How to calculate holiday entitlement

Most employees who work a normal 5-day week (ie Monday to Friday) are entitled to 5.6 weeks of holiday which is equal to 28 days in the working year. This can be inclusive or exclusive of bank and public holidays.

In England and Wales, there are currently 8 bank holidays, while in Scotland there are 9. While in England Wales bank holidays tend to be automatic public holidays ( the majority of workers are given the day off and the day is generally observed as a holiday) this is not the case in Scotland. In Scotland, there is much less uniformity regarding which bank and local holidays are granted as paid leave to employees. As a result, Scottish employment contracts will usually provide a holiday entitlement of a mixture of bank and local holidays and, according to the Scottish Government, most employees in Scotland do not have paid leave on all bank holidays.

Employers can use a 'leave year' or 'accrual system' to calculate an employee's holiday entitlement. Employers must tell their staff the dates for their statutory leave year as soon as they start working. An employee must take their paid holiday during the statutory leave year which can either be set out in the employment contract, or if the contract doesn't state, then the day the employee first started working. For example, a company's leave year could run from 1 January to 31 December if stated in the contract. An employee who starts part-way through a leave year will only be entitled to part of their total annual leave for the current leave year, depending on how much of the year is left.

The accrual system is where the employee gets one twelfth (1/12) of their leave in each month they've worked. For example, an employee who has worked for 3 months will be entitled to one quarter (¼) of their total leave (ie seven days if they work a normal 5-day week).

The legal obligation to provide paid holiday not only extends to full-time workers, but to part-time workers, agency workers and casual workers as well. However, calculating the exact amount of holiday a particular worker is entitled to is important to stay compliant with the law. The exact amount of holiday will depend on the type of employee or worker they are. You can calculate an individual worker's statutory holiday entitlement by using the government's webtool.

Full-time workers

Full-time workers are entitled to 5.6 weeks (28 days) paid holiday per year, if they work 5 days a week. 5.6 weeks is the maximum amount of paid holiday an employee is obliged to provide in the working year. If an employee works more than 5 days a week (ie 6 or 7), they will still only be entitled to 5.6 weeks of paid holiday a year. An employer can decide whether to include bank and public holidays as part of a worker's holiday entitlement or give these as extra leave and can choose to offer more leave than the legal minimum.

Part-time workers

Part-time workers are entitled to paid holiday, however, they don't need to be given the full legal minimum as they work less than full-time workers. Part-time workers are given paid holiday on a pro-rata basis. Their holiday entitlement is calculated based on how many days or hours a week they work. For example, if a part-time employee worked 4 days a week, they would be entitled to 22.4 days of paid holiday in a year. The calculation is 4 days x 5.6 weeks. Where the answer is not a round number, you should always round up to the nearest half day.  For example, a worker who is working 3 days a week gets 17 days annual leave, although the actual entitlement is 16.8 days. 

It is also important to remember that part-time workers should not be treated less favourably than full-time workers, eg if full-time employees are given extra days off then this must also be given to part-time employees as well.

Workers on casual or irregular working hours

This mainly applies to casual staff or workers on zero hours contracts. Zero hours workers are also entitled to statutory paid holiday. Calculating the amount of holiday a worker on a casual contract (ie zero hours contract) can be complicated and it's best to calculate it on an accrual basis in hours. The holiday entitlement of 5.6 weeks is equal to 12.07% of the hours a casual worker has worked. You would then have to multiply 12.07% by the number of hours worked by the worker to calculate how much holiday entitlement they should have. For example, if a worker on a zero hours contract has worked 10 hours then they would be entitled to 1.21 hours (or 72.6 minutes) of paid holiday. The calculation is 12.07% x 10 hours.

Shift workers

Shift worker's holiday entitlement is calculated by using an average of their shifts over a 12 week period.

All employees and workers who take paid holiday should also be paid the same rate that they're normally paid for their work. A week's pay is calculated according to the kind of hours someone works and how they're paid for the hours.

A shift worker with fixed hours should receive holiday pay equal to the average number of weekly fixed hours the worker worked in the previous 52 weeks at their average hourly rate.

Casual workers and those on zero hours contracts are entitled to holiday pay and are eligible for payment in lieu of any untaken statutory paid holiday on termination of their employment. This reflects the same rights given to full-time and part-time employees. Holiday pay for casual workers is calculated by multiplying the number of hours they are entitled to paid holiday and their hourly wage.

It is common practice for employers to require their workers to give notice of a request to take paid holiday. The amount of notice is usually twice as long as the amount of leave a worker wishes to take (eg 4 days' notice for 2 days' leave).

An employer has discretion for when an employee must take their holiday and can restrict when leave can be taken. However employers should try to accommodate all requests from their staff.

Employees and workers are allowed to make a complaint to the Employment Tribunal about an employer's refusal to allow reasonable time off. These rights are also regulated and exercised by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and local authorities. Employers could face heavy penalties for not allowing their workers to take time off or not paying the correct amount of holiday pay.