CIPD - Working time and leave: an overview

HR practice

Revised August 2008

This factsheet gives introductory guidance. It:

looks briefly at hours typically worked and overtime
discusses holiday and leave entitlements
summarises the statutory requirements for special leave
includes the CIPD viewpoint.

Hours worked

Working hours are continually in the news, with the UK’s so-called ‘long hours’ culture’ in the forefront. The average working week across all employee groups for full-timers was 37.0 hours in May 2008 (38.9 hours for men and 33.6 hours for women)¹. In general, manual workers work about three or four hours longer per week than non-manuals. About 6.4 million employees – over one in five - usually work more than 48 hours per week².

Working hours are governed by the Working Time Regulations which lay down minimum conditions relating to weekly working time, rest entitlements and annual leave, and make special provision for nightworkers.

For more information, see our factsheets Working hours in the UK (which contains an overview of the Working Time Regulations) and Work-life balance. CIPD members can find more detailed information on the legal position in our Working Time Regulations and Bank holidays FAQs.

Overtime

When employees exceed their standard working week, they may be eligible for overtime payments. Typically however, overtime applies to manual and relatively junior non-manual employees: for managers and senior professionals, there is an expectation that working longer hours goes with the job and that their higher salaries are sufficient compensation. In April 2007, almost 22.5% of full-time employees worked paid overtime, and the average number of overtime hours they worked each week was 1.4¹.

The usual rate for overtime is time and a half (so that if the normal rate is £10 per hour, the overtime rate will be £15) for weekday and Saturday working, but often double time for Sunday working and bank holidays. However, arrangements vary from employer to employer³.

Paying overtime rates is costly and employers may seek to reduce or control the levels of overtime through the use of flexitime, changing shift patterns, annual hours arrangements or recruiting temporary or part-time staff. For more information about these, see our factsheets on Flexible working and Working patterns.

Holidays

The legal position

In 1998 a statutory entitlement to four weeks’ paid holiday a year for full-time staff was introduced for the first time.

In June 2006, the government announced that it would be introducing legislation to prevent employers counting the 8 permanent bank and public holidays as part of this statutory entitlement, so that in due course there will be an entitlement to 28 days’ paid leave a year. To give businesses time to adjust, the extra entitlement will be phased in. From October 2007, the statutory entitlement was raised to 24 days, and this will rise to 28 days on 1 April 2009. However, there will be no statutory right for the leave to be taken on public holidays; when leave is to be taken is,in the main, a contractual matter between the employer and employee.

Employers' practice

Holiday entitlements for most employees exceed the statutory minimum. Incomes Data Services (IDS) maintains a database of hours and holidays, which shows that in 2007 the average basic holiday entitlement was 24.6 days (plus bank holidays). On average, manual employees had an average of 23.8 days and non-manuals 25.0 days. 25 days is the most common entitlement, and more than half the organisations on the IDS database offer either 25 or 26 days to both manual and non-manual workers⁴.

Special leave

Employers are legally obliged to provide special leave to employees in particular circumstances, for example:

carrying out public duties
court service
trade union duties and activities
military training and service
parental leave
personal and domestic leave.

Many employers, however, go beyond the legal requirements, for example, by allowing paid or unpaid study time for employees, especially if it is job-related (although the government has announced that a statutory right to request unpaid time off to train is likely to come into force in or after April 2010.)

Public duties

Employees who hold specified public positions have a statutory right under the Employee Rights Act 1996 to ‘reasonable’ time off work to carry out their duties. These include:

Justices of the Peace
local authority members
members of health bodies
school and college governors
members of police authorities.

Court service

Most court service is for jury service, but employees may also be called as witnesses. Employers are not legally required to provide time off for jury service, but could be found in contempt of court if they refuse to do so. Thus, in effect, employees’ right to time off for jury service is protected by law.

Individuals summoned for jury service are expected to attend court unless they are ineligible, disqualified or excused by the court. Jury service can be deferred. Among the categories who qualify for deferral are:

shiftworkers and night workers – shiftworkers’ service should be deferred to a period where they do not have to attend during a rest day
teachers or students during term time.

Applications for jury service to be excused on grounds of conflict with work requirements are likely to result in deferral, unless excusal is clearly necessary. Each application will be considered on its own merits, and applications must be made by those who have been summoned – employers cannot make them on employees’ behalf.

Employers are not legally required to pay employees while they are undertaking jury service. However, jurors are entitled to claim for travel and subsistence and for loss of earnings, up to a maximum daily rate. Where employees wish to claim for loss of earnings, they must get their employers to complete the appropriate certificate which is issued to all jurors prior to attending court. Employers are asked to provide information on net earnings and hours of work, and whether employees will be able to return to work on any full or half days when they are not required at court.

In many cases, the loss of earnings allowance may be below the juror’s normal pay, and IDS research⁵ suggests that most employers provide paid time off for jury service, with the loss of earnings allowance being deducted from employees’ normal salaries. There is no legal obligation on employers to pay employees attending court as witnesses, and arrangements vary considerably. For example, some apply the same payment procedures as for jury service; others require witnesses to use leave.

Trade union duties and activities

Officials of recognised trade unions have statutory rights to take a reasonable amount of paid time off to carry out their duties, while union members have rights to reasonable unpaid time off to participate in union activities. Union learning representatives are also entitled to reasonable paid time off.

For officials (shop stewards and the like) appropriate duties must be concerned with:

negotiations with the employer
other functions on behalf of employees – terms of employment, discipline etc
relevant training on, for example, negotiating skills, legislation.

Examples of the sort of activities that might entitle union members to unpaid time off include:

attending workplace meetings about the outcome of negotiations
meeting full-time officials
voting in union elections.

ACAS has a Code of Practice on time off for union duties, giving full guidance⁶.

Military training and service

Members of the Volunteer Reserve Forces undertake training and may be required to serve alongside the regular forces. Training is typically one evening a week, plus around 30 full days a year, of which 15 days are at weekends, with the remainder in one continuous period of 15 days.

Employers are under no legal obligation to provide time off for military training, but most provide at least some paid time off, taking the view that the skills and abilities employees pick up during such training are valuable in the workplace.

It is unlawful for an employer to terminate an individual’s employment solely or mainly because the employee is liable to be mobilised. However, an employer can seek exemption or deferral of call up if the relevant force adjudication officer can be satisfied that it would ‘cause serious harm to the employer’s business’.

Reservists do not suffer loss of earnings during military service – if their normal pay is higher than their military pay, they can claim the difference. Employers may claim for the costs of replacements or overtime if existing staff cover for reservists.

For more information on employing reservists, CIPD members can see our Reserve forces FAQs.

Go to our Reserve forces FAQs

Maternity, paternity, adoption and parental leave

Women employees have had statutory maternity rights for many years. Since April 2003, fathers and adoptive parents also have statutory rights to paternity leave and adoption leave. Paternity and adoption leave rights also apply to partnerships of the same sex.

Following the Work and Familes Act 2006, changes to the legislation in this area came into force from 1 October 2006 and further changes are expected by 2010. For more information, see our factsheet on Maternity, paternity and adoption rights. CIPD members can see more information on the legal aspects in our related FAQs.

In addition to maternity, paternity or adoption leave, an employee with one year’s continuous employment who is the parent of a child under five has the right to take a total of 13 weeks’ unpaid leave during the first five years of the child’s life. The leave should be taken in blocks of one week or more and is subject to a limit of four weeks a year. Part of a week taken as parental leave counts as a full week. A minimum of 21 days’ notice of intention to take parental leave must be given. CIPD members can see more information on the legal aspects in our FAQ on parental rights.

Go to our Flexible working, parental rights and family-friendly provisions FAQs

Personal and domestic leave

All reasonable employers will grant time off, paid or unpaid, for sudden personal reasons such as bereavement or illness, or domestic emergencies like fire, flooding or burglary. But there is no statutory right to time off, except to care for dependants in certain emergencies and to make funeral arrangements for dependants and attend their funerals.

Under the 1996 Employment Relations Act, employees may take a reasonable amount of time off, for example:

to help when a dependant falls ill, gives birth, is injured or assaulted
to make arrangements to care for an ill or injured dependant
because of unexpected disruption to the care of a dependant
as a result of the death of a dependant
to deal with an incident involving an employee’s child and occurring at the child’s school.

A dependant iincludes:

the employee’s spouse or civil partner, child, parent or someone who lives in the same house (but not a lodger or tenant), or
any person who reasonably relies on the employee for assistance when they fall ill, are injured or assaulted, or to make arrangements for provision of care in the event of their illness or injury.

What is ‘reasonable’ is not specified in the legislation as it will depend on the circumstances, but one or two days will probably be sufficient for most typical emergencies such as having to make arrangements for a sick child.

When a dependant dies, an employee is entitled to take time off to make funeral arrangements and to attend the funeral.

There is no right to time off to attend medical or dental appointments, and employers’ practices vary. Some may ask employees to make up the time or use annual leave. Others may grant unpaid leave.

References

OFFICE FOR NATIONAL STATISTICS. (2008) Labour force survey. London: ONS. Available at http://www.statistics.gov.uk/downloads/theme_labour/
LMS_FR_HS/WebTable08.xls
OFFICE FOR NATIONAL STATISTICS. (2007) 2007 Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings: first release [online] London: ONS. Available at http://www.statisticsdownload.gov.uk/pdfdir/ashe1006.pdf
INCOMES DATA SERVICES. (2006) Overtime. HR study 813. London: IDS.
INCOMES DATA SERVICES. (2007) Hours and holidays. HR study 854. London: IDS.
INCOMES DATA SERVICES. (2006) Time off and special leave. HR study 821. London: IDS.
ACAS. (2003) Time off for trade union duties and activities. Code of Practice 3. London: Acas. Available at http://www.acas.org.uk/media/pdf/l/q/CP03_1.pdf

Working time and leave: an overview