The holiday season is approaching. You may be wondering how many days you’re entitled to and whether your boss will let you go at a time that suits you. What are the rules for taking vacation this year, how is the length calculated, and when can your boss restrict you from taking it?
If you are in a traditional employment relationship, you are guaranteed at least four weeks’ holiday per year. However, most employers currently provide five weeks’ holiday (or more), and public service and administrative employees and other selected groups are guaranteed this directly by the Labour Code. Teaching staff are entitled to eight weeks’ leave.
Employees may be entitled to:
Agreements on work performed outside the employment relationship, i.e. agreements on the performance of work and agreements on work activity, are also covered by the statutory regulation from 2023. Holiday arrangements also apply to performance of work agreements and work activity agreements from 2023. The law provides for a notional working week of 20 hours per week for these purposes. To qualify, the employee must therefore have worked at least four times their weekly working time, which for agreements is 20 hours per week. The second condition is that the agreement must last at least 4 weeks. This also applies to agreements that are directly linked to each other.
Tip: Going on holiday and decided to boost your home security by installing a camera? It is a wise step. But be aware of the circumstances under which you may be breaking the law.
Annual leave shall be paid to an employee who has worked for the employer at least 52 times his or her fixed or agreed weekly working hours in hours. Otherwise, it shall be pro-rata leave. Thus, full-time employees are entitled to a minimum of 160 hours of annual leave. If you take a week’s holiday, you will be deducted 5 × 8 hours at full-time, i.e. 40 hours of holiday. And if you only work 20 hours a week, then a week of holiday means you get 5 × 4 hours, or 20 hours of holiday out of a total of 80 hours of holiday per year.
Tip: Read about how company leave works and what restrictions your employer must follow.
If your employment with one employer is for less than a full year, you are only entitled to a proportion of your holiday, which is 1/52 of your total holiday for each week worked.
For example, if you work for an employer who gives you four weeks’ holiday a year for 30 weeks, you will be entitled to 93 hours’ holiday:
The incomplete hours are rounded up to give 93 hours of holiday entitlement.
If you change employers during the year, you are entitled to holiday entitlement from each employer separately. Leave is not transferred between employers – the new employer does not take over the ‘leftover’ leave from the previous employer.
Your original employer must reimburse you for any unused leave when you leave. Leave can only be reimbursed at the end of employment, not during it.
You will then have a new holiday entitlement with your new employer, again depending on the length of service and the legal conditions.
Finding out exactly what you are entitled to as an employee may not be easy. If you think your employer has not calculated your holiday pay correctly, consult a lawyer and don’t let your rights be taken away.
Employees working in difficult conditions, such as miners or emergency workers, are entitled to extra leave. The length of this leave should be equivalent to the length of the working week.
Previously, the length of leave was reduced in the event of long-term, excused work stoppages on the part of the employee. Now, according to the Labour Code, maternity leave, sick leave, nursing leave, etc. are also counted as work, however, up to a maximum of 20 times the weekly working time, i.e. a maximum of 800 hours (assuming a normal 40-hour working week). It is important to note, however, that this option will only be available to employees who have worked for the employer for at least 12 times the weekly working time, which is equivalent to 480 hours.
So when is the holiday shortened? So if you are on parental leave or sick leave for a whole year, you are not entitled to any leave. If you are on parental leave or sick leave for part of the year and you work for at least 12 weeks, then you are entitled to at least 32/52 weeks of leave (12 or more weeks of work + 20 weeks of sick leave or holiday credit).
In the case of unexcused absence from work, the employee may have eight hours of leave reduced for each shift so missed.
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The length of your leave is guaranteed by law, but your employer has the final say on exactly when you take it. It should decide when you take your leave so that you take as much of it as possible in the year in which you are entitled.
In practice, of course, it is not usually the case that your employer will come to you and tell you to go on holiday from 1 to 14 August. On the contrary, employees come up with suggestions for dates to suit their needs. However, the employer has the final say, so you may not get approval for a holiday on a date for which you have already bought a package.
The only case where you do not need your employer’s approval to take leave is when you take leave immediately after maternity leave. In this case, the employee is only giving notice that she will be taking ordinary leave immediately after maternity leave.
Tip: We have covered the rules for taking maternity leave in our separate article.
The ideal situation is for an employee to take their holiday in the year in which they are entitled to it. However, this is not always possible – for example, due to operational reasons on the employer’s side, long-term illness or taking maternity or parental leave.
In such cases, the leave is carried over to the following calendar year. The employer is obliged to determine its use so that it is taken by 30 June of the following year at the latest. If he fails to do so, this right shall pass to the employee, who may determine the date of taking the leave himself. However, he must give the employer at least 14 days’ notice, unless they agree otherwise.
Please note – leave is not automatically “forfeited”. If it is not taken for reasons on the employer’s side or due to legal obstacles at work, the employee must be allowed to take it later.
The use of probationary leave is a specific case. If you join a new employer on 1 July or, conversely, around Christmas, when leave is most often taken, we recommend that you negotiate with your employer well in advance and be prepared to compromise.
The trial period is primarily for getting to know each other between the employee and the employer and it is therefore not very common for an employee to take leave during the first 3 months in a new job. If you join an employer with a request for leave taken in the second month of the probationary period, the employer will probably not comply. Especially as you probably won’t even be entitled to it yet. On the other hand, the Labour Code does not restrict you from taking leave in this way and does not lay down any rules other than those that apply outside the probationary period. However, the probationary period is also extended by a full day’s leave.
It is therefore up to the employer whether or not to allow you to take your leave during the probationary period. If you are indeed joining a new employer in the summer months, try to enjoy your leave in the previous months. Taking unpaid leave may also be an option for you.
Tip: Find out more about how sick or probationary leave works in our article.
In such a case, the Labour Code states that the employer is obliged to compensate the employee for the costs incurred through no fault of his/her own. Therefore, if the employer approves a holiday in the spring for July, for example, and then “changes its mind”, the employer must reimburse the employee for the costs, including the purchased trip.
The employer can interrupt or terminate the leave at any time and call the employee back to work, but then pay for such things as transportation back home, hotel cancellation fees, or deposits paid to the travel agent. In practice, however, this often does not happen.
Leave is an employee’s fundamental right to work and its use is governed by the Labour Code. It is normally at least four weeks a year, and more for some professions. Entitlement is based on the time worked and also applies to agreements outside the employment relationship, provided the legal conditions are met. The employer determines the date of use, but should take into account the employee’s wishes. Leave is calculated in hours according to hours worked and may be reduced in the event of long-term absence, with certain obstacles counting towards work performance. It is possible to take leave during the probationary period, but it depends on the agreement with the employer.
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