Your money

Your family

Your daily life

Your rights

Get advice

Please support us

Volunteer

Site updated:

11 February 2012

Am I entitled to paid holiday?

This information applies to England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland

You are entitled to a minimum of 5.6 weeks' holiday a year. This is called statutory holiday.

To work out how many days statutory holiday you can take a year, you need to multiply 5.6 by the number of days you work in a week.

For example:

if you work a five-day week, you are entitled to 28 days' paid holiday a year (5.6 X 5).
if you work 2.5 days a week, you are entitled to 14 days' paid holiday a year (5.6 X 2.5).

The maximum amount of statutory paid holiday you can be entitled to is 28 days. This applies even if you work more than five days a week.

Your contract of employment may give you more leave than this. Part-time workers are entitled to a pro rata amount.

Some workers are not automatically entitled to statutory leave (for example, members of the armed forces or police force) and these workers have to rely on their contracts of employment for their rights to holiday.

Your employer will decide when the leave year starts and finishes - it may run from 6 April one year to 5 April the next, or it may run from 1 January to 31 December. If your leave year includes time before 1 April 2009, your entitlement will be less. It is calculated on a pro rata basis - 4.8 weeks for the period before 1 April 2009 and 5.6 weeks for the period from 1 April 2009.

For more information about your right to paid holiday, see Holidays and holiday pay.