The annual leave overview is intended to provide insight into the distribution and usage of an employee’s leave balance. This overview is only available if your company allocates leave according to Dutch legislation introduced in 2012.
The leave overview clearly shows several elements, including: statutory leave accrued annually, non-statutory leave accrued annually, manual adjustments, leave taken, and the expiration of leave. To view the annual leave overview, go to the balance overview and click on the graph icon to the right of “Normal leave.”
Once you have done this, you will enter the annual leave overview. Here, you can see how the current leave has been requested. After clicking the icon, the following screen will appear:
Below is an explanation of what each bar represents:
- The date at the top indicates the year to which the information applies.
- Carryover from previous year: the remaining balance transferred from the previous year. This amount should match the “carryover to next year” from the previous year.
- Statutory and non-statutory balance: shows how many days and hours have been accrued this year.
- Manual additions: administrative adjustments made to this leave balance. A dash indicates that no adjustments have been made.
- Total: the sum of the carryover from the previous year and the subtotal. This is the total balance available to the employee.
- Taken: shows how much leave has been used to date, including all deduction entries.
- Expired: the leave that has expired in the current year. This is only filled after the expiration date. At the bottom, you can see how much will expire. Once the date has passed, it moves from “expires on 01-07” to “expired.”
- Sold: shows the number of hours paid out. It is not possible to pay out more than the available non-statutory balance.
- Carryover to next year: shows the balance that will be transferred to the next year. This is the total accrued minus the total used. It is possible for this to be negative.
- Expires on 01-07: shows how much statutory leave will expire on the specified date (in this case 01-07), as it exceeds the 1.5-year validity period. Make sure to use these hours before this date, or they will be lost.
- Expires after the fiscal year: shows the leave that will expire at the end of the current year.
- Valid for x more years: this refers to the non-statutory leave, which remains valid for up to 5 years from 2012. Each year, the balance shifts up one level and will only disappear when more than the statutory leave is used in a single year. At that point, the oldest balance is used first.
In principle, the legislation is quite clear. There is a statutory portion and a non-statutory portion. The statutory portion of leave equals four times the number of working days per week according to the employee’s contract. The remainder of the annual leave falls under the non-statutory portion.
For example, an employee who receives 24 vacation days per year and works 5 days per week is entitled to:
4 × 5 days = 20 statutory leave days. The remaining 4 days are non-statutory.
The key difference between these two types of leave lies in their expiration:
- Statutory leave expires after 1.5 years (on July 1 following allocation).
- Non-statutory leave expires after 6 years.
A general rule applies: the leave that expires first is also used first.
The complexity of this system mainly lies in the expiration rules, which require accurate administration and tracking.
Now that several years have passed, some employees have both statutory and non-statutory leave that has not been fully used. This can result in leave being divided across multiple “buckets,” for example:
- Statutory leave from the current year
- Non-statutory leave from the current year
- Statutory leave from the previous year (expiring on July 1)
- Non-statutory leave from the previous year (expiring in 5 years)
- Leave valid for another 4 years (non-statutory from 2 years ago)
- Leave valid for another 3 years (non-statutory from 3 years ago)
- Leave valid for another 2 years (non-statutory from 4 years ago)
- Leave valid for another 1 year (non-statutory from 5 years ago)
With the VrijeDagen application, this can be managed easily, clearly, and automatically. Once the different balances are set up, the system ensures everything remains correct. The application fully complies with the legislation.
- The system automatically calculates the statutory and non-statutory portions.
- When requesting leave, the system automatically selects the leave that will expire first.
- The balance overview clearly presents this complex structure to employees, managers, and administrators. This way, everyone can see which part of the leave will expire and when.