NASUWT is committed to ensuring that all teachers have the information they need and has produced this advice and guidance to assist them when looking to assert their rights in respect of annual leave and holiday pay

Background and context

All full-time workers in the UK are entitled to a minimum of 5.6 weeks of paid annual leave each year under the Working Time Regulations (WTR), which accrues from the first day of employment.

Your leave year should be clearly defined in your contract of employment, e.g. calendar year/academic year. As such, you should carefully check your contract of employment, including any references to annual leave and holiday pay.

Where a teacher works on a full-time basis, i.e. a five-day week, they must receive a minimum of 28 days’ paid annual leave per year, calculated on the basis of multiplying the teacher’s normal working week, i.e. five days, by the annual statutory leave entitlement of 5.6 weeks.

Whilst you must not be prevented from taking any holiday entitlement before it expires, employers do have discretion over when to allow you to take holiday and may, in some circumstances, require you to take all or part of your leave on particular days by giving you notice. For example, patterns of holidays for school teachers are predetermined by periods of school closure.

It is important to note that in circumstances where annual leave is not taken before the annual leave year expires, you may lose your entitlement as there is an expectation that annual leave is taken in the year in which it accrues (‘use it or lose it’).

However, it is possible in some situations that you may be permitted to carry forward holiday leave into the next leave year.

This can include situations where the ability for you to take leave is outside of your control, e.g. sickness absence and maternity leave, and preventing you from carrying it over would undermine the health and safety purpose of paid annual leave under the WTR.

If you have fixed hours that do not change, i.e. a permanent full-time or part-time teacher working in a school, then holiday pay is meant to equate to your usual rate of pay you are paid in your job.

For example, if you usually get paid £500 for a week’s work, you should still be paid £500 when you take a week off. If you only take a day off, and normally work five days a week, you would probably get paid £100.

The key principle is that you should not be at financial detriment when on annual leave, so if you take a week’s holiday, you should receive the same pay at the end of the month as if you had been at work, as payment for holiday pay will be due at the same time as your normal wages, e.g. weekly/monthly, and will be treated as earnings for pay as you earn (PAYE) tax and National Insurance contributions (NIC) purposes.

This applies to teachers who are employed on a permanent basis in the UK, as they are employed and receive a salary over 12 months of the year, despite only working 195 days in an academic year.

This would ensure that you would be in receipt of an element of rolled-up holiday pay for each day worked.

In this case, the rolled-up holiday pay would be in respect of annual leave and not just statutory leave.

As the rolled-up holiday pay would effectively be for 65 days’ paid leave (260 working days per year - i.e. 52 weeks in the year x 5 working days per week - minus 195 days), it would fully offset the value of any claim for 28 days’ statutory holiday pay.

Therefore, in such circumstances, it is unlikely that you would be entitled to an additional 5.6 weeks’ paid annual leave in circumstances where you are paid as an equivalent worker.

Important changes from April 2026 relating holiday annual leave and holiday pay

From April 2026, important changes have been introduced regarding annual leave and holiday pay.

Under the Employment Rights Act (ERA) 2025, specifically Regulation 3 (8), section 35 of the ERA comes into force requiring all employers to keep records relating to annual leave.

The advice from Acas suggests that employers must retain records of:

  • holiday taken;

  • holiday carried over from previous years;

  • holiday pay, including what’s included, e.g. bonuses or commission; and

  • any payments in lieu of holiday, e.g. pay for unused holiday when someone leaves a job.

NASUWT maintains that employers should be keeping evidence of:

  • holiday entitlement for each worker, including how it is calculated for those on different contracts;

  • holiday taken, including dates and amount of leave actually used each year;

  • holiday carried over from previous years, including any unused leave rolled over, e.g. due to sickness or maternity;

  • holiday pay calculations, including how much was paid for each period of leave, which elements were included or excluded, e.g. bonuses or commission;

  • accrual or rolled-up payments for irregular hours workers, such as supply teachers, including showing the 12.07% addition or separate pot retained for when any leave is taken;

  • any payments in lieu of holiday, such as pay for unused holiday or any leave carried over;

  • opportunity to take leave, including evidence that workers were able to book and take their statutory holiday, e.g. school closure periods.

The records must be retained for at least six years from the date they were made and employers can choose any ‘manner and format’ they reasonably consider suitable, provided the records are sufficient to prove compliance for every eligible worker, including those on irregular contracts, such as supply teachers.

This will be enforced by the Fair Work Agency and if an employer cannot prove they have kept appropriately detailed records, then it could be a criminal offence or an employer could face other enforcement action, such as unlimited fines or demands for underpayments of holiday pay.

Schools/colleges will therefore need to be cognisant of this and should be prepared to share and discuss this with you in order to demonstrate how your holiday leave and pay have been calculated.

The Union has produced a template letter to assist you when looking to establish your holiday leave and pay entitlement and how this has been calculated. This should be amended to suit your specific circumstances.

Contact us

If you have concerns that records relating to your holiday pay are not being kept, then you should initially raise this with your employer before contacting your local NASUWT Representative, or, alternatively, you can contact the NASUWT for further advice.

NASUWT Representatives

NASUWT Representatives should ensure that there is an effective mechanism in place for recording annual leave and holiday pay in schools/colleges.

This could be done on an annual basis aligned with the holiday period for the school/college or local authority.

 


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