Q: I have just found out that I'm entitled to 16 days holiday per year as I work part time. I earn £57.50 per day but only get £300 a year for holiday pay. This has been going on for six years now. I have no contract.
Dec 29 2010
Answered by: Peter Done Ask a question
There seem to be a couple of issues that need addressing here. It certainly sounds like your employer has been contravening the Working Time Regulations where your holiday entitlements are concerned. Additionally, assuming that you are an employee of your employer, rather than a ‘worker’, he has also failed to comply with your right to be given a written contract of employment.
It is important to recognise that you still have certain statutory rights in relation to your work even though nothing is written down in a contract.
Legislation states that you are entitled to a minimum of 5.6 working weeks’ paid holiday in each leave year and you have already calculated your pro-rata entitlement to be 16 days. This therefore permits you to be absent from work on holiday for this length of time and be paid for all of that time at your normal rate of pay. From the brief details that you provide, it appears you are receiving only around a third of what is due to you.
You should firstly bring this up with your employer, explaining that it is your statutory right to be paid for a minimum holiday entitlement of 16 days. If he refuses to address the issue, you could make a claim to a tribunal for the outstanding sum of money. Recent case law has shown that, in some circumstances, monetary sums outstanding from all previous years of employment in which incorrect payment has been made can be claimed at tribunal, rather than the outstanding sum from only the most recent year of employment, as has previously been the case.
It is also open for you to make a claim to a tribunal regarding your employer’s failure to issue you with a written contract of employment because you are entitled to be provided with one within 2 months of you starting work. As long as you were successful with your holiday pay claim, a tribunal could also award you a sum equal to 2 or 4 weeks’ pay for this second failure.
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