Outstanding holiday days

January is almost over and the chocolate Easter eggs are already on the shelves. We would therefore like to remind employers that they must encourage their employees to take any holiday entitlement accrued in 2025 before 1 July 2026. If, as an employer, you are too late or too non-committal in addressing this, you run the risk that outstanding holiday entitlement will not lapse and will have to be paid out when the employee leaves the company.

Statutory and non-statutory holiday entitlement: how does it work?

Essentially, it works as follows. Employees accrue statutory holiday entitlement each year equal to four times the agreed working hours per week. If someone works 40 hours per week, this amounts to 160 hours per year, or 20 days. These statutory holiday entitlement days have an expiry date: they expire six months after the end of the accrual year. In concrete terms, this means that statutory holiday entitlement accrued in 2025 will expire on 1 July 2026. Please note: if an employee was demonstrably unable to take holiday before that date, for example due to (long-term) illness, this short expiry period does not apply.

In addition to statutory days, many employers offer extra leave: days above the statutory minimum. This extra leave is not a statutory right, but is provided for in the employment contract, staff handbook or collective labour agreement. Days above the statutory minimum are not subject to a six-month expiry period, but to a limitation period of five years after the end of the year in which they were accrued.

Expiry period and limitation period for holiday days

The expiry period and limitation period must be made known to the employee at the start of the employment relationship. Preferably, these should even be included in the employment contract. But beware, it is important that you, as an employer, cannot sit back and relax. European case law stipulates that holiday entitlement only actually expires or becomes time-barred if the employer actively, clearly and timely informs the employee that days are (almost) lost and also gives the employee the opportunity to take holiday. If you fail to do so, statutory holiday entitlement may continue to accrue. The consequence is practical and costly: upon termination of employment, the employee can still have the accrued leave paid out, even if that leave already appeared to have “expired” in your records.

Inform employees early

In concrete terms, this means that employers must now inform their employees with outstanding holiday days about their balance, encourage them to take the days in good time and remind them of the expiry date. In any case, do not wait until June, as employees must have sufficient time to plan and take their holidays.

Inform each employee personally and specifically: state the number of remaining statutory hours/days, explicitly mention the expiry date of 1 July 2026, and explain what is expected of the employee: namely, to request and take leave in good time. Then record the same message in writing, for example by email or via the HR system, and ensure that you can prove that the employee has received the message.

Solution for leave backlog

Especially in sectors with labour shortages, employees often work long hours without taking holiday. However, this is not advisable. The right to holiday is there for a reason: employees need to be able to rest from their work and relax. This promotes the health of employees and is therefore also in the employer’s interest. So always encourage employees to take holiday, and not just a few days here and there, but especially a longer consecutive period.

One solution could be to impose a number of fixed days off, for example around Christmas or, as in the construction industry, part of the summer holidays.

Pension administration organisation PGGM found a particularly creative way to get rid of a backlog of leave. In the new collective labour agreement, it was agreed that PGGM employees can donate leave hours to colleagues who provide a lot of informal care. PGGM then doubles the donated hours in response to the increasing pressure on the care sector, which is demanding more and more informal care.

Questions

If you have any questions about outstanding holiday entitlement, the calculation of holiday entitlement or holiday entitlement for employees on long-term sick leave, please contact one of our employment law specialists.