How to Request Leave Over Christmas in South Africa (When You Don’t Have Enough Days)

Christmas is a time for family gatherings, spending time with your family and friends, visiting home villages and reconnecting with people you haven’t seen in a while because of work. Almost everyone in South Africa wants to have time off work for Christmas but what happens when you want to take leave and you don’t have enough days for you to spend time off work? The following tips will help you on how to negotiate for more days off and what to do when the request is declined.

Understanding South African Leave Law

In South Africa full- time employees are entitled to at least 21 consecutive days of paid leave every year according to the Employment Act(BCEA). This means for every completed month of service, you have 1.75 leave days.

If you have used most of your days during the year, but still need to take time off then you should take note of the following;

• There is no legal entitlement to unpaid leave unless it was initially included in your employment contract.
• You can request for an unpaid leave as long as your employer is in agreement with it
• Some companies in South Africa closes/shutdown during festive season so this is more like a forced leave for their employees

Can Your Company In South Africa Refuse to Give You Leave?

In South Africa, your employer has the power to approve or deny you leave days. Grounds for denial can be:

• Not having enough leave days
• Other people have applied for leave before you so your presence is needed during the period
• When the operational needs of the company are likely to pause in your absence

Employers have the right to deny you leave days in cases where your absence will affect the company’s daily productivity but they are more lenient towards the end of the year holidays as people want to go home and rest. To add on, business is generally slow for most sectors during the December festive season.

What You Can Do If Your Leave Request Is Denied

In cases where your employer has denied your request, in South Africa; here is a few actions you may take:

• Negotiate for other functional options like working from home or suggesting an unpaid leave
• If possible, suggest working overtime before or after the Christmas holidays to make up for the time you won’t be there
• You can choose flexibility of covering emergencies remotely or taking a shorter period instead of the days you initially requested
• Check for your company’s leave policies and explore other options like “special leave” or advance leave where employees can borrow leave days from future leave.

How to Request Leave Over Christmas When You Don’t Have Enough Days

The following examples are sample emails that you can use as guidance when you request for leave with low annual leave days on Christmas in South Africa:

Leave request Email Sample 1: Requesting Unpaid Leave

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Leave request Email Sample 2: Requesting Leave in Advance

Leave Email Sample 3: Offering to Work Remotely

How to Make Your Leave Request More Effective

To avoid your leave request being denied on Christmas holidays in South Africa, take not of the following:

• Make sure you request for leave earlier than usual just incase more people are planning to also take leave days
• Incases where you know your presence is highly needed, offer solutions like working remotely or get an unpaid leave incase they need to find someone to step in
• Some companies may not allow you to carry over your leave days if you don’t use it that  year, so learn your company policies and take advantage of those.

Conclusion

Finding a way to have your leave days approved over the Christmas break in South Africa can be difficult, especially if you run low on annual leave days. With the right approach and showing that you’re thinking for yourself and the company’s needs also can get you that break you need. If it proves to be a little difficult then offer functional solutions like working from home so that you can help the company while spending time with your family. Applying early may also come as an advantage so you might as well start now.