Guide
Bank holidays and annual leave: inside the 5.6 weeks or on top?
Updated
The most common reason two people compute a leave balance differently. There is no statutory right to a paid bank holiday in the UK; the rest is your contract.
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How this calculator works
- The statutory floor is 5.6 weeks' paid holiday a year. gov.uk states that "almost all people classed as workers are legally entitled to 5.6 weeks' paid holiday a year". It adds that "most workers who work a 5-day week must receive at least 28 days' paid annual leave a year" (gov.uk).
- The 28 day ceiling is applied to the regular hours figure. gov.uk states that "statutory paid holiday entitlement is limited to 28 days". So a six or seven day week does not produce more than 28 days of statutory leave (gov.uk).
- Part-time entitlement is days a week multiplied by 5.6, the calculation gov.uk and Acas both work. A three day week gives "at least 16.8 days' leave a year (3 x 5.6)" (Acas).
- Irregular hours and part-year workers accrue 12.07% of actual hours worked in a pay period, for leave years beginning on or after 1 April 2024. That percentage is 5.6 weeks divided by the 46.4 working weeks of a year (gov.uk).
- Bank holidays are treated as a setting, not a fact, because they are one. gov.uk: "bank or public holidays do not have to be given as paid leave". And "an employer can choose to include bank holidays as part of a worker's statutory annual leave" (gov.uk).
- The carry-over figure uses the general rule that "workers can normally carry over a maximum of 8 days into the next leave year, with the agreement of their employer". Statutory family leave is treated differently and is not modelled here (gov.uk).
- This tracks the statutory minimum for a full leave year. It does not model contractual leave above the floor, service-related uplifts, leave in the first year of a job under an employer's accrual scheme, or a leave year part-completed. Where the contract is more generous, the contract governs and this figure is the legal floor beneath it.
- Converting accrued hours to days uses the normal day length you enter. That conversion is a presentation choice, not a statutory rule: the entitlement of an irregular hours worker is measured in hours.
The statutory position
gov.uk is direct about it: "bank or public holidays do not have to be given as paid leave". And "an employer can choose to include bank holidays as part of a worker's statutory annual leave".
So the eight days that England and Wales usually observe are not an entitlement standing outside the 5.6 weeks. They are either counted inside it or given in addition to it, and the contract decides which.
Why it changes the number so much
For a five day week, counting eight bank holidays inside the entitlement leaves 20 days for the worker to choose. Giving them on top leaves 28. That is a difference of eight days a year for one line in a contract.
Both are lawful. Only one of them is what your staff think they have, and the disagreement usually surfaces in December when somebody tries to book the last week of the year.
Part-time staff and the days the holiday lands on
Where bank holidays are counted inside the entitlement, a part-time worker whose days never include a Monday loses very little, and one who works Mondays only loses a great deal. That asymmetry is why many employers pro-rate bank holidays across the week rather than applying them as they fall.
The safe practical test is whether a part-time worker ends up with less than days-per-week multiplied by 5.6 once bank holidays are accounted for. If they do, the arrangement has taken them below the statutory floor, whatever the policy says.
What to write down
One sentence in the written statement settles it for good: whether the entitlement is inclusive or exclusive of bank holidays, and what happens when one falls on a non-working day.
The statement of employment particulars has to cover holiday entitlement anyway, and it must be given on or before the first day. Making it explicit costs nothing at that point and is very hard to fix afterwards.