Dear TFT,
I am planning to head home and use the entirety of my annual leave of one month, but my employer says that it should be limited to one or two weeks only. Are employers allowed to do that?
Answer:
An employer has the right to decide the date of annual leave and it can be decided according to the work requirements and in agreement with the employee.
It’s the employer’s duty to notify the employee a month before the date of annual leave.
Employee must use his leave entitlement in the same leave year. However, with mutual consent, the employee may also carry over annual leave days for the next year.
The employer can’t stop the employee for using annual leave, if the latter has rendered more than two years of service without using leaves.
The new UAE Labor law (federal Decree-Law No. 33/2021) – Article 29 describes the annual leave where an employee will be entitled to get Paid annual leave 30 days a year for each year of service, and 2 days per month if service is more than 6 months and less than a year.
Under the new law, Part-time workers are also entitled to annual leave according to the working hours of their service.
