Early May Bank Holiday 2020 – are you ready?

The Government recently announced that the Early May Bank Holiday for 2020 will be moved. It is going from its usual ‘first Monday in May’ slot, to Friday 8th May, to commemorate the 75th anniversary of VE Day. This will keep the total number of Bank Holidays the same, but does still create potential problems for employers.

Are you going to be affected? What should you consider?

The first thing you should do is check your Employment Contracts. The wording of these will decide whether your team are entitled to this day off or not.

• Employees do not have a statutory right to time off on a Bank Holiday. If your contracts require your team to work on Bank Holidays, they will still need to do so, as long as you provide enough time off in lieu for statutory annual leave entitlements.
• If your team usually do have the day off on Bank Holidays, you will need to look more closely at the wording within your contracts.
• If your contracts specifically state that your team qualify for ‘all Bank Holidays’ or ‘including the Early May Bank Holiday’ without stating the date, then your employees will have the right to Friday 8th May 2020 as holiday.
• If your contracts specifically state that your Bank Holidays include ‘the first Monday in May’ then they may not.

You will similarly need to decide whether you will open the business on the Monday, and close on the Friday, and if so, how that will affect your staff needs. That then needs to fit around your Contracts.

We would strongly advise that you speak to your HR support in plenty of time to ensure that you are clear about where you stand well before your team ask!

If you don’t have any support, but have any employees or are considering them in the near future, now is the time to think about the level of support you may need for the future. Please do get in touch if you’d like an introduction to the HR gurus we’ve relied on for many years who will be able to help.