Annual Leave Policy

Principles

The leave year runs from 1 January to 31 December. 

You are expected to take your full leave entitlement each year to ensure you have regular breaks from work. Leave requests will be considered fairly, promptly and consistently, subject to reasonable notice and operational need.

Entitlements to leave are pro-rated for part-time/fixed-term staff, and those who join or leave part-way through a leave year.

Annual leave entitlement

Full-time appointments are entitled to 42 days annual leave, calculated in hours (294 hours for full time). 

Part-time appointments or fractional contracts have a proportional accrual to the number of hours you are contracted to work.

Some staff will have different entitlements due to, for example, the retention of previous terms and conditions under a TUPE transfer into the University.

Annual closure period and designated days

(May Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, Christmas and New Year Closure)

The University has designated periods of closure on Good Friday, Easter Monday and May Day, The University is closed between Christmas and New Year. You must therefore take compulsory annual leave on days designated by the University, which totals to 10 or 11 days, depending on the year. 

The specific dates and number of closure days are detailed in the Appendix.

Notwithstanding holiday arrangements for individual members of staff, all Schools and Directorates will be expected:

• to remain open until the official close of business for Christmas, typically 4.00 pm on Christmas Eve or 5.00 pm if closure begins before Christmas Eve
• to reopen on the first University day of business in the New Year, as detailed in the Appendix
• Staff are allowed to attend one office Christmas lunch or party not exceeding 2.5 hours, in addition to their regular 1 hour lunch break.  Longer absence or attendance of more than one such event, must be covered by annual leave. Please refer to the Alcohol, drug, and substance misuse policy for additional information on social events.

Certain critical services (i.e. activities or tasks that must continue to an agreed minimum level) will need to remain open over the designated closure period. Your manager will notify you in advance if you are required to work on the designated days. In these circumstances, no leave will be deducted from your entitlement, and you’ll be able to take equivalent time off at another time, shortly after the designated period (subject to the normal carry forward rules).

Annual Leave entitlement for starters and leavers

Staff who join or leave the University during the leave year will be granted a proportion of the total holiday entitlement days on a pro-rata basis starting with their first day of employment. Designated days can only be taken if they fall within your employment. 

If you leave the University your holiday balance will be updated to reflect your leave date and you should arrange to take your accrued leave before your final day of employment. Please note, if you leave the University and you have exceeded your annual leave entitlement, you will be required to re-pay to the University any excess taken. Such sums will be deducted from your final salary payment.

Annual leave and absence

Holiday accrual during sickness absence

While you are on occupational paid sickness absence, annual leave will accrue at the usual rate. If you have exhausted occupational sick pay your annual leave entitlement will accrue at statutory rate (ie 28 days per year, pro rata) . (This is subject to the minimum requirements as stated in the Working Time Regulations). You can request to  be paid for accrued annual leave while on sick leave. This request must be made via the One University system.

Designated days

When you are on occupational paid sickness absence, deductions from your annual leave entitlement will be made for e the University’s designated days which are Good Friday, Easter Monday, May Day and the time between Christmas and New Year.

Accrual of annual leave during maternity, adoption and parental leave 

Members of staff will continue to accrue contractual annual leave entitlement (including designated days) as normal during the full period of maternity, adoption and parental leave. For further details please see the specific policies.

Reclaiming annual leave

If you are ill whilst on annual leave, this time can be regarded as sickness absence if the period of sickness absence lasts for generally 8 or more days, and you can provide a medical certificate or Fit Note confirming that you would not have been fit enough to carry out your usual duties at that time. Designated days cannot be reclaimed.

You must submit self-certification forms and medical fit notes to cover the duration of your sickness absence

Employee responsibilities

You should request annual leave through OneUniversity. Reasonable notice should be given when submitting annual leave requests and the line manager will consider both individual preferences and operational requirements. 

Manager responsibilities

Annual leave should be accurately recorded and monitored using the manager leave dashboard available in OneUniversity. Managers must ensure that all staff request annual leave through OneUniversity. Managers will then be prompted to approve (or reject) the leave requested. Where the annual leave request is turned down, the reason f should be recorded in OneUniversity. OneUniversity will notify the employee to confirm if the leave request was approved or declined.  

Managers should also endeavour to communicate to staff as soon as reasonably practicable if a leave request is denied, for example, due to operational cover or busy periods.  Managers should proactively review and monitor the annual leave of their team, ensuring that staff are taking their leave due, and that holidays are planned in such a way that the team/department always has adequate cover.

Annual leave carry forward

You are encouraged to use your holiday entitlement within the current leave year; however, you can automatically carry over up to 5 days into the next leave year (pro-rated for part-time staff).  Exceptional requests to carry over more than 5 days must be authorised by your Dean or Director using the Annual Leave Adjustment Form found on OneUniversity. If you have been on long term sick  leave, accrued annual leave can be carried over into the following year. However, this amount of carry-over leave must not exceed the statutory amount of 28 days. 

Dates for the future

The indicative Christmas closure dates from now until New Year 2030 are as follows:

Holiday entitlements are based on calendar years, and staff are generally required to take a set number of days from their annual leave entitlement to cover the Christmas closure. The number of days to be taken can vary because of earlier closure or later opening dates. For the years to 2030, the indicative number of days required to be taken are as follows:

Table 1

Holiday entitlements are based on calendar years, and staff are generally required to take a set number of days from their annual leave entitlement to cover the Christmas closure. The number of days to be taken can vary because of earlier closure or later opening dates. For the years to 2030, the indicative number of days required to be taken are as follows:

Table 2

Table 1 straddles leave years as it concerns the issue of the whole closure period. Table 2 relates to full calendar years, so the days’ leave column relates to those at the very beginning of the year and those at that same year’s end.

Links to other relevant policies and guidance

You may find it useful to refer to other relevant University policies which you can find on the  People web page.

• Sickness absence management policy and procedure 
• Long term ill health policy and procedure
• Maternity agreement
• Adoption leave policy
• Surrogacy leave policy