What is impact of public holidays on period of notice?
Author Paul Munro 21 Feb 2012
Public holidays and other absences that fall in an employee’s period of notice leading up to a termination date can sometimes appear to confuse the actual date of termination.
The question was recently sent to WorkplaceInfo.
Q We have a full-time employee who gave four weeks of notice of termination of their employment in mid-January, with their date of resignation being 10 February.
Their period of notice included the Australia Day public holiday.
Also, the employee had taken two days personal/carer’s leave during the notice period.
The employee is employed under the Clerks — Private Sector Award 2010, which requires the same period of notice to be given by the employee to the employer as required to by the employer when giving notice under the National Employment Standard (NES).
The modern award does not indicate whether the period of notice is extended by any days the employee is absent during the period of notice.
Can we insist the period of notice be extended by three working days because the employee was absent due to illness, and the occurrence of the Australia Day public holiday?
A In the absence of a specific provision to the contrary in the modern award (or other applicable industrial instrument), any absence by the employee during the period of notice does not extend the period of notice.
Paid absences which commonly occur during a notice period, such as personal/carer’s leave, public holidays, compassionate leave, etc, do not extend the length of the period of notice but form part of the period of notice.
This principle applies regardless of which party has given notice of termination of employment.
Therefore, the original date of resignation (10 February in this case) will remain the date of termination of the employment.
A–Z on WorkplaceInfo
The A–Z collection on WorkplaceInfo is the place to look for explanation and analysis of Australian employment law/industrial relations topics.
For example, here are detailed writings on Notice of termination of employment.
The question was recently sent to WorkplaceInfo.
Q We have a full-time employee who gave four weeks of notice of termination of their employment in mid-January, with their date of resignation being 10 February.
Their period of notice included the Australia Day public holiday.
Also, the employee had taken two days personal/carer’s leave during the notice period.
The employee is employed under the Clerks — Private Sector Award 2010, which requires the same period of notice to be given by the employee to the employer as required to by the employer when giving notice under the National Employment Standard (NES).
The modern award does not indicate whether the period of notice is extended by any days the employee is absent during the period of notice.
Can we insist the period of notice be extended by three working days because the employee was absent due to illness, and the occurrence of the Australia Day public holiday?
A In the absence of a specific provision to the contrary in the modern award (or other applicable industrial instrument), any absence by the employee during the period of notice does not extend the period of notice.
Paid absences which commonly occur during a notice period, such as personal/carer’s leave, public holidays, compassionate leave, etc, do not extend the length of the period of notice but form part of the period of notice.
This principle applies regardless of which party has given notice of termination of employment.
Therefore, the original date of resignation (10 February in this case) will remain the date of termination of the employment.
A–Z on WorkplaceInfo
The A–Z collection on WorkplaceInfo is the place to look for explanation and analysis of Australian employment law/industrial relations topics.
For example, here are detailed writings on Notice of termination of employment.
Source: Paul Munro, IR Consultant.
 | Paul Munro Paul has over 30 years’ experience providing advice to employers on workplace issues, with over 25 years as a workplace relations advisor with New South Wales Business Chamber. Paul has also been in a workplace advisory role with employer organisations in the timber industry and club industry. more from Paul |
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