The Leave Policy After National Day: Annual, Sick and Public Holidays in One Document
A practical guide for small businesses to write a leave policy that sets annual leave, sick leave, Eid and National Day side by side, and settles the request path, the balance and carry-over.
The National Day holiday is over, and the HR desk is back to the same questions it fields every year: an employee who was on annual leave on 23 September and wants to know whether that day came out of their balance, another who wants to carry the rest of their entitlement into next year, and a third who came back with a medical report covering two days inside their leave. These questions are not settled by an email or a verbal decision from a line manager. They are settled by a written leave policy that gathers the types, the durations and the request path into one document everyone can consult.
A leave policy is not a rewrite of the Labor Law. The law sets the floor, and the policy turns that floor into a daily procedure: who submits the request, who approves it, how the balance is recorded, and what happens when a public holiday overlaps with previously approved annual leave. A business that has this document handles a request in minutes. A business that does not renegotiates every case from scratch and leaves behind a trail of contradictory precedents.
This guide sets annual leave, sick leave, the two Eid holidays, National Day and Founding Day side by side as they should appear in your policy, explains the rule on a public holiday overlapping annual leave, and then walks through the request path, the recording of balances and carry-over, and what a written policy adds to the HR and admin desk. Template E-15, the Leave Policy, is ready to fill in both languages.
Get the Leave Policy templateE-15What a written leave policy does for the HR and admin desk
A leave policy is an internal document that gathers in one place the types of leave the business grants, the duration of each, the conditions for entitlement, and the path a request takes from the employee to approval to the record. Its real value is not in its wording. It is in moving the decision from shifting individual judgment to a written rule known to everyone in advance, so employees are treated alike and disputes are reduced before they start.
- It settles routine requests without going back to the manager each time, because the conditions and durations are written and the employee can read them directly.
- It unifies treatment across departments and branches, so no employee receives what a colleague is denied without a written reason.
- It gives the admin desk a stable record of balances and requests to rely on at final settlement or during any internal review.
- It makes operational planning easier, so a manager knows in advance how leave is distributed across seasons, peak periods and the run-up to the Eid holidays.
- It reduces reliance on memory and personal messages, which are the weakest ground a business can stand on in a disagreement.
Because it is an internal document, it complements the employment contract and the internal work regulation rather than replacing them. The contract binds the employee to their own terms, the regulation organises the rules of work and penalties, and the policy details the leave chapter in practical terms an employee can apply without anyone explaining it to them.
The statutory leaves side by side: annual, sick and occasional
The first thing a good policy does is present the types of leave in one place instead of scattering them between the contract, the regulation and management circulars. The limits below are published on the website of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development, and they are the floor that no internal policy may fall below.
- Annual leave: not less than twenty one days for each year, rising to thirty days once the worker has completed five consecutive years in the employer's service, and its pay is made in advance.
- Notice of the leave date: the employer must inform the worker of the date of their leave thirty days in advance.
- Documented sick leave: the first thirty days at full pay, the following sixty days at three quarters of the pay, and the thirty days after that without pay, within a single year, whether consecutive or intermittent.
- Maternity leave: ten weeks at full pay, distributed as the employee wishes with no more than four weeks before the expected delivery date, and she may not be employed during the six weeks following the birth.
- Occasional leave: three days on the birth of a child, and five days for a marriage or for the death of a spouse, an ascendant or a descendant.
- Leave on the death of a husband: not less than four months and ten days for a Muslim woman, and fifteen days for a non-Muslim woman.
- Exam leave: at full pay for the number of exam days, for an employee enrolled in an educational institution.
يستحق الموظف إجازة سنوية مدفوعة الأجر بالمدة المقررة نظاماً، وتزيد هذه المدة ببلوغه المدة النظامية من الخدمة المتصلة لدى المنشأة. وتُصرف أجرة الإجازة مقدماً قبل بدئها. وتُحدَّد مواعيد الإجازات وفق جدول سنوي تعتمده الإدارة مع مراعاة حاجة العمل، ويُخطَر الموظف بموعد إجازته في المدة المقررة نظاماً.
The employee is entitled to paid annual leave for the period prescribed by law, and that period increases once the employee completes the statutory length of continuous service with the establishment. Leave pay is disbursed in advance before the leave begins. Leave dates are set under an annual schedule approved by management with due regard to the needs of the work, and the employee is notified of the date of their leave within the period prescribed by law.
Write the duration as an explicit number in your policy after checking the statutory text in force, rather than relying on a general reference, because the employee reads the policy and not the law.
The Eid holidays, National Day and Founding Day in your policy
Public holidays differ from annual leave in that they are not requested and not deducted from a balance. They apply across the whole business on a known date. Even so, they must appear in the policy by name, because the employee plans travel around them and the business plans its operations and shifts around them, and vagueness here costs both sides.
- Eid al-Fitr: four days beginning on the day following the twenty ninth day of Ramadan.
- Eid al-Adha: four days beginning on the Day of Arafat.
- The National Day of the Kingdom: one day, on 23 September, and if it falls on the weekend it is compensated on an adjacent working day.
- Founding Day: 22 February, which the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development has announced as an official holiday for the public, private and non-profit sectors.
- If National Day coincides with one of the two Eid holidays, there is no additional compensation for that day.
تعتمد الإدارة في مطلع كل سنة تقويماً داخلياً يبيّن الإجازات الرسمية المقررة لتلك السنة، ويُعمَّم على جميع الموظفين ويُدرَج في سجل الحضور والإجازات لدى المنشأة. ولا تُخصم أيام الإجازات الرسمية من رصيد الإجازة السنوية للموظف بأي حال.
At the start of each year, management approves an internal calendar setting out the public holidays for that year. It is circulated to all employees and entered into the establishment's attendance and leave record. Public holiday days are in no case deducted from the employee's annual leave balance.
Entering the calendar into the record at the start of the year is what prevents a wrong deduction later, because the internal system already knows the day as a public holiday before any annual leave request arrives.
A public holiday that lands inside booked annual leave: the rule and the clause
This is the question that comes back after every public holiday season. An employee requested annual leave from 20 to 30 September, the request was approved, and then National Day fell inside that period. Is the day counted against their balance because they were already on leave, or is it added to them because it is a public holiday for everyone?
The position published by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development in its chapter on overlapping leaves is clear: where a public holiday coincides with annual leave, the annual leave is extended by the number of overlapping holiday days. The employee does not lose the day. Their return to work simply moves back by a further day. The same page addresses two neighbouring cases: a public holiday overlapping the weekly rest is compensated before or after it, and a public holiday overlapping sick leave is paid at the full wage for the sick leave days without separate compensation for the holiday.
إذا تزامنت إجازة رسمية مع إجازة سنوية معتمدة للموظف، مُدّت الإجازة السنوية بعدد أيام الإجازة الرسمية المتداخلة معها، ولم تُحتسب تلك الأيام من الرصيد السنوي. ويُعدَّل تاريخ المباشرة في سجل الإجازات تبعاً لذلك، ويُشعَر الموظف ومديره المباشر بالتاريخ الجديد كتابةً قبل بدء الإجازة متى أمكن.
Where a public holiday coincides with the employee's approved annual leave, the annual leave is extended by the number of overlapping holiday days, and those days are not counted against the annual balance. The return date in the leave record is adjusted accordingly, and the employee and their line manager are notified of the new date in writing before the leave begins wherever possible.
This clause alone closes the most frequently repeated leave dispute after the Eid holidays and National Day, because it makes the adjustment an internal step in the record rather than a claim the employee has to raise after returning.
The path of a leave request: submission, approval and record
A policy that states durations but not the path remains incomplete, because practical disagreement arises in the procedure, not in the duration. Set out who submits the request, who approves it, within how many days, where the decision is recorded, and what happens on a refusal or when an alternative date is proposed.
- The employee submits the leave request in writing through the channel adopted by the business, ahead of the leave start date by the period set in the policy.
- The line manager reviews the request against the needs of the work and any overlap with colleagues' leave in the same department.
- The HR desk verifies the employee's available balance, the type of leave requested and the conditions for entitlement.
- The decision is issued as approval, refusal or a proposed alternative date, and it is written and reasoned in the case of a refusal or an amendment.
- The decision is entered in the leave record, the balance is updated, and the employee is informed of the leave start date and the return date.
- On return, the actual resumption of work is documented, and supporting documents are attached for the types of leave that require them, such as sick leave.
Make sure every decision is written, even an approval, because the written record is what will be relied upon later when calculating the balance or preparing the final settlement. A verbal approval in an office corridor leaves no trace in the record, and it is the first thing to fall away in a disagreement.
Balances, carry-over, postponement and leave pay on leaving
The balance is where mistakes turn into sums owed. A clear policy sets out how the balance is calculated, when it may be carried over, who has authority to approve the carry-over, and how the employee is informed of it periodically so that they are not surprised by a different figure at the end of service.
- The rule is that the employee takes the leave at the time it falls due, and it may not be given up in exchange for cash while the employment relationship is running.
- With the employer's approval, the leave or part of it may be postponed to the following year.
- If the employee leaves the job, they are entitled to the pay for the leave they did not take.
- Every entitlement and every use is entered in a single record that shows the available balance at any moment, rather than in separate spreadsheets held by each department.
- Leave requests, approval decisions and carry-over consents are kept in the employee's file, not in a manager's personal inbox.
يُحتسب رصيد الإجازة السنوية للموظف على أساس مدة خدمته المتصلة لدى المنشأة، ويُقيَّد في سجل الإجازات المعتمد. ولا يجوز ترحيل الإجازة أو جزء منها إلى السنة التالية إلا بموافقة كتابية من صاحب العمل أو من يفوّضه، وتُرفَق الموافقة بملف الموظف. ويُزوَّد الموظف ببيان رصيده عند كل طلب إجازة وعند انتهاء السنة.
The employee's annual leave balance is calculated on the basis of their continuous service with the establishment and is entered in the approved leave record. Leave, or part of it, may not be carried over to the following year except with the written approval of the employer or their delegate, and that approval is attached to the employee's file. The employee is provided with a statement of their balance with each leave request and at the end of the year.
What you may improve, what you may not reduce, and linking the policy to the work regulation
The governing rule is simple: what the Labor Law provides is a floor. Your policy may grant more, and it may not grant less. If the business grants thirty days a year to all employees from the first year, that is permitted, and it becomes binding on the business once announced and adopted. If it writes a period below the statutory floor, the clause has no effect and the statutory floor continues to apply.
- Improvement is permitted: a longer period, additional leave such as volunteering days or a birthday day, or wider flexibility on carry-over.
- Reduction is not permitted: a period below the statutory floor, a requirement to waive leave, or tying entitlement to a condition that empties it of meaning.
- What you grant voluntarily and announce becomes binding, so do not write in a benefit you cannot sustain in the years ahead.
- Review the policy with every amendment to the Labor Law or its executive regulation, and date each version and record its approval date.
If your business is required to have an internal work regulation, make the leave policy fully consistent with it, because the leave chapter in the approved regulation is the reference relied upon in a dispute. A conflict between the two documents is worse than the absence of one of them, because it hands the other side the text that suits them and leaves the business without a clear position.
تُعتمد هذه السياسة من الإدارة، وتُعلَن للموظفين بوسيلة يمكن إثباتها، وتسري اعتباراً من تاريخ اعتمادها. وفي حال تعارض أي بند فيها مع نظام العمل أو مع لائحة تنظيم العمل المعتمدة، يُعمل بالنص الأعلى مرتبة، ويبقى باقي بنود السياسة نافذاً.
This policy is approved by management, announced to employees by a means capable of proof, and takes effect from the date of its approval. If any clause conflicts with the Labor Law or with the approved internal work regulation, the higher ranking text prevails and the remaining clauses of the policy stay in force.
This guide and the template linked to it are general guidance certified by a licensed Saudi lawyer. They do not replace advice on a specific case, and the Arabic text prevails in the event of a discrepancy.
Frequently asked questions
If National Day falls inside an employee's annual leave, do they lose the day?
No. The position published by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development in its chapter on overlapping leaves is that annual leave is extended by the number of overlapping public holiday days, so the employee's return moves back by the same period and those days are not deducted from their balance. Make this an explicit clause in your policy so the adjustment becomes an internal step in the record rather than a claim after the employee returns.
May our policy grant more leave than the statutory floor?
Yes. What the Labor Law provides is a floor, and improving on it is permitted. But what you grant, announce and adopt becomes binding on the business, so do not write in a benefit you cannot sustain. Going below the statutory floor has no effect, and the statutory floor continues to apply regardless of what the policy says.
May we pay cash instead of the employee taking annual leave?
The rule published by the ministry is that the employee takes the leave at the time it falls due and may not give it up for cash while the employment relationship is running, and that postponing it or carrying part of it into the following year requires the employer's approval. On leaving the job, however, the employee is entitled to the pay for leave they did not take.
Do we need a leave policy if we already have an approved internal work regulation?
The approved regulation is the reference in a dispute, but it treats leave in general terms. The leave policy details the daily path: how a request is submitted, who approves it, how the balance is recorded and carried over, and how overlap cases are handled. Write the policy fully consistent with the regulation, because a conflict between the two documents is worse than the absence of one of them.
How do we document the leave balance so it is not disputed at the end of service?
Keep everything in a single record: the annual entitlement, every approved request, every written carry-over approval, and the actual return date after each leave. Then give the employee a statement of their balance with each request and at the end of the year. A written record agreed periodically is what makes the final settlement figure impossible to argue with.
This guide was prepared and reviewed by a lawyer licensed in the Kingdom. The content is general guidance, not legal advice; consult a licensed lawyer for your specific case. Where an Arabic and an English text exist, the Arabic text prevails.