Recording parental leave

Note: Information on recording parental leave in HR-Expert can be found HERE.

When should maternity protection* be recorded?

As soon as your employee announces her pregnancy and the expected date of birth, the maternity leave must be recorded in the absence client as an absence with the reason “(37) Maternity protection” with the data resulting from the date of birth.
A weekly program of zero hours applies for this time, which must be entered in the person's master record under Settings/Time recording with the appropriate data for the validity period.

[*Maternity protection is the period of non-employment before and after the birth of a child.]

When should parental leave be recorded?

In principle, parental leave should be recorded as soon as you receive the application, even if it will be some time before you start parental leave.

How does the person provide the information?

The informal application can be submitted by the mother no later than the last day of the employment ban (maternity leave).
If the father expresses the wish to be the first to take parental leave, he must inform the employer no later than eight weeks after the birth. Here too, the application is informal.
If the father wishes to take parental leave at a later date, the employer must be informed at least three months before the desired start date.
The application must include the start and duration of parental leave.

[Source: https://www.arbeiterkammer.at/beratung/berufundfamilie/Karenz/index.html]

What is to be recorded?

Duration and start of parental leave

What is a prerequisite for correct recording?

It is important that vacation entitlements are pro-rated.
Therefore, please check whether the corresponding entry “Yes” is also present in the field “Aliquotation of termination and parental leave” (person master record under Settings/Time recording/Leave offsetting) for the person applying for leave.
Please set it if this is not the case!

How is this data recorded in Personalwolke ?

In principle, parental leave is a planned absence and can therefore be entered as future absence time.
The entry is made in the absence client.

• Open the person with the leave request
• Enter the start and end of the leave as per the request under Start/end of absence.
• Select parental leave as the reason for absence (10), regardless of whether the request is made by the mother or the father.
• If there is an entry for another absence, such as vacation, seminar, etc., in the parental leave period, this will be overwritten automatically.

Special case for municipal/federal employees
Here, the parameter “GS40 regulation” or “Balance capping + GS40” must also be deleted in the “Payroll type” field (person master record under Settings/Time recording/Balance offsetting).

Can the person on leave continue to access the Personalwolke?

Even during the absence period, the person still has their previous viewing and editing options as long as you do not set them to inactive (person master record, first tab).

Which weekly program applies during parental leave?

Select a weekly program that specifies a working time of zero hours for the entire working day. Enter this in the person's master record in the Settings tab under Time recording.
Here you also have the option of limiting the expiry of the weekly program valid during parental leave to the end of parental leave and entering a weekly program that comes into effect after parental leave, if nothing else is known.

What happens at the end of parental leave?

The grace period ends automatically when the duration entered in the absence client expires.
Logging in as present or with a productive absence reason also ends the waiting time absence.

What working hours apply after the end of parental leave?

The weekly program with zero target hours expires at the planned end of parental leave.
After that, the previous weekly program should be used again, or a different weekly target working time is agreed.
As the validity of weekly programs for a person is determined by entering a start date and an expiration date, a new agreement on future working hours can also be entered during parental leave.

The parent wants to go on part-time leave, what to do?

The statutory entitlement to part-time leave is implemented through corresponding weekly programs.

Example:
Mrs. Hoffmann would like to take parental leave for 6 months after the end of the employment ban and then 8 months of part-time parental leave with 15 hours per week. She then wants to work part-time while her father takes parental leave.
Her maternity leave (employment ban) ends on 31.03.2025.
From 01.04.2025 to 30.09.2025, Ms. Hoffmann is on parental leave.
From 01.10.2025 until 31.05.2026 a weekly program with 15 hours per week is valid.
From 01.06.2026 until further notice, a weekly program with 20 hours per week applies.
(The following also applies here: if you do not have suitable weekly programs available, these must be created).

Keywords: baby leave, maternity leave, parental leave, child year, father year, paternity year, maternity protection, part-time parental leave, part-time parental leave