What are WTD payments?
This is a term used to describe payments made to employees to cover the loss of enhancements when taking annual leave. They are known as WTD payments because the payment is made in recognition of the Working Time Directive legislation.
What is currently paid?
Currently employees are paid 12.5% WTD on all enhancements and additional hours up to full-time (for part-time employees only). WTD is paid at the same time as the enhancements/additional hours are claimed.
Why is this changing?
As you may be aware there has been a recent employment law case (Flowers v East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust) of which the outcome is that regular overtime should now also be included in these payments. Regular overtime is where an employee has received overtime payments in at least 6 out of the previous 12 months.
This does not apply to bank workers, existing WTD method of payment continues.
What is changing? – a move from WTD payments to a payment call AfC Average
To facilitate this change Trusts currently paying WTD need to move to the alternative method of paying this entitlement through a payment called AfC (Agenda for Change) Average. This payment is calculated by taking an average of enhancements, qualifying overtime and additional hours (part-time employees only) over the previous 52 weeks. Payment is in arrears one month after the annual leave is taken. Therefore, from 1 April 2022 (first payment will be May 2022) contracted employees will now receive AfC average payments instead of WTD.
- This payment is not payable on bank holidays.
- Please note that this payment is NOT payable on bank holiday leave (or leave taken in lieu of a bank holiday) so bank holidays* must now be identified when creating the annual leave in ESR/eRoster by selecting the reason as “Bank Holiday”.
- It is vital that you record your annual leave regularly.
- The AfC average payments are generated by the annual leave recorded in ESR therefore it is crucial that all annual leave and Bank Holiday leave (if applicable) is requested and approved via ESR/eRoster in a timely way to ensure pay is correct from April 2022 onwards. If leave is not recorded payments cannot be made.
*If you normally record your bank holidays (all part-time employees and usually those that work shifts) then the new way of identifying the bank holiday applies to you. If you do not normally record bank holidays (typically full-time employees or those with standard Mon-Fri posts) then you should continue just recording annual leave and do not included bank holidays.
For employees using ESR to book and record leave
ESR is being updated to include an extra reason field when you book/record annual leave, further details will be sent when available.
For employees using eRoster to book and record leave
Continue to book and record leave on the roster and this will be transferred into ESR as normal, but you will now also need to identify bank holiday leave separately.
It is crucial that annual leave is recorded in the roster accurately and timely with rosters being finalised as per current deadlines.
Employees on Estates & Facilities Terms and Conditions
Please note that claims for enhancements manually via timesheet when on annual leave should no longer be submitted after 31 March 2022 as payment will be made automatically as per the above method.
Bank workers
This does not apply to bank workers, existing WTD method of payment continues.