PART VI STATUTORY PATERNITY PAY AND STATUTORY ADOPTION PAY: PROVISIONS APPLICABLE TO BOTH STATUTORY PATERNITY PAY AND STATUTORY ADOPTION PAY

33 Continuous employment
1 Subject to the following provisions of this regulation, where in any week a person is, for the whole or part of the week–
(a) incapable of work in consequence of sickness or injury;
(b) absent from work on account of a temporary cessation of work;
(c) absent from work in circumstances such that, by arrangement or custom, he is regarded as continuing in the employment of his employer for all or any purposes,
and returns to work for his employer after the incapacity for or absence from work, that week shall be treated for the purposes of sections 167ZA, 167ZB and 167ZL of the Act as part of a continuous period of employment with that employer, notwithstanding that no contract of service exists with that employer in respect of that week.
2 Incapacity for work which lasts for more than 26 consecutive weeks shall not count for the purposes of paragraph (1)(a).
3 Where a person–
(a) is an employee in an employed earner’s employment in which the custom is for the employer–
(i) to offer work for a fixed period of not more than 26 consecutive weeks;
(ii) to offer work for such period on two or more occasions in a year for periods which do not overlap; and
(iii) to offer the work available to those persons who had worked for him during the last or a recent such period, but
(b) is absent from work because of incapacity arising from some specific disease or bodily or mental disablement,
then in that case paragraph (1) shall apply as if the words “and returns to work for his employer after the incapacity for or absence from work,” were omitted and paragraph (4) shall not apply.
4 Where a person is employed under a contract of service for part only of the relevant week within the meaning of subsection 3 of section 167ZL of the Act (entitlement to statutory adoption pay), the whole of that week shall count in computing a period of continuous employment for the purposes of that section.