When Jörg Abel plans his holidays, the week around Shrove Monday is firmly anchored in the schedule. The 48-year-old works full-time at a health insurance company in Frankfurt am Main, and he is a passionate carnival enthusiast on a voluntary basis – not only in the hot phase: Since 2015 he has been active in the Mainz Carnival Association (MCV), since September 2022 he has been sitting on the board as secretary.
Volunteering involves more than just celebrations and confetti. The MCV is the oldest carnival club in Mainz, organizes the Mainz Shrove Monday procession and together with other clubs the well-known carnival meeting "Mainz bleibt Mainz, wie es singt und lacht". Abel himself is involved in the well-known floats for the move, and since the board elections, the regular board meetings have been added for him. "That was quite challenging, considering that we meet at 19 p.m. in the evening and often don't finish until midnight," he says. However, his job always has priority: "None of us took time off for it. You do that in the evening in your free time."
The fact that working jecken and fools like Jörg Abel have to take vacation if they want to celebrate the climax of the "fifth season" is the rule rather than the exception nationwide. Because Shrove Monday is not a public holiday – not even in the carnival strongholds, where it is considered a "traditional day". "The term has no legal meaning and, unlike a public holiday, is not a day on which the employee can simply stay at home," explains Volker Görzel, who works as a specialist lawyer for employment law in Cologne. It is common in Cologne or Mainz for most employers to voluntarily release their employees on Shrove Monday. However, employees do not have a fundamental claim to this.
"The operation must not be disturbed by costumes"
The situation is different if the boss regularly and without reservation gives his employees a day off on Shrove Monday. As a rule of thumb, if this happens for at least three years in a row, a so-called "operational exercise" is created – and employees can count on the release for carnival in the future without having to sacrifice a day of vacation.
This customary law also applies to new employees and cannot be easily repealed even after a change in the boardroom. The fact that in the past two years work was exceptionally also carried out on Shrove Monday because the carnival was cancelled due to the pandemic is not significant: "Corona did not interrupt this operational exercise," says Görzel. Those who regularly had Shrove Monday off on Shrove Monday before the pandemic can count on it again this year.
However, the operational practice does not automatically apply at all locations of a company. For example, employees in Mainz are allowed to take time off on Shrove Monday, while colleagues in Hamburg have to work – similar to public holidays, which are only celebrated in certain federal states. This is particularly relevant for companies that have their headquarters in one of the carnival strongholds, but are active nationwide. Because while the carnival regions are in a state of emergency, business continues elsewhere.
To ensure that this runs smoothly, preparation is necessary, says Friedrich Pautasso: He heads the human resources department of the insurance group Gothaer, which has its headquarters with around 3000,<> employees in Cologne, but also operates locations in other cities. While the Cologne workforce is largely free, everyday work in Berlin or Hamburg continues undeterred. "Not all of them are carnival enthusiasts. Colleagues who want to work here at the Cologne location can do so," says Pautasso. The company relies on them and on the employees at the external locations to handle the volume of calls in customer service. Experience from past years shows how many employees are needed on carnival days. "It's a well-rehearsed process," says Pautasso. "The queries within the customer service units run at an early stage: Who wants to celebrate carnival and who doesn't?" If necessary, external service providers can be used.