Bank holidays being used as your annual leave days

Post Reply New Topic

This thread is more for UK members.

It's so annoying that we get 28 holiday days a year but at least 8 of them are taken for bank holidays. I know the bank holidays means a day off like holiday days are but it's not chosen by me and it reduces the number of holiday days I can take off on non-bank holiday days. As well as having 2-3 weeks off a year (which isn't much out of the whole year), people also need to take holiday days for appointments and other important things as well that may crop up.
And when a year has extra bank holidays, like this year is going to have (I heard we're having a bank holiday in June, something to do with the Queen), that's another day taken off my holiday days, and I feel I hardly ever have a week's break. Last year I suddenly realised I had ran out of holiday days in December, so I have 4 months of work without a holiday (bank holiday or not).

I have a family event coming up next month, but it's not what you think. It's the day my mum's ashes are being buried and I want to be there of course. But because of so many bank holidays (the days the government give us and the work firm closes, not the days of my choice), I have no more holiday days until April.

Why are people forced to use up their holiday days on bank holidays? Stupid.

But isn't 20 days = 4 weeks?
That's an absolute minimum here, I have 8 weeks, bank holidays not included.
In fact, when the national day occurs on a week-end, we get to take an extra day off, to compensate.
Plus we can take (payed) time off for burials of close relatives, moving house, and something else that I forget.
And we have reduced hours the day before a bank holiday, like 4 hours work time instead of 8.

/Mats

Yes, we have 20 days legally as a minimum and 8 days bank holiday added to that.

I can understand that its annoying if you're in a place that closes on bank hols and you have to take them. Where I work we don't close and I can use the days whenever I like through the year. If I want the bank hol off I put in for a holiday that day.

The Queen's extra bank hol should be added to your allowance not taken away from it. If they take the day away complain.

Keep a diary of your holidays to keep track and make sure they don't short change you on that day.

We have an automated system that adds up our days so I can see at a glance how many I have which makes it easier to keep track.

A friend of mine is forced to take 3 weeks of his holiday allowance when his work closes at Christmas which is terrible. So he has 13 days left for the whole rest of the year.

We've got a really generous allowance compared to Americans. In some states they only get a week for the whole year! I'd go insane.

Well it seemed like 3 weeks. I took 1 week off in the spring and 2 weeks off in the summer, and had the odd 5 days for appointments and covid injections (I took days off for covid injections because I didn't know how I'd be with the side effects). It just doesn't seem a lot though. I could do with 6 weeks a year.

Maybe I should work in a school. They get the whole summer off.



That isn't fair.

Well it seemed like 3 weeks. I took 1 week off in the spring and 2 weeks off in the summer, and had the odd 5 days for appointments and covid injections (I took days off for covid injections because I didn't know how I'd be with the side effects). It just doesn't seem a lot though. I could do with 6 weeks a year.

Maybe I should work in a school. They get the whole summer off.



That isn't fair.

It's interesting how it works in different countries.
We used to have a system that counted 6 days off if the time spanned over a week end. One week=5 days, two weeks=11 days.
Also, if we took time off during winter, we'd get an extra day off per week.

Overtime is another thing, in some countries it's expected but here we have to get direct orders to work overtime, and we get compensated by as much as twise the time/money for it. Ie working 4 hours on a saturday gives me a day off on a work day.

/Mats