Although the first half of the year passed in a blur of Covid restriction,s time kept ticking on and over half of our beloved bank holidays are already gone.
There are nine public holidays in Ireland this year and last Monday, June 7, ticked number five off the list.
While we haven’t been able to mark them with the same fanfare as usual, and with many people off work, it was easy not to notice them slipping by.
But with things now opening up, this is fair warning for you to organise yourself for the remaining days.
Schools and most businesses are generally closed on bank holidays, and public transport usually operates a pared back timetable.
There are four fixed bank holiday dates in Ireland every year.
They are: New Year's Day, St Patrick's Day, Christmas Day and St Stephen's Day. The months of May, June, August and October all also have bank holidays.
The four bank holidays left in 2021 are as follows:
First Monday in August (August 2)
Last Monday in October (October 25)
Christmas Day (December 25)
Saint Stephen's Day (December 26)
As Christmas Day falls on a Saturday and St Stephen’s Day falls on a Sunday, this year Monday 27 and Tuesday 28 will see the banks closed.
However these are not public holidays. If a public holiday falls on a weekend, as is the case here, you do not have any automatic legal entitlement to have the next working day off work.
While many employers might treat the following Monday as a public holiday, they can require you to attend work on that day.
If a public holiday falls on a day that is not a normal working day for a business (for example, on Saturday or Sunday), employees are still entitled to the benefit for that day.
You are entitled to either a paid day off within a month of the public holiday, an additional day of annual leave or an additional day’s pay.
But with Christmas months away most people’s focus will be on the upcoming August Bank Holiday weekend.
If you really want to maximise what you can do with the time you can score yourself nine days off work (including weekends) using only four days holidays if you book August 3, 4, 5 and 6 as annual leave.
