Your employer is under no obligation to provide support for your childcare needs, although many are starting to realise that offering parents some kind of support can be a useful staff recruitment and retention tool. However, even if your employer doesn’t provide any practical or financial help with childcare, you should still check your contract to see if your employer gives you help in some other kind of way, such as allowing staff to alter their hours to for example, accommodate childcare drop off and pick up times.
There are also a number of rights to which you are entitled now that you are a parent. Individuals returning from a period of maternity, paternity or adoption leave have a right to request to work flexibly and you also have a right to reasonable time off to cover emergencies if you care for dependent relatives.
Should your employer agree to your request to work flexibly, you might choose to alter your start and finish times, condense your working week into fewer days or opt for term time working only. You should bear in mind however, that this is only a right to request and your employer may turn down your request if it feels that there is a reasonable case for doing so.
Time off for emergencies is limited to 5 days a year and is unpaid. As it is meant to cover unforeseen difficulties, and clearly has to be a genuine emergency, this leave cannot be booked in advance. However, you might need to call on the leave to rearrange emergency childcare if, for example, your usual childcare provider is unable to care for your child on a particular day. It is also not limited to parents and can also be used if you normally care for a neighbour, a friend or a member of your family.
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