Full List of UK Bank Holidays for 2024

Thinking ahead to 2024 already? We’ve got you sorted with a full list of the bank holidays across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, including any extra bank holidays that you might need to plan for.

Full List of UK Bank Holidays 2024

Each country within the UK has slightly different rules when it comes to public holidays, meaning they don’t all have the same bank holidays.

• England & Wales

• Bank Holidays in Scotland

• Bank Holidays in Northern Ireland

How do you maximise your annual leave for 2024?

2024 England & Wales

You can request 21 days of holiday and have 49 days off in total. These should be:

• 2-5 April
• 7-10 May
• 28-31 May
• 27-30 August
• 23, 24, 27, 30, 31 December (Christmas break)

2024 Scotland

You can request 24 days of annual leave and get 56 days off across the year. These should be:

• 3-5 Jan
• 7-10 May
• 28-31 May
• 6-9 August
• 3-6 December
• 23, 24, 27, 30, 31 December (Christmas break)

2024 Northern Ireland

You can request 28 days off but get 64 days off across the year. These should be:

• 19-22 March
• 25-28 March
• 7-10 May
• 28-31 May
• 15-19 July
• 27-30 August
• 23, 24, 27 December (Christmas break)

FAQs

When is the next bank holiday in 2024?

1st January 2024 (New Year’s Day) is the first bank holiday in 2024. It will fall on a Monday.

How many bank holidays will there be in 2024?

For England and Wales, there will be eight bank holidays in 2024. For Scotland, there will be nine. For Northern Ireland, there will be ten.

How many bank holidays in 2025?

For England and Wales, there will be eight bank holidays in 2025. For Scotland, there will be ten. For Northern Ireland, there will be ten.

What holidays are in the UK for Easter in 2024?

There are 2 bank holidays over the Easter period in the UK in 2024. These are Friday 29th March (Good Friday) and Monday 1st April (Easter Monday).

Is it double pay on bank holidays?

Legally, employees have no statutory right to extra bank holiday pay. They are included in an employee’s annual holiday leave, so any extra payments are dependent on the terms of their employment contract. However, workers in essential services (e.g. police, fire, ambulance, or healthcare workers) usually receive additional pay for working on bank holidays.

What if a public holiday falls on a weekend?

If a bank holiday falls on a Saturday or Sunday, it is moved to the next working day.

Employee Rights: Time Off

In accordance with UK employment law, nearly all employees are legally entitled to 5.6 weeks of paid holiday annually, commonly referred to as statutory leave or annual leave. This entitlement extends to agency workers, those with irregular working hours, and individuals engaged in zero-hour contracts.

When we refer to “almost all workers,” we are specifically addressing individuals falling into the following categories:

1. Workers with a contract or another arrangement to perform work or services personally for a reward. The reward may be monetary or a benefit in kind, such as the commitment to a contract or future work.
2. Workers with a limited right to delegate work through subcontracting. Their employer must have ongoing work for them as long as the contract or arrangement lasts.
3. Workers not engaged in work as part of their own limited company in situations where the ’employer’ is, in fact, a customer or client.

As per the Working Time Regulations 1998, the statutory minimum leave rights increased from 4 to 5.6 weeks in 2009. Most full-time employees working five days a week must receive a minimum of 28 days of paid annual leave annually, inclusive of the standard 8 UK bank holidays, equating to 5.6 weeks of holiday. Part-time workers are entitled to at least 5.6 weeks of paid holiday, although this may translate to fewer than 28 days.

Employee Rights: Bank Holidays

Employees do not possess statutory rights to bank holidays. Employers have the discretion to decide whether UK bank holidays in 2023 are included in an employee’s statutory annual leave or offered as unpaid time off, in accordance with Section 1 of the Employment Rights Act 1996.

Failure to adhere to the terms of an employee’s contract is considered a breach, and employees resigning due to non-compliance may file a claim for constructive unfair dismissal, particularly if their tenure exceeds one year (two years for employment beginning on or after April 6, 2012).

Employers can require their employees to work on a bank holiday, as long as their request is in line with the terms of their employment. In such a situation, employees cannot refuse to work. However, employers should be aware of the following:

• If employers refuse to grant religious employees time off for any of the bank holidays with religious significance, this could mean indirect religious discrimination.
• There is no requirement for employers to allow additional time off in lieu of employees who practise religions other than Christianity as this could be interpreted as unlawful direct discrimination. Instead, employees should use their annual holiday allowance.
• Employers need to know their obligations under the Equality Act 2010, which protects workers against direct and indirect discrimination.

Part-Time Workers and Bank Holidays

Part-time employees enjoy the same rights as their full-time counterparts. The part-time Workers (Prevention of Less Favourable Treatment) Regulations 2000 stipulate that part-time workers are entitled to the same terms as full-time employees, albeit on a pro-rata basis.

To safeguard both yourself and your company from potential claims of unfair treatment, it is advisable to adhere to the guidance provided by the UK government. This entails offering a prorated allowance of paid bank holidays to your part-time employees, irrespective of whether they are scheduled to work on a bank holiday or not.

Annual Leave Management with Factorial

Knowing national holidays is one thing, but managing how your team members apply for this time off alongside their annual leave is another essential responsibility of HR teams and managers.

With Factorial’s Holiday and Absence Management Software, you can automate and keep track of employee time off from one centralised team calendar, giving you full visibility over upcoming time off. Our tool allows you to:

• Centralise and automate absence requests.
• Get updated and available information at all times.
• Accept or deny time-off requests in one click.
• Check the number of holidays remaining for each employee.
• Create charts for the used days and the total available days.
• Gain visibility of all absences at a glance.
• Check the available human resources of each team.
• Define the number of holidays employees can carry over from one year to the next.
• Create and customise as many leave types as you need.
• Download annual and monthly summaries of your employees’ absences.
• Allow your employees to request and manage holidays from their mobile.
• Track your company’s time off with custom reports.
• Track all your employees’ leaves and holidays from your personal calendar.
• Create recurring cycles and carry over unused time off.

Book a free demo to speak to an expert about how this tool (and many more) can streamline your HR processes!