My company is sponsoring one of our people to attend University so he can gain an IT Business qualification. This is our first foray into this form of training benefit and I am now trying to find the best way of dealing with his contract of employment. We are doing all the usual stuff – continued sponsorship depends on results: he must work for us for a period of time after his education: failure may mean reimbursement of sponsorship etc. But, what do we do about holidays and accrued benefits? My CEO assumes the lad will work for us during all of his Uni’ holidays, but the lad says this rrequirement must mean he is still an employee, away on a training course, and so must be paid and accrue holidays etc. I think we should make the years at Uni a career break, with fixed-term contracts covering holiday working – am I close? How would this work in real life? Can someone please point me in the right direction so I can get this lad back onto Planet Real-Life?
Pam Lloyd