Accrued holiday and time off

From the entitlement in your contract, your start date and what you have already taken, it works out the accrual in twelfths, the balance in days and hours and the projection to the end of the year.

What your contract says

Yearly holiday (days)

Counted on a week of

Extra paid hours (per year)

Full time (hours per week)

These numbers change from one contract to another, so we ask you for them: you find them in your employment contract or on your payslip, usually in the holiday box. The values above are just a starting example.

Your schedule

Your hours per week

Your working days

Accrual rule

The dates

Start of the job

Count updated to

End date (if any)

What you have already used

Holiday taken (days)

Extra hours taken

Holiday carried over (days)

Extra hours carried over

Months without accrual

Nothing leaves your device: the whole calculation runs in your browser and nothing is saved.

How to use it

You need three groups of figures. From your contract take the yearly holiday entitlement, the weekly basis it is expressed on (26 days usually assume a six day week, 22 days a five day week) and any yearly bank of extra paid hours. Then your real schedule, meaning hours and working days per week. Finally the dates and what you have already taken, which you read on your payslip. If the job has ended or will end, fill in the end date as well: the count stops there and the projection becomes the balance to be paid out.

The twelfths rule

Italian collective agreements, and many payroll systems elsewhere, accrue holiday in twelfths: every month worked is worth one twelfth of the yearly entitlement, a part month of more than 15 days counts as a whole month and a part month of 15 days or less counts as nothing. Someone hired on 20 March gets no accrual for March (12 days), someone hired on the 16th gets the full month (16 days). The month by month table shows exactly which months entered the count. If your contract accrues day by day, switch the rule to pro rata and the share becomes days employed divided by days in the year.

Part time, why weeks matter and days do not

Holiday is a right measured in weeks. The yearly entitlement divided by the contract basis gives the weeks (26 divided by 6 is 4.33 weeks), which are then multiplied by your own days and your own hours. That is why a part time spread over five short days keeps the same number of holiday days as full time and only shortens each one, while a part time over fewer days really does cut the days (three days a week means 13 holiday days, not 26). A bank of extra hours works differently, being an amount of hours, and is scaled by the ratio between your schedule and full time.

How long you have to take it

Article 7 of EU Directive 2003/88/EC sets a minimum of four weeks of paid annual leave. In Italy article 10 of Legislative Decree 66/2003 adds that at least two weeks must be taken in the year they accrue and the remaining two within 18 months after the end of that year, so by 30 June two years later, and that the minimum four weeks cannot be paid in lieu while the job continues. Anything your contract gives on top of the four weeks follows the contract. National rules differ, so check yours.

Declared limits

This is a check, not a payslip. It does not know seniority increases, paid leave other than the hours bank, time banking or company practice, and it cannot see which absences suspended accrual: unpaid leave and similar periods have to be entered by hand in the months without accrual field. The current month is already counted as soon as it passes 15 days, while many payroll systems credit it only at month end, so your payslip may show it one month later. The official figure is your employer's under the agreement that applies to you, and this page does not replace professional advice.