General Note
NHS Fife acknowledges and agrees with the importance of regular and timely review of policy/procedure statements and aims to review policies within the timescales set out.
New policies/procedures will be subject to a review date of no more than 1 year from the date of first issue.
Reviewed policies/procedures will have a review date set that is relevant to the content (advised by the author) but will be no longer than 3 years.
If a policy/procedure is past its review date then the content will remain extant until such time as the policy/procedure review is complete and the new version published, or there are national policy or legislative changes.
Agenda for Change: TERMS AND CONDITIONS GUIDANCE
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Doc Title |
Term-time and Annualised Hours Working – Calculation of Annual Leave and Public Holiday Entitlements |
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Distribution |
Circulation to Executive Directors Group and General Managers for cascading to all managers who have staff working on a term-time basis
HR and Payroll Departments |
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Document Reference Number |
CoS013 (Updated June 2017) |
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Content Based on Decision made by |
Scottish Pay Review and Implementation Group (SPRIG) guidance letter dated 9/11/2005, ref no SGL/2005/011 |
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Description |
This briefing expands on the guidance provided by SPRIG and provides the formula for calculating the annual leave entitlements for staff who work on a term-time only basis and those working annualised hours. |
INTRODUCTION
Managers should have systems in place to ensure that the leave entitlements of term-time only and annualised hours staff are adjusted on completion of five and ten years service, including counting of any previous reckonable NHS service. This will result in a re-calculation of the employee’s term-time or annualised hours.
In addition, managers should have systems in place to ensure that staff are working for the agreed contractual term-time periods; the majority of which are on 38, 39 or 40 weeks. The basis of the term-time periods are as follows:
- A 40 week contract allows for being off only during the main school holidays, i.e. Spring Holidays, Summer Holidays, Autumn Holidays and Christmas Holidays, as confirmed by the relevant Council. Staff employed on a 40 week term-time contract will be expected to work during in service days and any other Council additional holidays.
- A 39 week contract allows for being off during all school holidays as identified above and the additional holidays as specified by the relevant Council, and may vary from year to year. Staff employed on a 39 week term-time contract must work during in service days.
- A 38 week contract allows for being off during all school holidays, i.e. the main school holidays, the additional holidays specified by the relevant Council and in service days.
Details of the relevant Council school holidays are published on their web site.
Where staff change to work on a term-time only or annualised hours basis or cease working on this basis part way through a leave year, the relevant calculation will apply to / from the date of the agreed contractual change, ie, either the commencement or cessation of term time working. No re-calculation will be done in respect of forthcoming school holidays, when a term time arrangement ceases, or retrospective school holidays on commencement of a term-time arrangement.
Depending on the agreed contractual annualised hours / term-time period, there may be days where a school or facility is closed and the term-time employee should be at work, therefore, arrangements need to be made to provide an alternative work base.
The normal NHS Fife fixed public holiday dates do not apply to term-time staff as these days are added to staff’s leave entitlement and salary payments. Public holiday enhancements are, therefore, only payable when term-time staff are required for service needs, to work on a public holiday designated by the Education Authority or other relevant authority.
Where an additional public holiday is granted for NHS Scotland, separate guidance will be issued for managers at that time.
Appendix 2is guidance for managers to assist with the calculations of leave for term time employees. Managers will need to ensure this is recalculated should the working arrangements for an employee change part way through a leave year.
A notification of change form or submission onto a management information system may be required. Please speak to your relevant HR Assistant, if you are unsure.
The minimum WTR entitlement of 28 days (pro rata) also applies to term time and annualised hours working arrangements.
Annualised Hours
Within NHS Fife, there are currently only a few formalised annualised hours arrangements in place. Should any department or directorate wish to introduce an annualised hours working arrangement for staff they must discuss this with their Human Resources contact in order that this may be progressed appropriately and in line with the relevant employment law provisions.
Please note that this guidance should not be used to calculate the annual leave entitlement for any other staff outwith those described (i.e. term-time and annualised hours workers).
Entitlement on Joining
Calculation of annual leave for staff who work on a term-time only basis and those working annualised hours should be undertaken as follows:
- Annualise the hours of the individual.
- Divide these annualised hours by 52.143 to get average weekly hours over the whole year.
- Add the annual leave and public holiday entitlement for this number of hours – using the tables for the calculation of leave.
- Increase the leave entitlement to reflect that this should be treated as service.
Example:
The following example is based on an individual who works for 38 weeks (although in practice, the number of weeks may vary), 20 hours per week over 5 days and based on a whole time annual leave entitlement of 27 days.
- Total hours worked in the year = 760 (38 x 20).
- Annual weekly average = 760 / 52.143 = 14.5 hours per week (to the nearest half hour).
- Then refer to Tables 1 and 2 attached: annual leave entitlement = 78.5 hours plus 23 hours for bank holidays. Total leave entitlement = 101.5 hours.
- Increase to reflect that the leave entitlement is treated as service (and, therefore, itself accrues annual leave).
Formula: Leave entitlement (101.5 hours) – divided by total hours worked in a year (760) – multiplied by the total hours worked plus leave (101.5+760 = 861.5) i.e.:
101.5 / 760 x 861.5 =115 hours
Leave Entitlement = 115 hours (to nearest half hour)
A table showing the calculation of School Terms Only hours including annual leave is attached, for reference purposes only at Appendix 1.
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