Holiday calendar for food processing units

When festivals are working days

A mithai and namkeen unit in Indore may run every day for the three weeks before Diwali, Dussehra included, and close for Diwali and Bhai Dooj once the orders have shipped. Publish this at the start of the year: which holidays will be working days, which will be observed, and how working a holiday is rewarded. Workers accept festival duty far more readily when they know in January what October will look like.

Compensating holiday work

Choose one approach for each type of holiday and keep to it. Either pay holiday work at a higher multiplier, or give a compensatory holiday after the peak with a deadline to use it. For seasonal workers whose contracts end with the season, a comp-off they cannot use before leaving is worth nothing, so pay them instead.

• National holidays worked: paid at the holiday multiplier
• Festival days worked by permanent staff: comp-off within 90 days
• Festival days worked by seasonal staff: paid, not comp-off
• A compensatory plant holiday once the peak is over

Off-season shutdown and deep cleaning

Seasonal units, such as fruit pulp and tomato processing plants, run hard for a few months and then slow down or stop. The off-season is when lines are stripped, deep cleaned, repaired and readied for the next crop, with permanent staff working on maintenance and cleaning. Put any plant-wide closure days in the calendar, decide under your standing orders whether they are paid holidays or leave, and let permanent staff take earned leave in the slow months.

Separate lists for plants and depots

A company with a plant in Gujarat and depots in Maharashtra and Rajasthan needs a list for each location. Depot and dispatch staff often work through holidays because trade demand peaks just then, while the plant itself may close. Apply each list by branch, and keep a few optional holidays for staff whose festivals are not on the local list, such as Onam for Kerala-born staff at a Gujarat plant.

How to set it up in ZeniaHR

1. In Holiday Calendars, create a list for each plant and depot, and apply festival holidays only to the branches that observe them.
2. Leave festival days the plant will work off that branch's list, and announce the working festival days on the Company Wall.
3. Add the compensatory plant holiday after the peak as a company holiday for that branch.
4. In the Overtime policy, set a holiday multiplier and choose pay or comp-off as the payout.
5. Grant permanent staff comp-off for festival days worked with a 90-day expiry, and pay seasonal staff for such days instead.
6. Let staff whose festivals are missing from the local list pick optional holidays, up to a yearly limit.

Read more about holiday calendars in ZeniaHR.

Roles this applies to

Frequently asked questions