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People & pay

Holiday & accrual

Fixed allowance vs 12.07% accrual, days or hours, pro-rata for part-timers, holiday-pay methods, opening-balance carry-in, and a one-inbox approval flow with clash warnings.

Open in WagePilot

Holiday turns the most spreadsheet-prone part of running a team into taps. Staff see their balance and request leave from their phone; you approve or decline from a single inbox that warns you about rota clashes; and accrual is calculated for you, including the rules that trip people up.

app.wagepilot.co.uk/app/holiday
Help Centre

Holiday

Approvals, the team calendar and balances.

Pending

2

awaiting you

Off today

0

full team in

Approved

3

next 30 days

Team days left

123

holiday remaining

Who's off: next 14 days

Wed 29 - Thu 30 - Fri 31 - Sat 1 - Sun 2 - Mon 3 - Tue 4 - Wed 5 PS Thu 6 PS Fri 7 - Sat 8 - Sun 9 -

Pending requests

LM Leo Marsh Sick · 1 day · Wed 17 Jun

“Migraine”

Decline Approve
PS Priya Shah Holiday · 4 days · Sun 12 Jul – Thu 16 Jul

“Family trip to St Ives”

Clashes with Sam's shift on Mon 13 Jul

Decline Approve

Balances

Ade Kowalski 25 days left
Jess Morgan 13 days left
Leo Marsh 0.5 days left
Priya Shah 30 days left
Sam Pengelly 26.5 days left
Tom Rowe 28 days left
One approval inbox. Each request shows the balance and warns if it clashes with the rota.

How UK holiday is calculated

Most UK workers are entitled to 5.6 weeks of paid holiday a year (28 days for a five-day week, including bank holidays, per GOV.UK). WagePilot tracks each person’s entitlement and balance, and handles the cases that are easy to get wrong:

Regular part-timers
Entitlement is pro-rata to the days they work — set “Days worked per week” and 28 × 3/5 = 16.8 is worked out for you.
Irregular-hours & part-year staff
Holiday accrues at 12.07% of hours worked for leave years starting on or after 1 April 2024 (the 2024 Working Time Regulations reform). WagePilot applies this automatically as hours are logged.
Bank holidays
Counted within the statutory entitlement as standard, so balances stay honest.

Choosing a holiday basis

You set each person’s holiday when you add or edit them (org defaults for rate, allowance and pay method live in Settings). The first choice is the basis, which changes the fields you see:

The fork: a fixed annual allowance for regular staff, or 12.07% accrual on hours worked for zero-hours and irregular staff.
Fixed allowance
A set entitlement for regular staff. Choose whether it’s in Days or Hours (hours suit shift workers, e.g. 20h/wk × 5.6 = 112h/yr).
Accrual (12.07%)
For zero-hours and irregular staff — holiday builds at 12.07% of the hours they actually work, so you never reverse-engineer it from a spreadsheet.

Fixed-allowance options

Days worked per week
Pro-rates a part-timer’s allowance (28 × 3/5 = 16.8 days).
Allowance builds
All up front makes the full allowance available from day one; Monthly accrual releases 1/12 each month.
Holiday pay
How leave taken is paid: 52-week average earnings (for variable pay) or a fixed contractual rate.

Carrying in a balance

On accrual basis you can enter Holiday already accrued (hours) — leave earned before WagePilot (from onboarding or switching a worker over). It’s credited to the current leave year on top of what they accrue here. When editing an existing person, saving stamps the carry-in as of today, so switching someone onto accrual credits the current leave year cleanly. Their profile’s holiday ring shows how much was carried in.

The approval flow

  1. 1

    Staff request

    They pick dates in the app; their remaining balance is shown so they request realistically.

  2. 2

    You see a clash check

    The request lands in your inbox, flagged if it collides with a shift they’re rota’d for.

  3. 3

    Approve or decline

    One tap. Approved leave updates their balance and shows on the rota so you don’t schedule over it.

Common questions

How do I work out holiday for part-time and zero-hours staff?
Most UK workers get 5.6 weeks of paid holiday a year (28 days for a five-day week, including bank holidays, per GOV.UK). For regular part-timers, set “Days worked per week” and WagePilot pro-rates it (28 × 3/5 = 16.8). For irregular-hours and part-year staff, use the Accrual basis: holiday accrues at 12.07% of hours worked for leave years starting on or after 1 April 2024. Either way, each person’s balance and accrual are tracked automatically.
Should I set the allowance in days or hours?
Days suit staff who work whole, regular days. Hours suit shift workers whose day lengths vary — e.g. 20 hours a week × 5.6 = 112 hours a year. You choose per person under “Allowance in” when you add or edit them.
Someone already had holiday accrued before I started using WagePilot — can I add it?
Yes. On accrual basis, enter it in “Holiday already accrued (hours)” on the person’s profile. It’s credited to the current leave year on top of what they accrue in WagePilot, and their holiday ring shows the carried-in amount.