We give all employees 28 days of holiday per leave year which runs from 1 April to 31 March. In 2024, Good Friday — which is normally in April — falls on 29 March. As a result, there will be nine bank holidays in the leave year 2023/34, but only seven in 2024/25. Do we need to give this bank holiday off twice in one year? And if we did give it on 29 March 2024, does this mean our employees would have one less bank holiday for 2024/25?

This will depend entirely on how your contract is worded in relation to holiday entitlement. If the contract states that the employees will be given eight bank holidays off in a year, you do not need to give the extra one in 2023/24. However, if you intend to close the business for the bank holiday on 29 March 2024, you will need to inform your employees in advance that they need to use one of their remaining holiday days to book the day off as annual leave.

Alternatively, if your contract is worded in such a way that employees are entitled to all bank holidays, or specifies the days that are bank holidays, ie it specifies Good Friday as a day off, you will need to give it to them as a bank holiday in 2023/24; however, you will not then be required to give them an additional day in 2024/25.

It is important to note that if you only give your employees the minimum holiday entitlement (28 days or 5.6 weeks) then for the annual leave year 2024/25 you will need to ensure your employees are given at least the minimum to ensure you are not in breach of the Working Time Regulations 1998. For a full-time worker, 7 days out of the 28 will be allocated in advance to the bank holidays, with the remaining 21 days for use at some other time.