The Working Time (Amendment) Regulations (NI) 2023 came into force on 1st January 2024 and make amendments to the Working Time Regulations (NI) 2016 by amending:
In summary, they provide for rights to carry over holiday leave, in certain circumstances (e.g. long term sickness and maternity leave), into subsequent leave years and clarify what amounts to normal pay for purposes of 4 weeks annual leave.
The regulations place obligations on employers to encourage workers to take leave and inform them that they if they don’t the leave will be lost. They provide that workers can carry forward annual leave they cannot take as a result of family related statutory leave (e.g. maternity leave, adoption leave, shared parental leave) to the end of the next leave year. They can also carry forward leave they cannot take as a result of long term sickness provided it is taken within 18 months of the end of the original leave year.
The Regulations also allows workers to carry forward leave if an organisation has failed to:
The regulations also clarify that overtime payments, which have been regularly paid to a worker in the 12 weeks preceding the calculation must be included in a week’s pay for 4 weeks’ holiday (‘normal remuneration’).
This means that the law in Northern Ireland has now set the reference period at 12 weeks (52 weeks applies in GB); if an employee works overtime regularly (or receives payments such as commission) in the 12 weeks immediately preceding a holiday then these payments should be included in the calculation of holiday pay.
Many organisations may currently use a different reference period. These updated Regulations do not apply retrospectively (i.e. they should not open the possibility of historical claims where a different reference period has been used), but organisations should review the reference period used going forward.
Source: Michelle McGinley, Director of Legal & Policy, Employers Federation michelle@eefni.org