What if half the team wants the same week off at Christmas?

In a team of six, two people off in the same week is a third of the business. And Christmas is the week everyone wants.

There are two ways through it. You decide fairly who gets which days, or you close and everyone takes the same days off. Both work. Both need deciding now, in October, because the notice rules run on calendar days and December fills up fast.

The short answer: you can turn down some requests, as long as you choose fairly and say no in time: notice at least as long as the holiday someone asked for, plus a day. Or you can close and tell everyone to use holiday for it, with notice at least twice as long as the days they're taking, plus a day, unless your contract sets its own rule. What you can't safely do is make the closure days unpaid, unless the contract allows it or each person agreed in writing beforehand. Whichever you choose, write the rule down and send it before the requests arrive.

The quick version:

• check what your contracts say about bank holidays and closures
• if you're closing, send the closure email now (there's one to copy below, and a free planner)
• check every new starter has enough holiday built up, and decide what happens if they haven't
• pick one rule for competing requests and tell the team by the end of October
• before the party, send a short note on behaviour and how to raise a concern

What are the dates for Christmas 2026?

Christmas Day is a Friday this year, so Boxing Day moves to the Monday. These are the bank holidays on GOV.UK:

Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve are normal working days in law. If you give them as extra days off, that's your generosity, and it's worth saying so in writing so it doesn't harden into an expectation by habit.

Can we close over Christmas and make staff use their holiday?

Yes. You can close and tell staff to use some of their paid holiday for the closure, Acas confirms, even if you've stayed open in previous years. What you need is the right notice, and enough holiday left for each person to cover it.

Check the contract first. A clause that says the business closes between Christmas and New Year, and that holiday is used for those days, saves the conversation every year, and a written contract term can set its own notice rule. If you're changing how holiday works for good rather than for one Christmas, that's a change to the contract, so agree it first.

How much notice do we have to give?

At least twice as many days as the holiday you're asking people to take, plus a day, counted in calendar days. That's the default rule in the Working Time Regulations. Acas rounds this to twice the days. The regulation says the notice must arrive before that point, so add a day to be safe. If your contract sets a different rule, the contract applies.

So count the days of holiday each person will use and double it. Then count back that many days from the first day of the closure, and make sure people have the notice before that date. If your contracts already say bank holidays are taken as part of the holiday allowance, count only the other days. If they give bank holidays on top of the allowance, those days can't come out of holiday at all.

Those are the last legal days, not the right ones. People book family plans in October, so send it now. For part-timers, count only the closure days they'd normally work.

What should the closure email say?

Something like this. Change the words in square brackets, and send it to everyone, including anyone who is off at the moment.

Copy the email

Want the dates, the notice and this email on one page, with room to note who is short of holiday? Our Christmas closure planner is free, with no email to give. Type into it on screen:

Download the Christmas closure planner (PDF)

The planner, on one page. Download the PDF to fill in on screen.

Can we make the closure days unpaid instead?

Not safely, unless the contract says so or the person agreed in writing before the closure.

Last year we were reviewing a client's people processes when something small came up. The business closes every year between Christmas and New Year: planned, consistent, no surprises. But a few people had joined in October, November and December, and they hadn't built up enough holiday to cover the closure. So the business did what most sensible employers would do: it spoke to each of them and agreed a few unpaid days. Everyone was fine with it. No complaints, no drama.

On the surface, it looked sorted. But an agreement in conversation is a weak basis for holding back pay. The law treats a deduction from wages as authorised if a written contract term covers it, or the person agreed in writing before the days in question (section 13 of the Employment Rights Act 1996). Someone who is ready to work, and isn't working only because the business has closed, is normally owed their pay. Without that clause or written agreement, the missing pay is likely to be an unlawful deduction from wages, and a signature collected afterwards doesn't fix it.

The saving was small. The disruption, if it was challenged, wouldn't have been. So we took the workaround out. The closure days are now paid, the cost is predictable and the risk has gone.

What about new starters without enough holiday?

In the first year of a job, people can only take the holiday they've built up so far: one-twelfth of the year's allowance each month, with part days rounded up to the nearest half day (GOV.UK). Someone who joined in November may have only a few days by Christmas. You have three options:

• pay the closure days on top of their holiday. This is the cleanest, and it is what our client chose
• let them take holiday in advance from next year's allowance. If you'd want that back should they leave early, it has to be agreed in writing beforehand, usually in the contract
• agree unpaid leave in writing, before the closure, and only if it's a genuine choice. A new starter who has just been told the office is shut isn't in a strong position to say no, so this is the weakest of the three

How does it work for part-timers and casual staff?

Start with bank holidays. There's no legal right to have a bank holiday off, and the contract decides whether bank holidays sit inside the 5.6 weeks of statutory holiday or on top of it.

This year Christmas Day and New Year's Day are both Fridays, and Boxing Day is a Monday. Have you got part-timers who never work Mondays or Fridays? Part-time staff must not be treated less favourably than full-timers, so holiday, bank holidays included, works pro rata. Acas says you can't make a part-timer use holiday for a bank holiday that falls on a day they don't normally work. In the same way, a closure day that isn't one of someone's working days doesn't come out of their holiday. And if your full-timers get bank holidays on top of their holiday, the safe approach is to give part-timers the pro rata equivalent, whichever days they work.

Casual, zero-hours and bank staff with no set hours build up holiday as they work: 12.07% of the hours they work in each pay period, for holiday years that started on or after 1 April 2024, up to 28 days a year (Acas). Christmas is a good moment to remind them it's there to be taken, and the same notice rule applies if you ask them to take some during the closure. If you pay them rolled-up holiday pay (the extra 12.07% on each payslip, allowed only for these workers), the time off itself is unpaid because it's already been paid for. You still need to make sure they can take it, and encourage them to.

Not sure who counts as an employee, a worker or casual? Employment status explained covers who gets which holiday rights.

What happens to holiday left at the end of the year?

If your holiday year runs January to December, this is when people find out they have six days left. Holiday mostly has to be taken in the year it's for, and you can't pay it off instead, except when someone leaves. There are exceptions:

• the extra 1.6 weeks on top of the basic 4 weeks carries over only if the contract allows it, or if family leave stopped someone taking it
• the 4 weeks has to carry over if sickness or family leave stopped someone taking it (after sickness, it has to be used within 18 months of the end of the holiday year)
• the 4 weeks also carries over if you didn't give people a reasonable chance to take it, encourage them to take it or tell them it would be lost at the end of the year. That rule has applied since 1 January 2024

For people on irregular hours or part-year contracts, the carry-over covers up to the full 5.6 weeks (Acas).

So the useful email this month is a short one: how much holiday each person has left, a nudge to book it and what happens to anything still left at the end of the year.

What if two people want the same days?

You can refuse a holiday request if you tell the person in time: one day more notice than the holiday they asked for, so someone asking for five days off needs at least six days' notice of the no (GOV.UK). You can refuse particular dates, not the holiday itself, and Acas says you should have a good business reason.

The legal part is simple. What makes it fair is deciding how you'll choose before you know who's asking. None of these is a legal requirement, and any of them works:

• first come, first served, with a deadline for requests (for example, 31 October)
• a rota, so whoever worked Christmas week last year gets first choice this year
• splitting the peak, one person before Christmas and one after

Swapping between them depending on who asks is what causes a grievance. So pick one, put it in writing and use it every year. And if you make an exception, document the "why".

Also, Christmas isn't everyone's festival. If someone would rather work Christmas week and take time off for Diwali, Eid or Hanukkah, the same rule covers it.

How do we keep the business covered?

Small teams run on the one person who knows how the invoicing works. Before anyone goes on leave, ask for a handover note: what's live, what's due, who to call and what can wait until January.

Check that someone else can do the tasks that can't pause over Christmas: payroll, client deadlines, anything regulated. Showing a second person once in November is cheaper than finding out on 29 December that nobody else can log in.

If you stay open, tell customers the dates early. Your website, your Google Business Profile opening hours, your email autoreply and your voicemail are the places people check.

What if someone is off sick over Christmas?

December is when colds and flu go round the team. Since 6 April 2026, Statutory Sick Pay is payable from the first full day off sick, with no waiting days and no lower earnings limit. So a two-day absence the week before Christmas now means sick pay for both days, for anyone who's eligible. What one sick day costs now has a worked example, and the Statutory Sick Pay calculator does the sums.

If someone is ill during a closure you asked them to take as holiday, and they tell you, those days can count as sick leave rather than holiday (GOV.UK). They keep the holiday to take another time. You can't make someone take holiday while they're off sick.

What changes at the Christmas party this year?

From October 2024, employers had to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment of their staff. Since 30 October 2026 that has been all reasonable steps. Since the same day you must not let third parties, such as customers, clients or venue staff, harass your team, which means taking all reasonable steps to prevent it. So this year's party is the first under the stricter duty.

A work party, or drinks straight after work, is likely to count as part of work for this. The Equality and Human Rights Commission's guidance on Christmas parties comes down to three steps:

• plan ahead: alcohol, getting home, any overnight stay and where junior and senior people mix
• set expectations early: what behaviour is expected, and how to raise a concern
• think about everyone else there: venue staff, other guests and any clients you've invited

A short note a week before the party covers the second step, and it takes ten minutes to write. Our post on the 30 October duty has the rest.

What records do we need to keep?

Since 6 April 2026, employers in England, Scotland and Wales have to keep records of holiday and holiday pay for six years, and not keeping them is a criminal offence. That includes the days you asked people to take for a closure and any bank holidays taken as part of their allowance. A shared calendar helps with planning, but it isn't a record on its own, because calendars get edited and deleted. Holiday pay record keeping sets out what to keep.

Quick answers

Where to start this year

1. Check what your contracts say about bank holidays, closures and holiday in advance.
2. If you're closing, send the closure email, with the right notice.
3. Check each new starter's holiday, and decide how you'll cover any gap.
4. Tell the team the rule for competing requests by the end of October.
5. Make sure every task that can't pause has a second person who can do it.

If your contracts say nothing about Christmas at all, that's a small fix before next year: a closure clause, the notice you'll give and what happens when someone hasn't built up enough holiday. Our HR Documents service writes it into your contract or holiday policy, at a fixed price.

What if this Christmas is the first one where nobody argues about the rota?

Send us your what-ifs.

This is general information for employers in England, Scotland and Wales, not legal advice. If you're dealing with a specific situation, speak to an employment solicitor. Checked against GOV.UK, Acas, the EHRC and legislation.gov.uk on 9 October 2026.