The purpose of this subpart is to—

After the end of each completed 12 months of continuous employment, an employee is entitled to not less than 4 weeks’ paid annual holidays.

For the purposes of subsection (1), the 12 months of continuous employment—

If, for the purposes of subsection (2)(b), an employer and employee agree that any period of unpaid leave of more than 1 week is to be included in the employee’s 12 months of continuous employment, the divisor of 52 to be used for the purposes of calculating the employee’s average weekly earnings must be reduced by the number of whole or part weeks greater than 1 week that the employee was on the unpaid leave.

An employee’s entitlement to annual holidays remains in force until the employee has—

An employer and employee may agree on how an employee’s entitlement to 4 weeks’ annual holidays is to be met based on what genuinely constitutes a working week for the employee.

If an employer and employee cannot agree on how an employee’s entitlement to 4 weeks’ annual holidays is to be met, a Labour Inspector may determine the matter for them.

In making a determination, the Labour Inspector may take into account any matters that the Labour Inspector thinks fit, including the matters specified in section 12(3).

An employer must allow an employee to take annual holidays within 12 months after the date on which the employee’s entitlement to the holidays arose.

If an employee elects to do so, the employer must allow the employee to take at least 2 weeks of his or her annual holidays entitlement in a continuous period.

When annual holidays are to be taken by the employee is to be agreed between the employer and employee.

An employer must not unreasonably withhold consent to an employee’s request to take annual holidays.

An employer may require an employee to take annual holidays if—

If subsection (1) applies, an employer must give the employee not less than 14 days’ notice of the requirement to take the annual holidays.

An employer may allow an employee to take an agreed portion of the employee’s annual holidays entitlement in advance.

If an employee takes an annual holiday after the employee’s entitlement to the holiday has arisen, the employer must calculate the employee’s annual holiday pay in accordance with subsection (2).

Annual holiday pay must be—

If an employee takes an annual holiday in advance, the employer must calculate the employee’s annual holiday pay in accordance with subsection (2).

Annual holiday pay must be—

To avoid doubt, for the purposes of subsection (2)(b)(ii)(B), the divisor of 52 for the purpose of calculating the employee’s average weekly earnings is to be reduced so that it represents the number of whole or part weeks that the employee worked for the employer in the period of employment.

Subsection (2) applies if—

An employer must pay the employee 8% of the employee’s gross earnings since the commencement of employment, less any amount—

Subsection (2) applies if—

An employer must pay the employee for the portion of the annual holidays entitlement not taken at a rate that is based on the greater of—

Subsection (2) applies if—

An employer must pay the employee 8% of the employee’s gross earnings since the employee last became entitled to the annual holidays, less any amount—

To avoid doubt,—

An employer must pay an employee for an annual holiday before the holiday is taken unless—

If subsection (1)(b) applies, the employer must pay the annual holiday pay in the pay that relates to the employee’s final period of employment.

Despite section 27, an employer may regularly pay annual holiday pay with the employee’s pay if—

If an employee to whom subsection (1)(a)(i) applies is employed by the same employer beyond 12 months on a series of fixed-term agreements of less than 12 months each, the employer and employee may agree that the employee is to be paid in accordance with subsection (1) regardless of the number of agreements.

If the fixed-term agreement of an employee to whom subsection (1)(a)(i) applies is followed by permanent employment with the same employer, the employee—

If an employer has incorrectly paid annual holiday pay with an employee’s pay in circumstances where subsection (1) does not apply and the employee’s employment has continued for 12 months or more, then, despite those payments, the employee becomes entitled to annual holidays in accordance with section 16 and paid in accordance with this subpart.

An employee may request that his or her employer pay out a portion of the employee’s entitlement to annual holidays.

A request under subsection (1)—

If an employee makes a request under subsection (1), an employer must—

An employer—

In this section, entitlement year—

If an employer agrees to pay out a portion of the employee’s annual holidays under section 28A(3)(c), the employer must pay the employee for that portion—

If an employer has incorrectly paid out a portion of the employee’s annual holidays where the employee did not make a request for the payment, the employee’s entitlement to take the portion of annual holidays concerned remains in force as if the payment had not been made.

A requirement that an employee must make a request under section 28A for a portion of his or her annual holidays entitlement to be paid out must not be a term or condition of the employee’s employment (whether contained in an employment agreement or otherwise).

Despite subsection (1), an employment agreement may set out the process for making a request under section 28A.

A requirement for an employer to pay out a portion of an employee’s entitlement to annual holidays must not be—

An employer may adopt a policy that allows the employer to not consider a request under section 28A for a portion of an employee’s annual holidays to be paid out.

A policy under subsection (1) may apply to—

If an employer has a policy under subsection (1), section 28A does not apply in relation to any part of the employer’s business to which the policy applies.

This section applies if an employer has agreed to an employee’s request to pay out a portion of the employee’s annual holidays under section 28A, but the employer and employee cannot agree on—

A Labour Inspector may determine either or both of the following:

In this section and sections 12(3A) and 30 to 35, closedown period means a period during which an employer customarily—

For the purposes of sections 31 to 35, the employer may have only 1 closedown period in any 12-month period.

However, subsection (1) does not prevent an employer and employee from agreeing—

If subsection (2) applies, sections 32 to 35 do not apply.

To avoid doubt, an employer may have different closedown periods for each separate part of the employer’s business.

An employee who is entitled to annual holidays at the commencement of a closedown period must, if required to do so by his or her employer, take annual holidays during the closedown period whether or not the employee agrees to take the holidays.

An employee who is not yet entitled to annual holidays at the commencement of a closedown period must, if required to do so by his or her employer, discontinue the employee’s work during a closedown period.

If this section applies, the employer must give the employee not less than 14 days’ notice of the requirement to take the annual holidays or to discontinue the work (as the case may be).

This section applies to an employee who, at the commencement of a closedown period, is entitled to annual holidays under section 16.

To the extent that the employee has an annual holiday entitlement, the period of the closedown must be taken by the employee as annual holidays.

If an employee does not have an annual holidays entitlement that covers the whole period of the closedown, the employer and employee may agree that the employee—

The employer must pay the employee annual holiday pay calculated in accordance with section 21.

This section applies to an employee who, at the commencement of a closedown period, is not entitled to annual holidays under section 16.

An employer must, in respect of the closedown period, pay the employee 8% of the employee’s gross earnings since the commencement of the employee’s employment or since the employee last became entitled to annual holidays (as the case may be), less any amount—

An employee who is paid annual holiday pay calculated in accordance with subsection (2) is not otherwise entitled—

This section does not prevent an employer and employee from agreeing that the employee may take the period of the closedown as annual holidays in advance under section 20 and be paid for the period in accordance with section 22.

If an employee is required under section 32(2) to discontinue his or her work during a closedown period, the employee’s 12 months of continuous employment must, for the purposes of section 16(1) or 28A(5), be treated as commencing on the date on which the closedown began.

However, to avoid having a different date in each year on which the employee becomes entitled to annual holidays, the employer may nominate a date which must be treated as the date on which the closedown begins provided that the date nominated is reasonably proximate to the actual beginning of the closedown period.

This section applies to an employee who is taking annual holidays under this subpart and who then—

An employee may, with his or her employer’s agreement, take any period of sickness or injury that the employee would otherwise take as an annual holiday as sick leave.

This section applies to an employee who is taking annual holidays under this subpart and who then suffers a bereavement as described in section 69(2).

The employer must allow the employee to take any period related to a bereavement that he or she would otherwise take as an annual holiday as bereavement leave.

This section applies if—

The employer must allow the employee to take—

This section applies if—

The employer—

A public holiday that occurs during an employee’s annual holidays must be treated as a public holiday and not as part of the employee’s annual holidays.

Subsection (3) applies if—

The employee is entitled to be paid for a public holiday if the holiday would have—

The purpose of this subpart is—

The following days are public holidays:

If 2 or more of the public holidays specified in subsection (1) fall on the same day, the public holidays must, for the purposes of this subpart, be treated as 1 day.

This section applies if—

If the criterion in subsection (3) is met, the employee and his or her employer may agree in writing (whether in an employment agreement or otherwise)—

The criterion is that the purpose of the transfer is not to avoid the employee’s entitlements under sections 50 and 56 for working on a public holiday, although the transfer may have that effect.

Where an agreement to transfer part of a public holiday applies, the employee’s entitlements under sections 50 and 56 apply only if the employee works during the period of 24 hours or 2 separate periods of 24 hours (as the case may be) to which that part of the public holiday has been transferred.

To avoid doubt, an agreement under this section must not reduce the total number of paid public holidays that the employee is otherwise entitled to in any year.

An employer and employee may agree in writing (whether in an employment agreement or otherwise)—

The criteria are that—

Where an agreement to transfer a public holiday applies, the employee’s entitlements under sections 50 and 56 apply only if the employee works on the identified or identifiable calendar day or period of 24 hours to which the public holiday has been transferred.

To avoid doubt, an agreement under this section—

An employer may adopt a policy that allows the employer to not enter into agreements that enable all or part of a public holiday being transferred under section 44A or 44B.

A policy under subsection (1) may apply to—

If an employer adopts a policy under subsection (1), sections 44A and 44B do not apply in relation to any parts of the employer’s business to which the policy applies.

For the purposes of this subpart, if any of the public holidays listed in section 44(1)(a) to (d)—

To avoid doubt, this section does not entitle an employee to more than 4 public holidays for the days listed in section 44(1)(a) to (d).

For the purposes of this subpart, if Waitangi Day or ANZAC Day—

To avoid doubt, this section does not entitle an employee to more than 1 public holiday for Waitangi Day or more than 1 public holiday for ANZAC Day.

An employee is entitled to public holidays, and payment for those holidays, in accordance with this subpart.

Public holidays are in addition to annual holidays that an employee is entitled to under this Act or otherwise.

An employer may require an employee to work on a public holiday if—

If a public holiday falls on a day that would not otherwise be a working day for an employee, section 46 is complied with if—

If a public holiday falls on a day that would otherwise be a working day for an employee, section 46 is complied with if—

If an employee does not work on a public holiday and the day would otherwise be a working day for the employee, the employer must pay the employee not less than the employee’s relevant daily pay or average daily pay for that day.

If an employee works (in accordance with his or her employment agreement) on any part of a public holiday, the employer must pay the employee the greater of—

In subsection (1)(a), penal rates—

This section is subject to section 51.

This section applies to—

An employer may pay an employee for work on a public holiday as part of the employee’s regular pay if the requirements of subsection (3) are met.

The requirements are that—

This section applies to an employment agreement that is entered into after 1 April 2004.

The employment agreement must include a provision that confirms the right of the employee to be paid in accordance with section 50 for working on a public holiday.

To avoid doubt, the employment agreement may not state that the relevant daily pay or average daily pay of the employee already includes an amount that is calculated to comply with section 50.

This section applies to an existing employment agreement.

The employment agreement must, from the date referred to in subsection (3), be amended to include a provision that confirms the right of the employee to be paid in accordance with section 50 for working on a public holiday.

The date is,—

To avoid doubt, an existing employment agreement may not state that the relevant daily pay or average daily pay of the employee already includes an amount that is calculated to comply with section 50.

This section applies if an employer and employee cannot agree on the amount of pay that should be paid to the employee for work done on a public holiday.

A Labour Inspector may determine the amount of pay for the employer and employee.

In making the determination the Labour Inspector must apply the provisions of this subpart to the circumstances as determined by the Labour Inspector.

To avoid doubt, a dispute about whether an employer is complying, or has complied with, section 50, section 51, section 52, or section 53 is an employment relationship problem for the purposes of the Employment Relations Act 2000.

An employer must pay an employee for a public holiday in the pay that relates to the pay period in which the holiday occurs.

An employee is entitled to another day’s holiday (an alternative holiday) instead of a public holiday if—

If subsection (1) applies, an employer must—

The entitlement to an alternative holiday remains in force until—

An employee is not entitled to an alternative holiday under this section if the employee works for the employer only on public holidays.

An alternative holiday provided under section 56 must—

If an employer and employee cannot agree under subsection (1)(a) on when an alternative holiday is to be taken, the day must be taken on a date determined, on a reasonable basis, by the employer.

If subsection (2) applies, the employer must give the employee at least 14 days’ notice of the requirement to take the alternative holiday.

This section—

If an employee is on call on a public holiday and is called by the employer, or a representative of the employer, to work on that day, the employee is entitled to an alternative holiday in accordance with section 56.

If an employee is on call and is not called in to work, the employee is also entitled to an alternative holiday if the nature of the restriction imposed by the on call condition on the employee’s freedom of action is such that, for all practical purposes, the employee has not had a whole holiday.

This section applies in addition to section 50 (which requires payment of time and a half for working on a public holiday).

An employer must pay an employee not less than the employee’s relevant daily pay or average daily pay for the day which is taken as the alternative holiday.

Payment for an alternative holiday must be made—

An employee may request the employer to exchange the employee’s entitlement to an alternative holiday for a payment.

A request under subsection (1)—

If the employer agrees to the employee’s request, the employer must pay the employee the amount agreed between the employer and the employee in exchange for the alternative holiday.

The employer must make the payment for the alternative holiday as soon as practicable after the employer has agreed under subsection (3).

This section applies to an employee who is required, or has agreed, to work on a public holiday but who does not work on the day because—

If this section applies,—

The purpose of this subpart is to provide all employees with a minimum entitlement to paid leave in the event of their sickness or injury, or of the sickness, injury, or death of certain other persons.

An employee is entitled to sick leave and bereavement leave in accordance with this subpart—

Sick leave and bereavement leave must be provided—

However, an employer and employee may agree that—

An employee who intends to take sick leave or bereavement leave must notify the employer of that intention—

An employee may take sick leave if—

An employee is entitled to 5 days’ sick leave for each of the 12-month periods specified in section 63(2).

An employee may carry over, to any subsequent 12-month period of employment, any sick leave that has not been taken by the end of the period to which the leave relates.

For the purposes of subsection (1), an employee may carry over up to 15 days’ sick leave to a maximum of 20 days’ current entitlement in any year.

To avoid doubt, subsection (2) does not prevent an employer from allowing an employee to carry over any enhanced or additional sick leave entitlement.

An employee is not entitled to be paid for any sick leave that has not been taken before the date on which his or her employment ends.

An employer may require an employee to produce proof of sickness or injury for sick leave taken under section 65 if the sickness or injury that gave rise to the leave is for a period of 3 or more consecutive calendar days, whether or not the days would otherwise be working days for the employee.

Despite subsection (1), the employer may require proof of sickness or injury within 3 consecutive calendar days if the employer—

Subsection (1) does not prevent an employer and employee from agreeing that the employee will produce proof of sickness or injury for sick leave provided to the employee in addition to the entitlement set out in section 65.

For the purposes of this section, proof of sickness or injury may include a certificate from a medical practitioner that—

To avoid doubt,—

In this section, medical practitioner means a health practitioner who is, or is deemed to be, registered with the Medical Council of New Zealand continued by section 114(1)(a) of the Health Practitioners Competence Assurance Act 2003 as a practitioner of the profession of medicine.

An employee may take bereavement leave in accordance with sections 63 and 70 if the employee suffers a bereavement.

An employee suffers a bereavement—

For the purposes of subsection (2)(b), relevant factors include—

An employer must allow an employee to take—

If an employee suffers more than 1 bereavement at the same time, he or she may take the amount of bereavement leave specified in subsection (1) in respect of each bereavement.

An employer must pay an employee an amount that is equivalent to the employee’s relevant daily pay or average daily pay for each day of sick leave or bereavement leave taken by the employee that would otherwise be a working day for the employee.

Despite subsection (1), an employer is not required to pay an employee for any time for which the employee is paid weekly compensation under the Injury Prevention, Rehabilitation, and Compensation Act 2001 or former Act.

An employer must not require an employee to take as sick leave any time for which the employee is being paid—

However, if an employer pays the difference between the employee’s first week compensation or weekly compensation and ordinary weekly pay, the employer may agree with the employee that he or she may deduct from the employee’s current sick leave entitlement 1 day for every 5 whole days that the employer makes that payment.

An employer must pay an employee for sick leave or bereavement leave in the pay that relates to the pay period in which the leave is taken.

However, if an employee is required to provide proof of sickness or injury under section 68 and fails, without reasonable excuse, to do so, the employer is not required to pay the employee for any sick leave in respect of which the proof is required until the employee complies with that requirement.

When dealing with each other under this Act, an employer and employee must deal with each other in good faith.

At the time an employee enters into an employment agreement with an employer, the employer must inform the employee—

The provisions of this Act may be enforced in accordance with this Act by—

An employee’s entitlement to annual holidays, public holidays, sick leave, or bereavement leave that are in addition to entitlements under this Act may be enforced only by the persons listed in subsection (1)(a) to (c).

An employer who fails to comply with any of the provisions listed in subsection (2) is liable,—

The provisions are—

A Labour Inspector is the only person who may bring an action in the Authority against an employer to recover a penalty under section 75.

A claim for 2 or more penalties against the same employer may be joined in the same action.

A claim for a penalty may be heard in conjunction with any proceedings for the recovery of holiday pay or leave pay.

After hearing an action for recovery of a penalty, the Authority may—

An action for the recovery of a penalty must be commenced within 12 months after the earlier of when the cause of action became known, or should reasonably have become known, to the Labour Inspector.

A penalty that is recovered must be paid,—

A Labour Inspector may take proceedings on behalf of an employee to recover unpaid holiday pay or leave pay that the employee is entitled to under this Act.

If a Labour Inspector takes proceedings under subsection (1), the Labour Inspector must not issue a demand notice under section 224 of the Employment Relations Act 2000 in respect of the same pay.

Section 131 of the Employment Relations Act 2000 applies, with all necessary modifications, to proceedings taken under subsection (1).

An action initiated or taken under this Act by a Labour Inspector may be completed by another Labour Inspector.

For the purposes of this Act, every Labour Inspector has, in addition to any powers conferred by this Act, all the powers that a Labour Inspector has under the Employment Relations Act 2000.

Except to the extent that, in any proceedings before the Authority, the Authority makes its own determination on the matter, a determination made by a Labour Inspector under section 11(2), section 13(2), section 17(2), section 54(2), or section 85(2), is binding on the employer and employee.

Before making a determination under this Act, a Labour Inspector must—

An employer must keep a holiday and leave record that complies with this section.

The holiday and leave record must contain the following information for each employee:

The holiday and leave record must be kept—

Information entered in the holiday and leave record must be kept for not less than 6 years after the date on which the information is entered.

The holiday and leave record may be kept so as to form part of the wages and time record required to be kept under section 130 of the Employment Relations Act 2000.

The following persons may request an employer to provide access to, or a copy of, or a certified extract from, information in the holiday and leave record relating to an employee:

An employer who receives a request under subsection (1) must comply as soon as practicable with the request by—

Evidence that an employer has failed to comply with section 81 or section 82 may be given in an action before the Authority—

To avoid doubt, for the purposes of subsection (1), an action before the Authority includes the determination of an objection to—

If, after hearing the evidence, the Authority is satisfied that the employer failed to comply with section 81 or section 82 and that the failure prevented the claimant from bringing an accurate claim, the Authority may make a finding to that effect.

If a finding under subsection (3) is made, then the Authority may accept as proved, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, statements made by the employee about—

Subsection (2) applies if—

The Authority may include, in the sum for which judgment is given or the determination is made, interest for the whole or any part of the period between the date when the cause of action arose and the date of payment in accordance with the judgment or determination.

Interest included in a judgment or determination must not exceed interest at the rate calculated under clause 11 of Schedule 2 of the Employment Relations Act 2000.

This section does not authorise the giving of interest upon interest.

If an employer dismisses an employee and then re-employs the employee within 1 month after the dismissal, the employee’s employment must be treated as being continuous for the purpose of the employee’s entitlements under this Act.

Subsection (1) does not apply if a Labour Inspector makes a determination that the Labour Inspector is satisfied that—

Holiday pay and leave pay payable by an employer to an employee is—

The Governor-General may, by Order in Council, make regulations for 1 or more of the following purposes:

Any annual holidays to which an employee had, before the commencement of this section, become entitled under section 11 of the Holidays Act 1981 and that remain untaken on the commencement of this section—

The operation of this section does not affect the date on which the employee next becomes entitled to annual holidays.

Any holiday to which an employee had, before the commencement of this section, become entitled under section 7A of the Holidays Act 1981 and that remains untaken on the commencement of this section—

Any special leave to which an employee had, before the commencement of this section, become entitled under section 30A of the Holidays Act 1981 and that remains untaken on the commencement of this section—

The operation of this section does not affect the date on which the employee next becomes entitled to sick leave.

The enactments specified in Schedule 2 are repealed.

The enactments specified in Schedule 3 are amended in the manner indicated in that schedule.