The Supreme Court has made it clear that holidays are not days of rest. They are different rights. Therefore, if a holiday coincides with your day of restthe company has to give you another additional day off.
For years it has been common that, if a holiday coincided with, for example, a Saturday, that day of rest was lost. A Supreme Court ruling has considered that loss of a holiday “does not conform to the law.” Therefore, the employee must be able to enjoy both rights: to weekly rest and to enjoy official holidays.
The injustice: that holidays coincide with your rest. The High Court ruled in this sense in a ruling from July 2024which establishes that workers who work from Monday to Sunday and have a fixed day of rest during the week have the right to an additional day when that rest coincides with a work holiday.
This resolution corrects the previous criteria of the Social Chamber of the Superior Court of Justice of Madrid in response to the demand of the workers of a business that opened from Monday to Sunday with rotating shifts, in which the staff’s breaks did not always coincide with the weekend. This meant that, if an employee was assigned, for example, Mondays as a day of rest, and it coincided with one of the 14 holidays recognized by law, that employee would lose either a holiday or a holiday, while his colleagues (with other days of rest) did enjoy both.
On holidays you also rest. The usual practice to date was that, if the holiday coincided with the assigned day of rest during the week, the employee “lost” that day since, in reality, that rest was also occurring.
However, the Supreme Court ruling reinforces that the 14 annual holidays recognized by law must be enjoyed in their entirety, without overlapping with the minimum weekly rest to which workers are also entitled, thus separating both rights and forcing the company to compensate the employee with another additional day off.
Weekly and holiday rest are not the same. The doctrine of the Supreme Court is based on article 37.2 of the Workers Statutewhich indicates that “work holidays will be paid and non-recoverable.” That is, they cannot replace or be a replacement for any other type of rest.
In practice, the court considers that allowing a holiday to overlap with the day of rest creates comparative grievances between people with different calendars within the same company. While some enjoy the 14 legally recognized holidays plus their weekly rest, others end up with fewer days off per year just because their day of rest coincides with the holiday.
If both coincide, another day must be assigned. Based on this doctrine, if a national, regional or local holiday coincides with the assigned day of rest, the company must grant you an additional day off on another date. This compensatory day does not have to be the one immediately following the holiday, but rather must be set by mutual agreement, respecting the work calendar and ensuring that the holiday is not lost.
For companies, this forces them to review quadrants and calendars in sectors that open every day, such as commerce, hospitality or certain essential services, where it is common to work on Sundays and holidays.
How it affects you if the holiday falls on a weekend. In a classic weekday from Monday to Friday, if a holiday falls on a Saturday, the new jurisprudence prevents that holiday from simply “disappearing.” The company has to compensate with an additional day of rest.
According to the article 47 of Royal Decree 2001/1983 that regulates the effective enjoyment of days of rest, when for organizational reasons the day of rest cannot be enjoyed, the company “will be forced to pay the worker for the hours worked” or to grant an alternative compensatory rest. That is, since the holiday must be taken because it is not recoverable, the day of rest is not “lost”, but must be compensated with another day or paid with a 75% increase if not enjoyed.
Image | Pexels (Leeloo The First)
GIPHY App Key not set. Please check settings