Managing Leave Balances
Many of the board's staff regularly take annual leave when the school closes for school holidays.
This keeps many employees' total annual leave entitlements manageable.
Other employees who work during term breaks can sometimes accumulate large amounts of annual leave.
This not only represents a large financial liability for the board, but it also means an employee may not be taking enough time to rest and relax away from work.
What do principals have to do?
Ensure effective leave management procedures are implemented, communicated with staff and monitored, which include:
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How and when employees make requests
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Who has the authority to approve requests
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The process for preventing or managing huge leave accumulations for 52-week non-teaching staff.
Ensure that accurate leave records are kept, which comply with the requirements of the Holidays Act 2003open_in_new.
These can be included in the employment detail summaryopen_in_new, which should be updated annually and kept in the employee's personnel file.
Education Payroll Limited's (EPL) leave report contains much of this information.
Ensure they or their EPL-authorised users submit leave information, forms, and bookings promptly to EPL to ensure accurate payment calculations.
Report on leave matters to the board in accordance with policy.
This may include discretionary leave, long-term sick leave and significant leave liabilities.
Promote healthy work/life balances to staff who are hesitant to take leave, encouraging it to support one's wellbeing.
How can you reduce a large accumulation of leave?
Make a plan with the employee(s) and agree to reduce the leave.
This could include taking leave when they would not normally take it (such as during the school holidays when they are a 52 week a year employee), having a period of 3-day weekends or taking one large holiday.
You could cash up to one week of annual leave per yearopen_in_new at the employee's request.
If you cannot reach an agreement with the employee about how to use their leave, you can direct the employee to take annual leave with at least 14 days notice of the requirement to take some or all of their accrued leave.
See section 19 of the Holidays Act 2003 open_in_new to ensure you follow the law when requiring employees to take leave.
Note: If you have employees not paid through EPL online, the same requirements as above apply to your school payroll systems.
Questions a principal could ask
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Are staff aware of and have access to our Managing Leave policy and procedures?
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What delegations do I have for approving paid or unpaid discretionary leave?
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How do we induct new employees around managing leave?
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What information do I need to include in reporting to the board?
Templates, resources, and references
Click on the link(s) below to access the templates, resources, and references related to this topic.
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Links from us
Education Payroll Limited
Holidays Act 2003