Employment Leave Act

Sick leave will accrue from an employee’s first day of employment at a rate of 0.0385 an hour per standard hour of work (as defined above) up to a maximum of 160 hours. If your sick leave balance is more than 160 hours, you stop accruing it until your balance reduces. However, provisions in a collective agreement may override this cap, entitling employees to accrue additional sick leave.  

Sick leave can be taken on an hourly basis. 

The number of days available remains the same: three days’ bereavement leave on the death of a close family member and one day in other eligible cases, but employees are entitled to bereavement leave from their first day of employment. The new Act also explicitly allows for leave to be taken in whole or part days. 

The number of days available remains the same: up to 10 days’ family violence leave per year, but employees are entitled to family violence leave from their first day of employment. The new Act also explicitly allows for leave to be taken in whole or part days. 

If your employment agreement does not specify days of work or you work additional days to those specified – you will be entitled to a public holiday if you worked (or were on paid or unpaid leave) on 50% or more of the days of the week that the public holiday falls on over the last 13 weeks (or the over period of your employment, if fewer than 13 weeks).  

Currently, in our Te Whatu Ora collective agreements, we have the same formula but with a lower threshold of 40% (5 out of 13 weeks). 

Where you work (or are on call) on a public holiday that falls on your otherwise working day, you will accrue alternative leave at a rate of one hour for every hour worked. This leave can then be taken in hours or cashed up. 

This changes the current requirement that an employee is entitled to a whole paid alternative holiday if they work on any part of a public holiday. For example, if you work the night shift on a public holiday, and commence the shift at 23:00, you work for one hour of the public holiday (23:00 – 00:00). Currently, you are entitled to one whole day’s alternative holiday. Under the new legislation, you will be entitled to just one hour of alternative leave.   

All leave types will be paid at the employee’s base hourly rate for your contracted hours only during the shift (i.e., continuous period) the leave is taken. Fixed allowances will be paid in full during periods of leave, but other components of pay will be excluded. This means leave payments will no longer take overtime, extra shifts, and weekend or night penal rates into account; a provision that previously ensured you are not disadvantaged in pay when you go on holiday.  

Annual leave taken following parental leave will not be paid at a lower rate. 

A leave compensation payment (LCP) of 12.5% of an employee’s ordinary hourly rate, will apply to all ‘casual’ and ‘additional’ hours of work (as defined above). This is instead of annual or sick leave being accrued on these hours. This leave compensation payment will be paid in your regular pay (like “pay for the holiday as you go”) – the expectation being employees will squirrel away the 12.5% LCP as they receive it to save up for their holiday. LCP is required to be an identifiable and separate item on your payslip. 

Where an employer has two or more roles with standard hours with the same employer, the parties may agree how leave entitlements and payments under the Act will be treated for each role. If the parties do not agree, however, the Act will apply to each role separately. 

Some of our members at Te Whatu Ora have already experienced the challenges of being classified as a so-called “multi-jobber”. Consequently, before accepting a second or subsequent role with the same employer (whether at Te Whatu Ora or elsewhere), we encourage members to get in touch with the APEX office.