With the government’s advice having now changed from work from home if possible, to return to the workplace if it is COVID-19 secure, many parents will find it difficult to return to work due a lack of childcare.
It is a good idea to talk to your employer about the different options available to you to assist with balancing childcare responsibilities with working.
Options include:
Furlough
If you were previously furloughed before 10 June or are returning from maternity leave you can ask your employer to be furloughed.
The guidance provided by the government makes it clear that if you are unable to work due to caring or childcare responsibilities as a result of coronavirus, your employer can furlough you and claim under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme.
Work from Home
If the nature of your job allows, you could discuss with your employer whether you could continue to work from home if you have already been doing so. If you are returning from furlough leave, you could discuss whether you could work from home, at least until schools and other childcare facilities reopen in September.
You may wish to negotiate changing what hours you work – perhaps you could work in the evening when your partner is home to help with the children or the children are in bed.
We discuss making flexible working requests later in this blog.
Time Off For Dependants
You can request to take time off for dependants – this is usually unpaid unless your contract states it is paid or your employer agrees to pay.
Time off for dependants is to allow you time to make childcare arrangements when an unexpected event occurs, and therefore, is usually only expected to be for a couple of days.
This may not be suitable under the current circumstances as options for childcare that can be arranged is limited.
Parental Leave
Parental leave is usually unpaid. You are entitled to 18 weeks’ leave for each child and adopted child, up to their 18th birthday.
The limit on how much parental leave each parent can take in a year is four weeks for each child (unless you employer agrees otherwise).
You must take parental leave as whole weeks (e.g. one week or two weeks) rather than individual days, unless your employer agrees otherwise or if your child is disabled. However, you don’t have to take all the leave at once.
A ‘week’ equals the length of time you normally work over seven days.
Annual Leave
If you have holiday remaining, you could request to take annual leave.
You are likely only to be able to take what leave you have already accrued and your employer, will have to agree to this.
Your employer might be willing to allow you to take holiday that you’ve not yet accrued, however, if for any reason you leave your employment you would have to pay them back for any holiday you’ve taken over and above what you’re entitled to at the date that you left.
Flexible Working
Employees who have been employed for more than 26 weeks are eligible to make a request for flexible working.
Options for flexible working that may assist you in the current situation include:
- Working from home – It might be possible for you to do some or all your work from home rather than your normal place of work.
- Part-time working – You would work less than your usual full-time hours (either working fewer hours per day or fewer days per week).
- Compressed hours – This would involve you working full-time hours but over fewer days.
- Flexitime – This would allow you to choose when to start and end work (within agreed limits) but works certain ‘core hours’, for example 10am to 4pm every day.
- Staggered hours – This would mean that you have different start, finish and break times from other workers.
Any changes to your normal working pattern can be on a temporary or permanent basis. Your employer must consider your request but can reject it for one or more of eight prescribed reasons.
Unpaid Leave
If your employer agrees, you can request to take unpaid leave. There is no specified amount of unpaid leave that you can take however, your employer is likely to ask you for at least an indication of how long you expect to be off work for.
For more information and to find out how we can help you, please contact our Employment Team on 0345 646 0406 or fill in our online enquiry form and a member of our Team will be in touch.