Leave Arrangements For Parents: Everything You Want To Know

If you are pregnant, you want to know what you (and your partner) are entitled to when it comes to all leave arrangements.

This applies, of course, to your maternity leave, but also to leave after the birth, such as parental leave.

What are you entitled to and how do you plan this properly for as much quality time as possible with your (future) family?

In this article, I will share with you everything you should know about leave arrangements for parents.

Let’s go on now.

Maternity Leave & Maternity Leave: What Are You Entitled To

Everyone who works and is pregnant is entitled to maternity leave .

Maternity leave is a nice and necessary arrangement that ensures that you can take the rest your body needs.

You can also prepare for childbirth and this period is good for the development and final growth spurt of your baby.

After the birth, your resting period will turn into maternity leave.

You need this time to recover and to get used to your family together with your baby.

Birth Leave For Partners

With birth leave your partner gets a number of days off after giving birth. This leave is paid. Birth leave consists of one working week.

Additional Birth Leave

With the additional birth leave you can take up to five weeks of leave. The additional birth leave is partially paid.

After this, your partner – just like you – is entitled to parental leave.

Paid And Unpaid Parental Leave

With parental leave , both you and your partner can temporarily work less.

Both parents can take nine weeks of paid parental leave in their baby’s first year of life.

In total you are entitled to 26 times the number of hours per week that you work and you can take this until your child is eight years old.

Very nice to get used to your new family and to take care of your child.

How Long Are You Entitled To Parental Leave

You are entitled to 26 weeks of parental leave.

The hours for the leave are calculated on the basis of the number of hours stated in your employment contract.

In addition, the father, or your partner, also receives five days of birth leave and is entitled to five weeks of additional birth leave.

The Possible Consequences Of Parental Leave

Please note that the ‘income-related schemes’ (such as rent allowance, childcare allowance and home care allowance) are linked to your salary.

By taking unpaid leave, your income can change and this can have consequences for the allowances.

Whether the pension accrual continues during the leave depends on the pension scheme. Please check with your employer in advance.

Public Holidays

Does your parental leave coincide with a public holiday? In that case, that day will simply count as parental leave.

If you become unemployed, the parental leave ends on the first day that you are unemployed.

Do You Accrue Holiday When You Are On Parental Leave

You do not accrue vacation days over the unpaid parental leave.

About the paid parenting hours, yes. Some employers have different agreements about this. So always check with your employer.

Parental Leave And Partial Disability

It is legally possible to take parental leave if you are (partially) incapacitated for work.

But the leave can cause problems with reintegration. It is important that you can return to work as soon as possible.

The company doctor or occupational health and safety service can advise in the first instance whether the leave will hinder reintegration.

Consult your employer carefully and make clear agreements to prevent problems.

Parental Leave And A New Job

Do you have a new job and still have parental leave left? Then you can take this leave with your new employer.

Your new employer may ask whether you have already taken parental leave with a previous employer.

That is why you should ask your previous employer for a statement showing how much parental leave you are still entitled to.

Try to ensure that the survivor’s pension continues in any case.

Pause Or Stop Parental Leave

You can interrupt or terminate parental leave in the following cases:

• You are going to take maternity leave, adoption leave or foster care leave.

• A special unforeseen situation has arisen.

For example: your partner becomes unemployed and as a result your family income decreases, a place becomes available for your child in childcare, you have extra costs, for example due to a move, or you have become (long-term) ill.

7 Best Tips That Will Help You Work Less After Your Leave

How much will you work after the birth of your child? Many women (and fortunately more and more men) are working less after their leave.

As a result, your salary often falls behind. Are you thinking about working less? It’s good to be aware of a few things.

1. Check leave arrangements

Check which leave arrangements you are entitled to, such as the additional birth leave for your partner that can be used in addition to the regular birth leave.

The arrangements change. For example, since August 2022 you are entitled to 9 weeks of paid parental leave, previously this was always completely unpaid.

The paid parental leave can only be taken during the first year of your child’s life.

This also applies to your partner. Sometimes your employer does not know exactly what the situation is and what you are entitled to.

First make this clear to yourself and then go to your employer with your plan.

Don’t wait for your employer to bring it up. Take action yourself, you will see that it will work in your favor.

2. Reject tasks

Women often work fewer hours, but the tasks are not reduced.

So you actually get paid less for the same work and the workload has increased considerably.

And then you often feel guilty because you don’t finish it. Take a good look at which tasks you will no longer be doing.

Make clear agreements about this and adjust them if they do not seem to fit. Very often we see that the workload remains the same.

Did you know that 30% of mothers drop out in the first months after their leave? This is because they can’t cope with the work load anymore.

3. Focus on output

If you think you can do the same work in fewer hours, make agreements based on output.

Make sure you don’t pay attention to your hours, but to what you can deliver. That way you won’t lose your salary.

We pay so much attention to the number of hours that we forget to look at how well we do what we do.

4. Claim your promotion, scale or step

Check if you are entitled to a salary increase. This sounds crazy because you are already working less.

And emotionally you have been out for so long because of your leave.

But motherhood also brings you an upgrade in your qualities.

While we often don’t feel this way. Claim your promotion, scale or step. Do not forget

5. Make arrangements with your partner

Make good agreements with your partner. Certainly fathers often want to work less, but it still seems less possible.

Discuss together how you want to do it and look for solutions. It can be nice to experience that you want to divide it equally.

6. Build up slowly

Don’t try to pick up all your old tasks again the first week. Give yourself time to get used to your new work situation.

Take the time to catch up. Have colleagues taken over tasks from you? Talk to them about how they felt about it.

Maybe they got a lot of energy from tasks that you actually find terrible and you can swap or even let go of the tasks.

7. Use the attention from your colleagues

Colleagues are of course happy to see you again, but after a festive coffee moment it is back to business as usual for everyone.

Take care of yourself by regularly reflecting with a colleague or manager on how you are doing in the initial period.

Are you happy with how you combine work and home? What do you need to feel better about this?

Conclusion

Taking leave after child birth is important to your wellbeing and that of your newborn.

It is also an important time to bond with your partner and enjoy the new life in your family.