In every calendar year an employee is entitled to paid leave, which consists of basic leave and supplementary leave.

The extent of basic leave is 20 days. . The extent of supplementary leave depends on the age of the employee. Based ont hat is can range from 1 day to 10 days as a maximum. After the age of 25 the employee is eligible for 1 day and after the age of 45 the employee will be eligible for 10 days supplementary leave.

Employees shall be first entitled to extra vacation time in the year when reaching the age specified in the law.

With certain groups of employees the law provides for other supplementary leave. These groups of employees include young people, parents raising children, people working underground, workers exposed to ionizing radiation, employees having suffered a degree of health impairment of at least fifty per cent as diagnosed by the body of rehabilitation experts, people receiving disability or blind assistance.

As a main rule, leave must be issued in the year in which it is due. Vacation shall be allocated to contain at least fourteen consecutive days at a time. It is also possible to issue leave after the current year if the employee has been prevented from taking his or her leave in the current year due to ill health or some other personal obstacle. In this case it must be issued within 60 days after the obstacle ceased.

Vacation time shall be considered allocated during the year when it is due, provided that it begins during that year and the portion allocated in the following year does not exceed five working days.

If the employment relationship commenced on the first of October or subsequently, the employer shall be entitled to allocate vacation time by 31 March of the next year. In the event of economic reasons of particular importance or any direct and consequential reason arising in connection with its operations, the employer may allocate one-fourth of the employee’s vacation time by 31 March of the following year if so stipulated in the collective agreement.

By agreement of the parties, the employer shall be entitled to allocate one-third of the vacation time (20 days basic leave and 1-10 days supplementary leave) by the end of the year following the year when due.

The time limitation on a request for leave is 3 years.

Although an employee has a natural right to leave, leave is not ‘taken’ by the employee, but is issued by the employer. For under the Labour Code the employee is free to dispose over no more than seven days of his or her leave, while the balance is left at the discretion of the employer.

As an important rule, leave has to be issued in kind, i.e. it cannot be redeemed for money. There are only one exception to this rule: when the employment relationship terminates.

Sickness:

An employer is entitled to 15 days of sick leave in a calendar year, for whose duration he or she receives 70% of his or her wage for absence. (If the employee has used up all 15 days of the sick leave, he or she will continue to receive sick pay from the social insurance fund.)

The 15 days of sick leave can be taken several times or, if incapacity to earn an income lasts for an extended period, once as a whole.

If a person enters into an employment contract with an employer during the year, he or she is entitled to sick leave proportionate to the balance of the year.

As opposed to regular leave, the unspent days of sick leave cannot be carried over to the next year, i.e. if an employee has not been ill, or has spent less than 15 days off sick in the current year, some of his or her sick leave will be ‘lost’.

Entitlement to sick leave, i.e. incapacity to earn an income has to be certified by the employee’s doctor. As an important provision, if the loss of income-earning capacity is caused by an industrial accident or occupational disease, it is not considered part of the sick leave.