Entitlement to Public Holiday Benefits

There are 9 Public Holidays during the year in Ireland:

1. 1^st January (New Year’s Day)
2. St Patrick’s Day
3. Easter Monday
4. First Monday in May
5. First Monday in June
6. First Monday in August
7. Last Monday in October
8. Christmas Day
9. Stephen’s Day

Note:  Good Friday or Christmas Eve are not Public Holidays.

 Entitlement to Public Holiday Benefits

• All full-time staff are automatically entitled to Public Holiday benefit
• Part-time staff are also entitled to benefit for Public Holidays if they have worked at least a total of 40 hours in the 5 weeks ending on the day before the Public Holiday.
• Employees are entitled to benefit for Public Holidays, even if they do not work on the day.

Entitlement is one of the following (as the employer decides)

•  A paid day off on the Public Holiday
•  A paid day off within a month
•  An extra day’s annual leave
•  An extra day’s pay

Part-time employees

If an employee has worked for at least 40 hours in the 5 weeks before the public holiday and the public holiday falls on a day they normally work they are entitled to a day’s pay for the public holiday. If the employee is required to work that day they are entitled to an additional day’s pay.

If an employee does not normally work on that particular day they should receive one-fifth of their weekly pay. Even if they are never rostered to work on a public holiday they are entitled to one-fifth of their weekly pay as compensation for the public holiday.

If an employee does not have normal daily or weekly working hours, under SI 475/1997, an average of their day’s pay or the fifth of their weekly pay is calculated over the 13 weeks they worked before the public holiday.

In all of these situations an employer may choose to give paid time off instead of pay for the public holiday.

Calculating Entitlement
1.   If the Public Holiday falls on a day the employee works or is normally rostered to work

• The employee is entitled to be paid the equivalent of the hours they worked on the last working day before the Public Holiday

2.   If the employee does not work on the Public Holiday, and it’s a day the employee does not

       normally work (i.e. staff whose hours of work vary)

• The employee is entitled to be paid the equivalent of one-fifth of their last working week.

Sick leave on a public holiday

Full-time workers on sick leave during a public holiday, are entitled to benefit for the public holiday they missed, as described above. If a part-time worker is on sick leave during a public holiday, they are entitled to benefit for the public holiday, provided they worked for at least 40 hours in the previous five-week period – see ‘Part-time employees’ above.

However, if they have been off work for more than 26 consecutive weeks due to illness or accident, or for more than 52 weeks due to an occupational accident and they are absent from work immediately before the public holiday because of this, they are not entitled to the public holiday.

All Annual Leave and Public Holiday records should be kept for at least three years.