The rules about lay-offs and annual holiday

The worker gets annual holiday days for each month when he or she works for at least 14 days. If the worker does not have 14 working days during any month, or only has 14 working days during some months, he or she will get annual holiday days for the months when he or she has worked for at least 35 hours.

If the worker is laid off full time

The Annual Holidays Act (Vuosilomalaki) says that the worker will also get annual holiday days based on some days during which he or she has not worked.

For example, a maximum of 30 days when you have been laid off will be used as a basis for giving you annual holiday days. If the lay-off is no longer than 30 working days, it has no effect on your annual holiday. If the lay-off is longer than 30 working days, you will not get annual holiday days for the lay-off period after the first 30 working days.

If the worker works between lay-off periods, the period of 30 days is counted from the beginning when each lay-off period begins. The holiday credit year (lomanmääräytymisvuosi) is from 1 April to 31 March. During this period, you will earn the annual holiday days that you will then use during the next holiday season. If a new holiday credit year begins during an uninterrupted lay-off period, counting the period of 30 days will continue and not start from the beginning.

Example: The 14-day earning rule is applied to a worker. He works regularly from Monday to Friday. He was laid off in June 2014 for four weeks, with no breaks. After this, he worked, but was laid off again from 1 September 2014 to 17 October 2014. The June lay-off period has 20 lay-off days, which would have otherwise been working days. The worker gets normal annual holiday days from June, since there are less than 30 lay-off days. Since the worker worked between the lay-off periods, the 30 days are counted again from the beginning when the second lay-off period begins. The second lay-off period that started on 1 September 2014 was seven weeks, 35 lay-off days. The first 30 of these, from Mondays to Fridays from 1 September to 10 October, are used to calculate annual holiday days. The last five lay-off days (from 13 to 17 October) will not be taken into account as the basis for annual holiday. However, the worker will get the normal number of annual holiday days from October, since eight of the lay-off days will be used as a basis for annual holiday days, and there are 10 normal working days in that October. This way, the 14-day minimum is met.

If the worker is laid off part-time by shortening the working week

The worker can also be laid off part-time so that the working week is shorter in one way or another. There are special rules for annual holiday days for these situations. The employer gets a normal number of annual holiday days during the first six months of the part-time lay-off. This means that annual holiday days are also counted based on the lay-off days during this time. Lay-off days or lay-off hours are not counted separately.

If the worker works for a full week at some point during the lay-off period, the six-month period will be calculated again from the beginning. When the part-time lay-off has gone on for six months without breaks, the rules of the Annual Holidays Act say that the annual holiday days will be counted using either the 14-day rule or the 35-day rule, and lay-off days or hours will not be counted into the working days.

Read more:

• You get annual holiday days for each month that you work
• Giving annual holiday, taking annual holiday, and deciding when the annual holiday is
• Annual holiday when your job is fixed-term