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Dublin Live
Dublin Live
National
Cormac O'Shea

Christmas 2020 holidays: Annual leave rights in Ireland with one Bank Holiday problem

Christmas is just around the corner and people will now be planning their festive period.

While it will be a very different Christmas in 2020 for reasons we don't need to mention - people will still want to make the most of their time off.

Many of us will have plenty of holidays left due to not being able to go anywhere this year but I'm sure people are hoping to use their annual leave days wisely.

Which brings us to Christmas this year - so how many days off will you be given?

Well, many people have to hold over a certain amount of holidays each year so they can take all of Christmas week off.

Christmas shoppers in Dublin (Image: Philip Fitzpatrick)

And then you are almost always blessed with St Stephen's Day off as it's a Bank Holiday.

However, Boxing day as it's called across the Irish Sea, falls on a Saturday this year.

So what does this mean for your bank holiday? Will you get the following Monday off or will it just mean nothing?

Well, your employer does not have to give the Monday off although you are entitled to whatever benefits you would usually get for a public holiday.

The official Citizens Information website says: "If the public holiday falls on a day which is not a normal working day for that business (for example, on Saturday or Sunday) you are still entitled to benefit for that public holiday.

"This will apply in 2020 when St Stephen’s Day (26 December) will fall on a Saturday. Note that where a public holiday falls on a weekend, you do not have any automatic legal entitlement to have the next working day off work. This means that Monday 28 December 2020 is not a public holiday."

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