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Jayshri Kakde remembers well the painful conversations she would have with her husband as they discussed the logistics of summer holiday childcare for their son every year.

So in 2023, when her employer introduced a “term-time only” contract for staff in her department, it almost felt too good to be true. “It was such a relief for me and my family — it really works wonders for my personal life.”

Kakde is one of a number of UK employees of Amazon participating in a flexible working scheme offering “term-time” contracts to parents, grandparents and guardians of school-aged children. Under the arrangement, available across UK operations, staff work only during school terms, with guaranteed unpaid leave during summer, Easter and Christmas holidays. 

The approach is one among many alternative arrangements offered by UK employers, who are now obliged to consider staff requests for flexible working that could range from fewer hours to allowances for hybrid working. The vast majority of employers now say they offer some kind of flexible working arrangement, with many seeing it as a competitive advantage for attracting and retaining talent.

Term-time contracts are “really needed”, said Susannah Streeter, head of money and markets at Hargreaves Lansdown. While UK school holidays run for about 13 weeks of the year, the average full-time worker is entitled to just five or six of annual leave. The mismatch leaves many parents with eye-watering costs: above-inflation increases in holiday care mean they now face average bills of £179 per child per week — £1,075 over a six-week summer holiday, according to children’s charity Coram.

Yet work that takes a pause for school holidays is hard to find. According to a Trades Union Congress analysis of data from the Office for National Statistics, about 8 per cent of women and 2 per cent of men work term-time only. Those that do may work in a range of set-ups, including flexitime, gig work shifts, or teaching that runs on educational terms.

Specific term-time contracts are so unusual there is no official data on their use: in the Department for Work and Pensions’ employer survey they are likely to be categorised among “other” kinds of flexible working, which in 2024 accounted for 3 per cent of alternative arrangements offered by employers.

Nicola Fyfe, Europe vice-president for Amazon Logistics, said its offer came from a “drive to create more flexibility”. Pay is prorated, as in part-time roles, and staff can take accrued paid leave during school holidays, with the remainder of the 10 weeks as unpaid leave. “While it’s not for everyone, it’s a valuable option for those who need it.”

The few organisations to also offer term-time contracts report positive results: Pursuit Marketing, a Scotland-based company, introduced them in 2017 and reported a boost in staff productivity at the time. In teaching, where staff receive full annual salary but do not have to work when schools are closed, the arrangement is a draw for a majority female workforce. Officials in the civil service, which offers term-time working among a suite of flexitime options overseen by individual departments, said staff found the option useful for school holidays and other caregiving responsibilities. Pay tends to be prorated to reflect the number of hours worked.

There has been pushback, however. Even accounting for childcare costs, employees working 39 weeks of the year could be left with significantly reduced income. The GMB union is calling for an end to contracts for school support staff paid for the time they are in school, arguing it leaves them underpaid by thousands of pounds each year. More women working term-time could also drive gender pay gaps: the Institute for Fiscal Studies found women who worked part-time, especially after having children, saw their wages rise much more slowly than if they worked full hours.

Still, the decision is often about more than money. Shahid Iqbal, an area manager working nights at an Amazon fulfilment centre, said his wife, who works for the police, was “very happy” when he took a term-time contract. “I really enjoy the time with my children during holidays,” he said. “I’m more relaxed, not tired, and I can give them 100 per cent of my time.”

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Fyfe said Amazon’s term-time contracts focused on jobs with “fixed start and finish times and fewer flexibility options compared to corporate roles”. Other teams operated “part-time or flexible working on a case-by-case basis”.

“Could other companies do the same thing as Amazon? Possibly — but it depends,” said Streeter. “If you’ve got a company with a lot of zero-hours contracts in the gig economy . . . it might work. But smaller companies that have to deliver weekend work for clients will find it much harder.”

She said employers could be “more imaginative” in organising shift patterns to guarantee parents had school holidays off. Parents also have the legal right to take 18 unpaid weeks off for each of their children, for up to four weeks a year, which can ease childcare pressures.

At Amazon, Kakde said the contract had many benefits. “At Christmas — which is usually a busy period — I can take two weeks off to travel and celebrate with my family,” she said. “It definitely makes me more engaged and productive at work. You know what you’re getting out of it, so you’re happy to go the extra mile if needed.”