Unlimited holiday could represent a very good alternative to flexible working, experts argue

Offering employees the possibility of taking unlimited holiday instead of offering them flexible working conditions could represent a major alternative for numerous businesses and make it easier for them to monitor and manage employees, a top expert in the field of HR has recently argued.

Director of EST Accountants Barry Esterhuizen believes that unlimited holiday, where employees take as much holiday as they want when they want, offered the benefits of flexible working but gave businesses more certainty.

"If you know someone's away for a week you can work with that. If someone's leaving at four one day and then two another for example, it becomes more difficult," said Esterhuizen. "Unlimited holiday allows us to manage resources more effectively."

The policy would probably lead employees to take less than their allocated 28 days some years, as people often see 28 days as "a target" to be hit rather than a desirable amount of time off. He said he thought use would average out to around 28 days a year over several years though.

Time and Attendance payroll technology to automatize unlimited holiday pay calculations

Companies who're considering offering unlimited holiday options to their personnel should also consider implementing a solid and reliable time and attendance system designed to offer HR and department managers a clear overview of all holiday bookings and approve (or disallow) them accordingly.

That's exactly the case with Tensor's WinTA.NET system, which supports extensive Absence Planning and Entitlement Management. The built-in graphical calendar charts provide a colourful way of viewing an individual's or a department's absence records, and each employee can be allocated different entitlements for absence such as annual leave or allowed sickness.

As absence is booked and taken, the remainder available for each entitlement is updated. Entitlement formulae are used to calculate more complex entitlements calculated on a rising scale based upon length of service.

WinTA.NET provides this information through warning email notifications or via hardcopy reports. The system quickly identifies missing employees that are expected to be at work and then informs you via automatic email reporting reports distributed by email.

If you'd like to find out more about the Tensor WinTA.NET system just contact us or Book a Demo, we'll be more than happy to answer all of your questions and queries.