Holiday entitlement during leave




Employees on maternity, adoption, ordinary or shared parental leave accrue holiday, both statutory and contractual, during their leave. However, they are not allowed to take holiday while on these kinds of leave, so they often build up large amounts of holiday to take at the end. Taking paid holiday can be a good way of extending the time spent at home, once the statutory right to pay has run out. 




An employee who is unable, because of the timing of their holiday year, to use up their full statutory annual leave before going on maternity leave must be allowed to carry it over to take after the maternity leave has ended (Gomez v Continental Industries del Caucho [2004] IRLR 407), even if the contract of employment says that an employee will forfeit any holiday unused at the end of the holiday year. Making the woman forfeit the leave she was unable to take while on maternity leave would be maternity discrimination.




An employee who returns to work part-time having worked full-time before going on maternity, adoption or shared parental leave will accrue holiday during leave based on their full-time hours.