What is the policy of your place of employment as regards religious holidays? Is a (for e.g.) Jewish employee allowed Channukah or Simchat Torah as an automatic holiday, or is it deducted from his/her annual leave?
Is this sort of decision enforced by law in your country, or is it left to the individual discretion of the company?
Enough questions…
Gp
If somebody could fix the thread title please :o
Thanks…
Gp
At the university I go to, you can get an excuse to celebrate/attend/assist/go to your religious ceremonies/celebrations/holidays/masses. Make up work is given to the student. I don’t know how the excuse work, I suppose the church/religious organization give the excuse.
I can take them as vacation days, personal days or as unpaid leave.
BTW, Channukah is not a holiday where it is forbidden to work. Some people may take a day off to be with the kids (many Jewish schools close for part of Channukah), but, unlike most other holidays, cessation from work is not necessary.
As for the law, in the U.S. an employer must make “reasonable accomodations.”
Zev Steinhardt
Ditto what Zev said, plus:
On occasion, I’ve been able to work on another day (Thanksgiving, day after Thanksgiving, random Sunday, etc) so that I don’t lose the vacation/personal day.
A couple of the places I’ve worked were owned by Jews of different levels of observance, and they had the entire company – including non-Jews – closed for some holidays, but not all of them.
Some companies – usually where all owners are observant – will close down for all the major holidays.
Most jobs I’ve had, my bosses let me take those as “personal days” and didn’t count them against me.
My current job, I must take them as vacation days, but they’ll allow me extra days off if I work on a Sunday or other non-work day.
I had one job where the CEO of the company was a fellow Orthodox Jew. The company was closed on Jewish holidays as well as the regular secular holidays, so my religious holidays cost me nothing, vacation-wise, and if I recall correctly, non-Orthodox Jews were allowed to work that day and take off a different day if they so wished.
Zev says, correctly:
This applies to any employee’s religious preferences. For example, if a retail establishment wanted to be open on Christmas Day, and a Christian wanted the day off, the firm would have to make “reasonable accommodations.” The question becomes, what is “reasonable”, and the courts have ruled this is determined on a case-by-case basis.
For instance, imagine a retail store with only three employees, and it is important to be opened on Good Friday. If one employee wants to take Good Friday off, the store can usually accommodate one employee being absent. If all three of them want to take Good Friday as a day off, then the courts would most likely side with the employer, that it is “unreasonable” to close the store.
Generally, people with strong religious convictions or strong desires for specific days off should check early with the employer, to try to avoid problems. If “reasonable accommodation” can be made, all will be well. If not, the employee should seek another employer.
The laws are, of course, different in other countries.
Sorry, I meant to say: the laws on “reasonable accommodation” apply broader than just days off, they apply to all religious practices that may come into conflict with workplace practices.
And note that the resolution of these things is usually by a court case, after the fact.
We have discussed on this board, here’s a typical scenario: Imagine someone working as cashier in a children’s bookstore who is opposed to selling Harry Potter because it teaches witchcraft, say, and so refuses to ring up any sales of Harry Potter books. The employer fires the person. The employee sues on the grounds that the firing was based on religious discrimination (which would be illegal.) The court asks whether there was an effort at “reasonable accommodation” – could the person work a cash register in the nonfiction department, or the beginner reader department, and so not come into contact with Harry Potter? If the answer is yes, then the employer would possibly have to make that accommodation. If the answer is no, , then the courts would likely rule in favor of the employer, that the firing was not based on religious discrimination but was based on the employee refusing to do the job. But obviously, there can’t be a general “law” – the individual circumstances of THAT bookstore must be taken into account (Do they have separate departments at all? Do people buy from one department but ring up the sales at a different register? etc)
Another example, imagine a Muslim whose religion forbids him/her to touch pork, who goes to work on the assembly line for a company that makes pig-skin items. The employee refuses to touch the pig-skin. The employer fires the employee for failure to perform the job; the employee sues for religious discrimination. The court would ask whether the job requires touching the pig-skin, and if so, then there is probably no “reasonable accommodation” – unless the employee could be assigned a desk job or a supervisory job that doesn’t involve touching pig-skin. If there is reasonable accommodation (for instance, if the employee can wear latex gloves), then that would indicate the firing was discriminatory because there was reasonable accommodation that was not considered.
In short, it’s a complex area of labor law, although the over-all guidelines are pretty clear.
In one programming house where I once worked, I was one of five programmers, all of us observant Jews. The president and hardware guy were not observant, and the receptionist was not Jewish.
The president realized what he was getting into when he hired us, and we programmers really had no choice but to take off for the major holidays. He and the other two went crazy all day fielding customer calls with no programmers around, and I really felt bad for them.
As the holiday of Purim approached, he told us, "I know you will all want to take off on Purim. I also know that you don’t have to take off, and I insist that at least one of you come in. " We knew that he was 100% correct, and then (knowing the story of the Purim holiday) he added, “I suggest you draw lots.” (We cracked up at that.)
End of story, we modified his idea, drew lots, and I and another each came in for half the day, so that we could be with our families for at least the other half.