← Back to Blog

Bank Holidays and Your Annual Leave: How It Really Works

22 January 2026

Let me bust the biggest myth in UK employment: you do NOT have an automatic right to bank holidays off. I know. Most people think they do. But the law says something very different, and understanding this could change how you look at your entire holiday package. Let me explain what's really going on.

The Myth Everyone Believes

Here it is, plain and simple: there's no separate legal right to bank holidays in UK employment law. None. Your statutory 5.6 weeks (28 days for a full-timer) can include bank holidays. So your employer can count the 8 bank holidays in England and Wales as part of your 28 days, leaving you just 20 days to choose yourself. And that's completely legal.

Lots of employers do give bank holidays on top. But that's a contractual perk, not a legal requirement. Whether you get bank holidays as extras depends entirely on what your contract says. This is why I'm always telling people: read your contract properly when you start a new job. The words "including bank holidays" versus "plus bank holidays" can mean a difference of 8 days off.

How Many Bank Holidays Are There?

In England and Wales, there are typically 8 bank holidays per year:

Scotland has 9 public holidays, and Northern Ireland has 10, including St Patrick's Day and the Twelfth of July. The exact number can vary slightly from year to year, particularly when the government announces additional bank holidays for special occasions such as royal events.

What Your Contract Should Say

Your contract should spell out your annual leave and whether bank holidays are included or on top. Here's what the common wording actually means:

Red flag: If your contract just says "20 days annual leave" with no mention of bank holidays, that's ambiguous. Does it mean 20 plus bank holidays, or 20 with bank holidays counted separately toward the 28-day minimum? Get it clarified in writing. Don't guess.

Working on Bank Holidays

There is no right to have bank holidays off. If your employer needs you to work on Christmas Day, Easter Monday, or any other bank holiday, and your contract allows it, that's perfectly legal. Retail, hospitality, healthcare, emergency services, transport -- millions of UK workers are in the office or on shift every bank holiday.

If you do work a bank holiday, your employer should give you a day in lieu or count it as a normal working day and add an equivalent day to your annual leave. Some employers pay time-and-a-half or double time for bank holidays, but that's a contractual bonus, not a legal right. There's no statutory premium for bank holiday work.

The bottom line: your employer still has to give you your full 5.6 weeks over the year. If you work all 8 bank holidays and they're included in your 28 days, you need 28 other days off to compensate.

Part-Time Workers and Bank Holidays

This is where things get properly unfair if your employer isn't paying attention. Think about it: most bank holidays fall on a Monday. If you work Monday to Friday, great -- you benefit from all of them. If you work Tuesday to Friday, you miss nearly every single one. If bank holidays are included in the annual leave pot, Monday workers get a better deal through pure luck of scheduling.

The fair solution is pro-rata bank holiday entitlement. Full-time gets 8. Four days a week gets 6.4 (that's 8 x 4/5). That way it's equitable regardless of which days you work.

Even better, some employers convert the entire holiday entitlement into hours and let workers use them flexibly. No arguments about which day bank holidays fall on. If your employer isn't doing something like this, they might be inadvertently discriminating against part-time staff. Worth flagging.

Requiring Workers to Take Bank Holidays

Your employer can direct you to take annual leave on specific dates, including bank holidays. To do this legally, they need to give you notice of at least twice the leave length. So for a single bank holiday, that's two days' notice minimum.

Most employers sort this through the contract from day one, so the notice requirement is already covered. But if they suddenly want to change things -- say, making people work on bank holidays when they previously had them off -- that requires consultation and potentially contract amendments. They can't just spring it on you.

Bank Holidays During Sick Leave or Maternity Leave

If a bank holiday falls while you're off sick, it doesn't eat into your annual leave. Your employer can't deduct it from your balance. When you come back, your remaining holiday should be calculated as if the bank holiday didn't happen during your absence.

Same goes for maternity leave, paternity leave, adoption leave, or shared parental leave. You keep accruing holiday throughout, bank holidays included. That leave carries over for when you return.

Religious Holidays and Alternative Days

UK bank holidays are largely based on the Christian calendar. There's no legal right to swap bank holidays for other religious observances, but under the Equality Act 2010, employers mustn't discriminate on grounds of religion. That means they should at least consider reasonable requests for time off for religious holidays, and shouldn't refuse without a solid business reason.

Some forward-thinking employers now offer "floating holidays" that workers can use for any religious or cultural celebration they choose. It's a simple solution that treats everyone fairly.

Extra Bank Holidays

Every now and then the government announces a bonus bank holiday -- like for the late Queen's Platinum Jubilee in 2022 or King Charles III's coronation in 2023. When that happens, you don't automatically get the day off. It depends entirely on your contract wording. "All bank and public holidays"? You're covered. "The usual 8 bank holidays" or a fixed number? Probably not.

Most employers were generous about the recent extra ones, but some made staff work or use annual leave. If another one gets announced, check your contract wording immediately.

Check Your Entitlement

Use our Holiday Entitlement Calculator to work out your total statutory entitlement and see how bank holidays should fit in. If the numbers don't add up, raise it with your employer or contact ACAS. You've earned your holiday. All of it. Don't let a misunderstanding about bank holidays cost you days you're entitled to.

Related Articles