Take a week off every once in a while or take a five-week break in the summer: everyone likes their vacation differently. But is the employer actually obliged to grant you all of your annual leave in one go? A lawyer knows.
Many have avoided long trips over the past two years due to the restrictions imposed by the pandemic. Now you can finally plan better again. Four or five weeks off sounds tempting. But what about employment law?
Can employees turn their entire holiday entitlement upside down at once?
“It’s possible if the employer agrees,” says Alexander Bredereck, a specialist lawyer for labor law in Berlin. But it becomes more difficult if employers and employees cannot agree.
Paragraph 7 of the Federal Holidays Act stipulates that the employer must grant holidays in one go. According to Bredereck, however, this does not apply if there are urgent operational reasons or personal reasons for the employee.
According to the law, however, employees are entitled to be granted at least twelve working days of vacation at a time. But only if you assume a six-day week. With a regular five-day week, employees must be granted at least ten vacation days at a time.
“The situation is different only if the statutory holiday entitlement is lower, for example because the employment relationship did not last for the entire year,” says Bredereck.
