Weddings and Time Off from Work: When You’re Entitled to Paid Time Off from Your Employer

Brief Overview

Labor law provides for these situations. A wedding is considered one of the so-called other important personal obstacles to work. The employer must therefore grant the employee time off work to the extent prescribed by law. However, this does not always automatically mean paid time off. The decisive factors are whose wedding the employee is attending and whether it is their own wedding, a child’s wedding, or a parent’s wedding.

Your Own Wedding: Two Days Off, One Paid

If an employee gets married, they are entitled to two days off work. One of these days is designated for attending the wedding ceremony.

However, wage or salary compensation is only payable for one day. Starting in June 2025, the rule will be further clarified: if an employee takes two days off work, they are entitled to wage compensation only for the day on which they attended the wedding ceremony.

In practice, this means that if an employee’s wedding is on a Friday, for example, and they are scheduled to work that day, they may take paid time off specifically for the day of the ceremony. They may use the second day of time off for preparations or travel, for example, but without wage compensation.

The situation is different if the wedding takes place on a day when the employee is not scheduled to work, such as a Saturday. In such a case, the employee’s shift on that day is not canceled, and therefore there is no entitlement to wage compensation for the day of the ceremony. If the employee needs time off, for example, on the Friday before the wedding, that can be the second day of time off, but without wage compensation.

A Child’s or Parent’s Wedding

The law also provides for the participation of parents and children in wedding ceremonies. If an employee attends their child’s wedding, they are entitled to one day of paid leave. This is typically the day of the ceremony. Conversely, if an employee attends a parent’s wedding, they are also entitled to one day off work, but in this case without pay. The difference between a child’s wedding and a parent’s wedding, therefore, does not lie in the length of the leave, but in whether the leave is paid. Paid leave applies to a child’s wedding, but not to a parent’s wedding.

Do these rules also apply to registered partnerships and civil law partnerships?

Current legislation now applies more broadly than just to traditional marriage. For the purposes of the government regulation on personal obstacles to work, the term “spouse” also includes a partner under the Civil Code as well as a registered partner under the Act on Registered Partnerships.

In practice, this means that the same rules apply even in cases where the law refers to a spouse, marriage, or wedding ceremony, but the relevant legal institution is a partnership.

An employer should therefore not distinguish between employees based on whether they enter into a marriage, a partnership, or a registered partnership, if the law treats these situations as equivalent for the purposes of obstacles to work.

How to Request Wedding Leave

A wedding is an event that an employee usually knows about well in advance. Therefore, they should inform their employer in a timely manner and request time off well in advance. The Labor Code generally stipulates that if an employee is aware of an impediment to work in advance, they must request time off from their employer in a timely manner.

The employer may require the employee to provide proof of the reason for the leave. In the case of a wedding, this may include, for example, a certificate from the registry office or other reasonable proof of the ceremony date. As a rule, however, the notification itself is sufficient.  In general, the employer should only request information that is actually necessary to assess the employee’s entitlement to time off.

An employer cannot unilaterally require an employee to take vacation time instead of statutory time off. Vacation and absence due to personal circumstances are distinct concepts. If an employee meets the conditions for wedding leave, their absence should be considered an absence due to personal circumstances, not the use of vacation time.

A wedding is just one of many personal impediments to work

A wedding is not the only life situation in which an employee may need time off. The government regulation also covers other important personal obstacles to work, such as a doctor’s appointment, accompanying a family member to a medical facility, the birth of a child, a death in the family, a coworker’s funeral, moving, or looking for a new job.

For each obstacle, the duration of the leave and whether wage compensation is due vary. For example, in the case of a doctor’s visit, it is assessed whether the examination could not have taken place outside of working hours and whether it was at the nearest appropriate medical facility. In the case of a funeral, the amount of time off depends on the employee’s relationship to the deceased. When looking for a new job, it also depends on the reason for the termination of employment.

It is therefore important for both employees and employers not to rely on the general assumption that “there is always paid time off for family matters.” Labor law distinguishes between individual situations quite precisely.

Summary

An employee is entitled to two days off work for their own wedding, but is entitled to wage or salary compensation for only one day—namely, the day of the wedding ceremony. For a child’s wedding, an employee is entitled to one day of paid leave. For a parent’s wedding, an employee is entitled to one day off, but without pay.

It is advisable to request time off well in advance and to expect that the employer may ask for reasonable proof of the ceremony date. Conversely, the employer should not automatically count wedding leave as vacation time if the employee meets the conditions for a statutory impediment to work.

The wedding season is thus not only a romantic matter but also an issue of labor law. Properly arranging time off will help prevent unnecessary disputes and allow the employee to focus on a day that should, above all, be a joyful life event.