Leave is where rostering meets employment law. Everyone is entitled to paid time off, the minimum depends on where they work, and a roster that ignores approved leave creates a gap on the day and a grievance afterwards. If you roster teams in more than one country, the differences are worth knowing.
Statutory minimums at a glance
| Where | Minimum paid annual leave | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Australia | 4 weeks a year (5 for some shift workers) | National Employment Standards |
| Saudi Arabia | 21 days a year (30 after five consecutive years with the employer) | Labor Law (Royal Decree M/51) |
| United Kingdom | 5.6 weeks a year (28 days for a five-day week) | Working Time Regulations 1998 |
| European Union | At least 4 weeks a year; many countries give more | Working Time Directive 2003/88/EC |
These are minimums for full-time employees. Awards, agreements and contracts often give more, and part-time staff usually accrue leave in proportion to their hours.
Australia
The National Employment Standards give full-time and part-time employees four weeks of paid annual leave a year, and five weeks for some shift workers, plus ten days of paid personal or carer’s leave. Casual employees don’t get paid annual leave; they receive a casual loading instead. Awards add rules about when leave can be taken and how much notice is needed.
Saudi Arabia
The Labor Law gives at least 21 days of paid annual leave a year, rising to at least 30 days once someone has completed five consecutive years with the same employer. Leave should be taken in the year it falls due and can’t be swapped for cash while the job lasts, and the employer can set the dates to suit the work with at least 30 days’ notice. Sick leave runs to 120 days in a year: the first 30 on full pay, the next 60 on three-quarters pay and the last 30 unpaid.
The official holidays are four days for Eid al-Fitr, from the day after 29 Ramadan, four days for Eid al-Adha, from the day of Arafat, and one day each for Founding Day on 22 February and National Day on 23 September. A holiday that falls inside annual leave extends the leave, and work on a holiday counts as overtime. The Eids move about eleven days earlier each year, and Muslim staff work at most six hours a day and 36 a week during Ramadan, so plan that month’s roster on its own. The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development’s guide for employers and workers sets all of this out.
United Kingdom
Workers are entitled to 5.6 weeks of paid holiday a year, which is 28 days for someone working five days a week, and bank holidays can count towards it. Irregular-hours and part-year workers accrue holiday in proportion to the hours they work.
European Union
The Working Time Directive sets a floor of four weeks’ paid annual leave, and member states build on it. Germany’s statutory minimum is 20 days for a five-day week, and France gives two and a half working days for each month worked, which adds up to five weeks a year. Collective agreements commonly add more.
Rostering around leave
The law sets how much leave people get. The roster decides whether they can actually take it without leaving a post empty. A few habits help:
- Ask for requests early. Set a notice period for planned leave and make the request easy to send, ideally from the phone the person already uses for shifts.
- Decide quickly. A request that waits two weeks for an answer can’t be planned around by anyone.
- Make approved leave block the roster. Once leave is approved, nobody should be able to roster that person on those days, whether by hand, by copying last week or through a repeating shift.
- Cover the shifts straight away. When leave is approved, find the shifts it affects and reassign them while there’s time.
- Keep availability separate. The hours someone usually works are a preference that should warn you, not a rule that blocks you, because people do agree to cover.
How TDS Workforce Management handles it
In TDS Workforce Management, staff request leave from the app and their manager approves it in a tap. Approved leave is a hard block: the shift form refuses to roster the person on those days, copies and repeating shifts skip them, publishing skips any clashing drafts, and the manager sees how many existing shifts fall inside the leave. Usual availability is advisory and warns instead. Annual and sick leave balances accrue each month on ordinary hours, as the National Employment Standards count them: approved hours except overtime, plus paid leave, for hourly staff, and the ordinary week for salaried staff, at the rate you set (1/13 gives four weeks a year). Accrual can be turned off for casual staff. Approved leave comes off the balance, skipping public holidays and the days the person’s usual availability marks as off. Saudi Arabia’s Founding Day and National Day can be added for a year in one go, and the two Eids by hand once they’re announced. Paying the leave stays with your payroll system.
This summary is general information, not legal advice. Entitlements depend on the employment type, the award or agreement and the jurisdiction, and they change over time.