HR Magazine - Western Europe has world's best statutory holiday entitlements

Workers in Western European countries, on average, have access to the greatest amount of statutory paid holiday in the world.

In contrast, employees in Asia Pacific have the lowest levels of statutory paid holiday.

Workers in the UK have one of the most generous statutory holiday entitlements (28 days) while workers in the United States of America have the least with no statutory holiday entitlement.

The data comes from Mercer's Worldwide Benefit and Employment Guidelines, which provides an overview of employee regulation and employment practices across 62 different countries.

The report is used by multi-nationals to define their employee benefit policies across the countries in which they operate. Statutory holiday entitlement is the amount of time off work that an employer must provide to their employees by law.

According to Mercer, holiday entitlement is often more complex since actual holiday provisions often depends on company contracts and the number and treatment of public holidays.

In the UK employees are entitled to 28 days holiday. With the UK also holding eight public holidays each year, this suggests that employees in the UK could be on holiday for 36 days, or 10%, of each year.

This would be one of the highest entitlements of all 62 countries. The reality is that companies are allowed to include the 8 public holidays as part of the 28-day entitlement so UK employees actually have fewer days' holidays than their peers in the rest of Europe where, in general, the practice is for European employees to take public holidays in addition to their statutory entitlement.

Employees in the Asia-Pacific region have comparatively low levels of statutory entitlement but public holidays are taken in addition to this rather than as part of it. However, the levels of holiday entitlement in Asia-Pac are still below those of Western Europe.

Wolfgang Seidl, head of Mercer's healthcare consulting business, said: "Despite continued economic turmoil, interest in the issue work/life balance continues to grow. From the employee's and company's perspective, health creates wealth. Companies recognise that a healthy, happy workforce is a productive one and this feeds directly into the bottom line. How companies interpret holiday regulations provision is a major factor. With pay rises muted and often below the rate of inflation, companies are searching for other ways to motivate their staff.

"Flexible working and a good employee work/life balance helps improve employee engagement when the usual financial tools are unavailable."

Employees with the potential for most holiday time is Austria with 25 days statutory holiday entitlement and 13 days public holidays and Malta with 24 days statutory holiday entitlement and 14 days public holiday. In both countries employees have the potential for 38 days holiday a year. The Philippines and Canada have the lowest possible entitlements with 20 and 19 days, respectively.

Employees in Columbia have the greatest number of public holidays (18 days) while those in Mexico (7) have the least.

Statutory holidays in Europe

UK (28 days)

Poland (26)

Greece (25)

Austria (25)

France (25)

Sweden (25)

Luxembourg (25)

Finland (25)

Denmark (25)

Malta (24)