Parental leave

What it means

Parental leave is excused time off that an employer must grant a parent on request, to care for a child until the age of three, or until six where the child has a long-term adverse state of health.

It has nothing to do with annual leave and it is not maternity leave: that one is shorter, tied to the birth, and parental leave picks up where it ends. Either parent may take it, each on their own request, and both may be on it at once.

During parental leave the employment relationship continues but is not performed: the employee does not work and the employer does not pay. That is what separates it from carer’s benefit, which covers short-term care of a sick child and is paid by the Social Insurance Agency as a sickness insurance benefit while the parent otherwise works as usual.

How it works in practice

No wage is paid while it lasts. The family income is the parental allowance from the labour office, and sometimes still maternity benefit from the Social Insurance Agency while entitlement from sickness insurance runs.

The employee’s compulsory insurance is suspended for the duration and the employer reports this on a registration form; the state pays the parent’s health insurance. After maternity leave the original job and workplace are due back, after parental leave only work matching the employment contract.

To cover parental leave, companies usually hire a substitute on a fixed-term contract. In that employment contract we state the reason as cover for an absent employee, because where the absence is maternity or parental leave the law allows the fixed term to be extended or repeated beyond the usual limit.

What to watch out for

Time on parental leave does not count as work performed, unlike maternity leave. An employer who credits a parent returning in the autumn with a full year of annual leave pays wage compensation for days that never accrued, and the gap only surfaces at the final settlement.

A protected period runs during parental leave: the employer may not give notice even in a reorganisation, except in the cases the law lists expressly, such as the employer being wound up. Notice given during this time is invalid, and a dispute over it can end in wage compensation for the whole period in which the employee offered to work.