The rules on carrying over annual leave have been relaxed due to COVID-19.
If you were hoping for some news that wasn’t all doom and gloom, then this might just be it. The government announced on Friday that, due to the disturbance caused by the coronavirus outbreak, workers who haven’t used their annual holiday allowance, will now be able to carry it over into the next two years.
Usually, if you don’t use your allocated holiday days, you’re not able to carry them over and use them the following year. Instead, whatever you don’t use you’ll lose.
However, now employees will be able to defer up to four weeks of their unused holiday into the following two years. Which is pretty ideal considering most people only get 28 days, including bank holidays.
These changes look to prevent staff shortages in the key industries like food and healthcare, during the Coronavirus pandemic. Which Environment Secretary George Eustice commented on: ‘At this crucial time, relaxing laws on statutory leave will help ensure key workers can continue the important work to keep supplies flowing, but without losing the crucial time off they are entitled to.’
These changes will apply to almost all workers, including those who work irregular hours and those on zero-hours contracts, so if you’re yet to use any of your sacred holiday, you don’t need to rush. This means staff can continue to work through the national effort against COVID-19 without losing out on holiday — and employers in the UK’s key industries, i.e. food and healthcare, are less at risk of being short-staffed.
Hopefully this means that come 2021, we can all head off across the globe and soak up some much-deserved (and much missed!) sunshine.