Recognised Customary Or Other Holiday (Info)

Recognised, customary or other holidays should be disregarded when considering the hours worked.

Recognised customary or other holidays are days which employers and employees have agreed are non-working days. However, not every day that employers and employees agree are non-working days are days of recognised, customary or other holiday.

Example

Stephen Jones is a non teaching assistant in a school where lessons take place Monday to Friday and Saturday morning. Stephen’s contract of employment requires him to work Monday to Friday and on Saturday. In May, following discussions between the Headmaster, Governors and employees, it was decided with the agreement of all parties that from the start of the next academic year lessons would no longer take place on Saturday.

Stephen’s contract of employment now requires him to work Monday to Friday. Although all parties agree that Saturday is a non-working day it was not agreed that it was a holiday. It is therefore, not a day of recognised, customary or other holiday.

A period can be recognised, customary or other holiday even when an employee

• Does not receive holiday pay

Or

• Is free to seek work elsewhere during the holiday

People who work in a particular place are covered by the holiday arrangements there. However, a day that is a holiday for most workers in a place is not always a holiday for the claimant. This can only be decided by examining all the evidence to see whether there is anything that makes the claimant’s holiday agreement different from that of their colleagues. This happens, most commonly, in educational establishments.

Any period for which a person receives holiday or wages in lieu of holiday pay is a period of recognised customary or other holiday, as is a period which the claimant considers to be a holiday.

To decide whether a period is a recognised, customary or other holiday the claimant should

• Look at the terms of their contract of employment, which may set out the actual period and dates of the claimant’s holidays. Often the contract will only state that the claimant is entitled to a certain number of days holiday pay

• Consider any employer’s evidence, supplied by the claimant about attribution of holiday entitlement to certain days. If it is attributable these days are days of recognised, customary or other holidays

If the holiday pay or entitlement is not linked to specific days then the claimant should advise you that they

• Have arranged to take a holiday at a particular time

Or

• Consider any particular period to be a holiday

Such days (up to the maximum holiday entitlement in the claimant’s contract) should be treated as days of customary recognised holiday and disregarded.