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British Airways Plc (Respondents) v Williams (Appellant) and Ors [2012] UKSC 43
Published on: 19/10/2012
Issues Covered:
Working Time
Article Authors The main content of this article was provided by the following authors.
Background This case involved Regulation 4 of the Civil Aviation (Working Time) Regulations 2004 which states that pilots and other crew members are entitled to be paid annual leave of at least four weeks. However, unlike the Working Time Regulations 1998, which cover the majority of employees in other fields, the Civil Aviation Regulations fail to specify how holiday pay is to be calculated. This case went to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) where it was decided that pilots' pay could not be limited to basic pay. However, payments “intended exclusively to cover occasional or ancillary costs arising at the time of performance” did not contribute towards holiday pay. 83The issue returned to the Supreme Court where the respondent, British Airways, argued that the Civil Aviation Regulations were too vague for the CJEU decision to be implemented. The problem lies in the lack of detailed guidance. This prevents Tribunals from properly calculating the average pay over any particular period of time. The Supreme Court has not accepted those arguments to date. However, Tribunals may still award such compensation as they consider just and equitable, but there is no reference to calculation of holiday pay. Tribunals must also take into account any allowances that were genuinely paid to cover a pilot's expenses whilst on duty. Such allowances must be removed from their calculations, if deemed appropriate.http://bit.ly/R9eDvJ

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Disclaimer The information in this article is provided as part of Legal Island's Employment Law Hub. We regret we are not able to respond to requests for specific legal or HR queries and recommend that professional advice is obtained before relying on information supplied anywhere within this article. This article is correct at 19/10/2012
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