Parental Leave or Annual Leave Purchase Impacts

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faketales

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I would like to take a little bit more time off work to better balance family life. This year I am thinking 5 days extra. My two options are, Parental Leave or Annual Leave Purchase. I am interested to see if there are any benefits of taking one over the other particularly from a long term benefits impact.

Parental leave ( I have a 2 year old) is well defined below and it looks like I would get a PRSI credit. Work is flexible in that I can take them as single days or a week. The days are unpaid by my employer and the state.


"You can get credited PRSI contributions while you are taking parental leave. Credited PRSI contributions can protect your social insurance record and your entitlement to benefits in the future."

The alternative is Annual Leave Purchase. This allows you to buy up to 5 days annual leave. They then pro rates you pay across the year.

The Annual Leave Purchase seems the better options as I keep my 26 weeks incase I would ever need than a worst case scenario and I don't have weeks with uneven pay or need to engage with social welfare but will I have any loss of social contribution?

Am I missing anything? I presume tax and the impact on pension contributions will be the same for both options?

Anyone take either and have comments?
 
faketales said:
but will I have any loss of social contribution?
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Won't it be the same as being on normal vacation leave so you'll be covered by the usual PRSI contributions? Even if not then the loss of one (?) week's PRSI contribution is hardly going to be significant in the greater scheme of things in terms of PRSI benefits?
 
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ClubMan said:
Won't it be the same as being on normal vacation leave so you'll be covered by the usual PRSI contributions?
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I don’t know.

ClubMan said:
Even if not then the loss of one (?) week's PRSI contribution is hardly going to be significant in the greater scheme of things in terms of PRSI benefits?
Click to expand...

I might do it every year for the next 20 years. I won’t make min. credits for full pension so might as well pick the best option if there is any difference.
 
I have take a few weeks unpaid leave for many years. My pay is evened out over the whole year and I get 52 PRSI contributions. Our payroll person told me to do it this way as it avoided a reduction in contributions.
I started pre parental leave laws
 
@Annieindublin Seems to have this well worked out.

Other than this if you take 5 consecutive unpaid days off per year these might spread over 2 Prsi weeks. If this is the case and you earn a minimum of €38 in each Prsi week you would not miss any contributions.

The Prsi week begins on the first day of each year.

So for 2026 it begins on Thursdays and ends on Wednesdays.
If you took 5 days leave from Monday to Friday during 2026 and earned at least €38 euro during all your other working days you would not miss any Prsi contributions.
 
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