Q: We have an employee intending to take up to 52 weeks of parental leave.
She wants to start leave 11 days before her due date.
She has 16.50 days of entitled annual leave, and 10.90 of accrued and wants to use this first, at the start of her leave period.
Can she do this, and add the 52 weeks on after that, or does the 52 weeks of parental leave need to start on the due date? Can she technically be paid annual leave after the due date on her midwife certificate?
A: The employee can take annual holidays prior to taking extended leave (52 weeks). Does she want to use accrued leave before entitled leave?
Q: I think she intends to take both entitled and accrued, which means she will be being paid annual leave for almost a month after her due date. I want to confirm that that is allowed, or if there will be any complication with government parental leave payments, since the Employment New Zealand website says: ‘Primary carer leave starts on the due date or the date childbirth starts if the child is born to the employee.’
A: The employer has no obligation to provide leave in advance to the employee prior to going on parental leave (up to the employer to approve). In the past, if the baby arrived while on annual holidays, the annual holiday stopped, and parental leave would commence. Now the employee can stay on annual leave and then take parental. The result of this is parental leave stops based on what comes first: the baby turns 1, or the employee completes 52 weeks of parental leave.
Parental leave payments from the government have nothing to do with payroll and are based on the employee’s circumstances; they need to talk to MBIE or IRD.