Holidays
This doc summarises co-op policy around holiday entitlement, the Christmas shutdown period, how to schedule holidays, our holiday process, and holiday rollover.
Holiday entitlement
The standard holiday year runs from 1 April to 31 March. Your holiday accrues on a daily basis.
All staff are entitled to paid leave on:
- Statutory holiday entitlement based on days worked per week.
- Plus 3 days public holiday
This comes out to:
| Days worked per week | Annual entitlement |
|---|---|
| 5 | 31 |
| 4 | 25.5 |
| 3 | 20 |
If you have a different working week pattern, you can use the Holiday / pay calculator to work out your entitlement under this policy.
Co-op winter shutdown
Three days of your leave entitlement must be taken in the period between 25th December and 1st January, when Common Knowledge closes.
We normally close on the 23rd of December and return to the office on the 3rd of January, but this depends on where weekends fall.
Scheduling holiday
The longer the holiday, the sooner in advance you should mention it
As a guideline:
- 1 day: 1 week
- 1 week: 1 month
- 4 weeks: 4 months
Let people know on Twist
When you have ideas or plans about time off, let the team know so we can discuss and plan around it.
Ideally summarise your plans in the Availability thread on Twist.
Record your leave in BrightPay and Google Calendar
How to record leave in Google Calendar
Create an all day event "Out of Office" event in your own personal calendar that spans all the days you expect to take off.
This means we'll be able to see if event invites clash with your OOO period.
How to record leave in BrightPay
- Login to BrightPay:
- Click the
Add Leavebutton below the calendar: - Fill out the form:
- Another member will approve the days!
- Ensures accurate / precise data entry.
- Builds awareness of availability between team mates.
Going on holiday
- On the last day before you head off, check in with 'critical concerns' meeting to relieve you enough that you can take your mind off work and not dread the return date.
- Right before you finish work, leave the Signal group so that you're not mindlessly checking in on it. We re-add you when you're back.
- When you're back, we'll do a debrief on anything that's happened — if it coincides with a planning or a retro, we can feed two birds with one scone.
Unused holidays
A maximum number of 10 days may be carried forward to the following holiday year, with the co-op’s written permission. It must be used within 2 months of the new year.
If you leave the co-operative with some holiday entitlement not taken in the current holiday year, you will be paid on your last day of employment a sum representing pay for the number of holidays accrued but not taken.