Using your holiday before resigning

[RonaldMcDonald]

hi folks,
i have started a new job a few months ago and I have used about 60% of my holiday allowance for this year although in fairness some of it is a month or two down the line.

im also on probation which means I could leave whenever I like with no working notice. would they have any comebacks if I used all my holidays before leaving a few weeks later? bar a bad reference?

[RemainAllHoof]

You will have to pay back salary if you over-use the holiday "pro-rata". Or they will just withhold some of the salary. Or chase you in the small claims court (presumably it's under £2k and you're not a £1.2m a year city banker ).

[RonaldMcDonald]

I've not overused the amount allocated to me / pro-rota. nowhere in my contract does it state that if i leave before my first year that I have to return a proportion of my salary to cover the holidays

[Slinky]

RonaldMcDonald said:

I've not overused the amount allocated to me / pro-rota. nowhere in my contract does it state that if i leave before my first year that I have to return a proportion of my salary to cover the holidays

Your holiday entitlement is based on a years service, therefore if you leave prior to the end of that year, having taken a full year's worth of holiday you have generated a debt.. That debt will need to be repaid and should be deducted from your salary.

[edc]

It might not be in your contract but could be in your handbook or some other policy addendum. The clause may well say something along the lines that your annual holiday entitlement is X and your accrual will be at Y per month.

Even if it doesn't state it anywhere I bet your employer will claw back the pro rata amount from your final salary anyway. What are you going to do then? Cry foul play? If you really want your money back in that situation you will have to go to Tribunal to make a claim for unlawful deduction of wages. I'd like to see you win that one.

[GeraldSmith]

Think of it this way, if you worked 6 months then left without having taken any holiday you would, rightly, expect to be paid for unused holiday. Well it works the other way round too.

[RemainAllHoof]

Yeah, we had someone who joined us for 2 weeks, then buggered off on holiday for 2 weeks, then handed in her resignation upon returning. Some salary was returned from the employee.

[TurricanII]

Does your contract mention that holiday is accrued at the rate of 2 days per complete calendar month worked? This wording I have seen in a couple of contracts, and makes it easy to tot up how many days will be deducted from your final payment

[RonaldMcDonald]

as expected, thanks guys.