro rata basis) no matter what days they normally work. Holiday Manager can do these part-time calculations for you, if you wish.

If you’re not already using Holiday Manager, why not try it in the HUB today? Instead of having to calculate individual pro rata entitlements yourself, it works all of this out for you in a way that makes it all much easier to understand and the calculations are automatic. 

What about salaried GPs?

If you’re using the BMA model contract for salaried GPs, this gives them a set entitlement to 6 weeks plus 10 days pro rata (similar to example 3 above). The ten days are intended to cover bank holidays, as well as extra statutory days, so practices could, if they wished, require salaried GPs to take the Coronation bank holiday from this usual entitlement.

If the practice is closing for the Coronation, but staff have to take the day from their regular leave entitlement, how do I instruct them about this?

First, check that this approach fits with what your contracts say. (See the contract examples earlier in this blog.) If it does, then you should inform everyone about what is happening well in advance. In a strictly legal sense, so long as you give at least two full days’ notice, you’ll be fine, but in a situation like this, employees will understandably expect to be told earlier than that.

It’s important that whatever you decide, you manage things in line with your annual leave policy. Here’s an example you can adapt to your needs: Holiday Policy [PLUS].

How can Holiday Manager help me to communicate and manage all this?

As we’ve seen, bank holiday entitlement issues can be quite complicated, so you may well find some confusion or concern about it within your team. Having a clear and robust annual leave system ensures your team can see exactly what they’re entitled to, and when. Holiday Manager is managed within the HUB; each employee has their own login, and they can see their leave entitlement in real time. They can also submit requests for the remainder of their annual leave entitlement.

How do we input our arrangements into Holiday Manager beforehand?

Holiday Manager uses the information you provided about your staff contracts and calculates this automatically for you.

• If your contracts say your staff are entitled to “5 weeks plus bank holidays” you’ll have added your contract information as “25 days” base entitlement and “No” bank holidays are not included. We’ll make the adjustments for you automatically as long as you are opted in to the bank holidays.
• If your contracts are written as “5.6 weeks including bank holidays”, then you’ll have added your contracts as “28 days” base entitlement and “Yes” bank holidays are included. There will be no change to entitlements but staff will have the day off deducted for the bank holiday.

Please note: If you’re not closing for the bank holiday, or if your contracts are written with bank holidays included as part of their overall entitlement and you want to give your staff the day off anyway, you’ll need to make a decision about how to deal with the additional bank holiday depending on how the contracts are written. Opting out of the bank holiday affects both entitlement and deductions, so you may need to add an adjustment to their leave. You can do this using the instructions in the Help Centre (you’ll need to be logged into the HUB to access the Help Centre).

Holiday Manager makes managing annual leave and bank holiday entitlement so much simpler; just pop in a few details and it does the rest for you – and did we mention, it’s completely free! Head on over to the HUB to set your practice up now, or log into the HUB and book a spot on one of our daily demos to find out more.