Consider the options when employees must stay home with children
Even if you don’t have children of school age, the fact that it is half term this week won’t have escaped your attention. Your journey into work will have been easier for a start and the office may well be quieter, with a number of staff on prebooked leave to care for children off from school.
But what do you do if someone who has not booked holiday telephones this morning to say that the grandparent or child minder who was due to look after their child has fallen ill and they can’t make it into work for the rest of the week? What can your employee ask for and what can you offer? Duvet days or holiday If you have a policy of allowing employees a given number of days leave each year at short notice and without having to give any reason – often known as duvet days or personal days - the employee may elect to take those days to cover their absence.
Alternatively the employee may ask to take some holiday without giving the usual period of advance notice you require either by practice or contained in formal holiday policy. You cannot insist that your employee takes holiday but can offer this option. The absence is then paid leave. Working from home How effective a solution this is depends on the particular circumstances. The kind of work the employee does may not be capable of being carried out at home or they may have young children who cannot be left for long periods in front of the telly while the employee sits at their computer.
Although many employers embrace flexible working, there are others who feel that employees do not put in a full day’s work from home.
However, this is a solution which can work very well for both employer
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and employee, particularly as the employee does not lose any pay and the employer gets the work done. Time off for dependants Employees have the right to take a “reasonable amount” of time off work in order to deal with particular situations affecting their dependants. There is no qualifying period of employment before employees acquire this right but it is unpaid leave.
It relates to dependants not just children so includes spouses, civil partners or parents (but not grandparents) of the employee.
The right expressly includes unexpected disruption or termination of arrangements for the care of a dependant. Unexpected does not mean “sudden” and two weeks’ notice of a disruption in childcare has been held to be unexpected. Parental leave This is not the new shared parental leave but a longer standing right for employees to take unpaid leave to care for children. Employees must have been employed for one year, have responsibility for the child and be taking the leave to care for the child. Unless the employer agrees to a more flexible scheme, the leave must be taken in blocks of one week,