Holiday entitlement and the Working Time Directive

View contents

<<Previous page

The thinking behind the holiday entitlement

Many freelancers make the mistake of seeing the holiday entitlement within the Working Time Regulations as a handy top-up to the freelance rate. This is not the prime objective of the legislation at all. Fundamentally the Directive is designed to make sure that employees take holiday time, and that this holiday time is paid, so that the workers can afford to take it. First and foremost, the Directive is motivated by the human need - and the right - to take time off.

Holiday pay in lieu is not supposed to be considered as an alternative to the time off. The issue of holiday pay, in lieu of paid holiday time, only kicks in when an employee terminates their contract without having taken all the paid holiday time that is due to them. They are then, as a last resort, entitled to remuneration in lieu of the paid holiday they should have taken during that period.

Of course, within the TV industry, freelance contracts may be only for a few days, weeks or months, and often do not have holiday time built in to them. As an employer is constantly 'terminating' a contract each time the freelancer moves on to a new job, without the accrued holiday time being taken, payment in lieu is often the only possible outcome, rather than taking the actual paid holiday time.

>>Next page

View contents

Back to knowledge base