Remember to take your holidays

Disclaimer: This page has been automatically translated. It may contain grammatical inaccuracies, but the content is guaranteed to be correct.

As an employee, you are entitled to 5 weeks' holiday each year.

You must take 4 weeks / 20 days of holiday during the holiday period, which runs from 1 September to 31 December of the following year.

If you have holiday in excess of the 4 weeks / 20 days remaining at the end of the holiday period on 31 December, you can:

• Transfer your holiday or
• Have your holiday pay paid out

Transfer of holiday

You can carry over more than 20 days to the next holiday period by making a written agreement with your employer to carry over the days. The agreement must be made before the end of the holiday period on 31 December.

If you take the 5th week of holiday during the holiday period from 1 September to 31 December, there is no carryover of holiday.

Please note that holidays up to 4 weeks not taken during the holiday period are non-transferable. If you do not take the holiday, you will lose the holiday, unless you are affected by a holiday obstacle – i.e. that you are prevented from taking your holiday due to illness, maternity, adoption or the like.

Read more about holiday obstacles

Receive holiday pay

If you do not make an agreement with your employer to transfer the holiday to the next holiday year, the employer must automatically pay out holiday beyond 4 weeks at the end of the holiday period on 31 December.

If you have not been employed the entire holiday year (from 1 September to 31 December the following year) and have received public benefits such as unemployment benefits, early retirement pay, flexi-benefit etc., you cannot be paid the holiday benefit. In order to receive the holiday pay, you must declare in writing that you have not received public benefits.

Have you changed jobs?

Did you get a new job before 31 December? Then you can get the holiday money paid out without you taking the holiday, regardless of the amount and the number of holiday days.

To get the holiday pay from your former employer, you need to fill in a form and send it to your former employer by 30 September of the following year.

The form will be available on borger.dk after 31 December.

If you have received one or more public benefits during the holiday year (e.g. unemployment benefit, old-age pension, flexi-allowance etc.), you will be deducted a corresponding number of days from the benefit for which you are paid holiday pay.

Can I transfer extra holiday entitlements (the 6th week of holidays / special holidays)?

If you are entitled to holiday in addition to the Holiday Act's 5 weeks - the so-called extra holiday entitlements, or the 6th holiday week - the days off can only be transferred or paid out if this is possible according to the collective agreement or other agreement of which you are covered.   

A number of IDA's collective agreements contain rules on the transfer of holidays.

If you are employed by the state, a region or a municipality under a collective agreement with IDA, you can carry over holiday days (including special holidays) in excess of 20 days per year from one holiday year to the next if you have made a written agreement with your place of work. The agreement must be concluded before the end of the holiday period.

If you resign before the transferred holiday has taken place, the right to take the transferred holiday is lost. In that case, you must receive a payout of holiday allowance for the transferred holiday.

Remember to take your holiday before 31 December 2021

With the introduction of the new Holiday Act, if you were working, you earned 16.64 days of holiday from 1 January to 31 August 2019, to be taken in the mini-holiday year from 1 May to 31 August 2020. If you had any holiday days left on 31 August 2020, they were carried over and covered by the new Holiday Act. You can therefore keep the holiday days until 31 December 2021.

If you have any doubts about whether you had any holiday entitlement as of 31 August 2020, you can check your payslip for August 2020 or contact HR.

If you do not take the transferred holidays before 31 December 2021, the days are lost and you lose the right to both the holiday and the holiday pay. The reason is that these days cannot be included in the transfer of holiday days earned in excess of 20 days to the next holiday period (1 September 2021 - 31 December 2022), as the days are not earned in the holiday year 1 September 2020 - 31 August 2021.

Did you get a new job?

If you have taken a new job or left a job before 31 December 2021, you can receive holiday pay without taking the holiday. You can apply for payment after 31 December 2021 via borger.dk

Apply for holiday pay on borger.dk

It is a condition for payment that you have not received the following public benefits during the holiday period from 1 September 2020 to 31 December 2021: unemployment benefit, temporary labour market benefit, cash benefit, after-salary benefit, flexi-benefit, resource transition benefit, integration benefit, training aid or cash benefit.

If you have received one of the benefits, you cannot have the holiday paid out - then you must take the holiday before 31 December 2021. The days on which you have received the public benefit will be deducted from your holiday days.

Increased holiday allowance - transitional period for the new Holiday Act

If you are entitled to an increased holiday allowance under a collective or individual agreement, you should note that you are entitled to payment of the increased part of the holiday allowance in addition to the one per cent of the Holiday Act that you earned during the freeze period from 1 September 2019 to 31 August 2020.

A trade union arbitration concerning a specific agreement on this very issue must be presumed to have clarified the legal position of similar arrangements.

Payment of the increased part of the holiday allowance shall only be made to employees who were employed by the same employer for the entire period. Employees who resigned during the period shall continue to be entitled only to holiday pay earned during the period at the rate of 12.5 % of the holiday pay. The reason is that holiday pay is not payable to employees who resign, as the holiday pay is part of the 12.5% rate.

Hopefully you have already been paid, but if not, you should contact your employer/HR.