Entitlement to annual leave and public holidays is set out in the Agenda for Change Handbook. These provisions are developed further in the Scottish context by PCS(AFC)2025/6. In addition, NHS Scotland staff and managers can now use an online calculator to check on annual leave and public holiday entitlement. This can be found here.
Annual leave and public holiday entitlement is expressed in terms of days in the Agenda for Change Handbook. This will not change. However, the length of the working week for Agenda for Change staff in Scotland is reducing. From 1 April 2024, the standard working week reduced from 37.5 to 37 hours, meaning a standard day reduced from 7.5 hours (7 hours 30 minutes) to 7.4 hours (7 hours 24 minutes). Annual leave and public holiday entitlement, as expressed in hours, reduced in proportion.
From 1 April 2026, the full-time working week for Agenda for Change staff will reduce further from 37 hours to 36 hours, with a standard day reducing in proportion to 7.2 hours (7 hours, 12 minutes). At all stages, the hours of part-time staff will reduce on a pro-rata basis.
A spreadsheet setting out annual leave and public holiday entitlement in hours, in the context of the reduction of the working week, can be found here.
The spreadsheet is divided into tabs setting out tables for different circumstances, and covers both annual leave and public holidays. With regard to annual leave, entitlement as set out in the Agenda for Change Handbook is 27 days on appointment, 29 days after 5 years’ service, and 33 days after 10 years. Yearly entitlement in hours is calculated by taking working time, dividing by 5 and multiplying by the relevant number of days (27, 29 or 33). For part-time staff, this is then rounded to the nearest half hour.
The public holiday section contains tabs setting out entitlement at each stage of the reduction of the working week. As noted above, from 1 April 2026 the standard working week will reduce to 36 hours, giving a standard working day of 7.2 hours. Again, entitlement is worked out according to working hours, divided by 5 and multiplied by 8. It is then rounded up to the nearest half day, as per paragraph 13.6 of the Agenda for Change Handbook.
To use the spreadsheet, go to the appropriate tab and find the range within which the relevant working hours sit, then read across to determine entitlement. For example, a part-time member of staff with 10 years’ service (who is therefore entitled to 33 days of annual leave a year) whose new working week from 1 April 2026 is 28.8 hours, would sit in the range between 28.75 and 28.82 on the 33 days annual leave table, and is therefore entitled to 190 hours of annual leave.
On the public holiday tab, the same member of staff would sit in the range between 27.01 and 29.25 hours, and therefore be entitled to 46.8 hours of public holiday per year. Adding the two together would give a total entitlement of 236.8 hours.
The online calculator does all these calculations automatically and is therefore the most convenient way of determining entitlement in any given situation. The calculator can also be used to determine entitlement for staff who depart or take up post part way through the leave year, or change contracted hours within a given leave year.
In using the calculator, staff and managers should be careful to choose the correct options and enter the correct information (particularly with regard to working hours).
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