How many bank holidays does a part-time worker get?
Essentially part time staff get the same share of bank holidays as they get of the week. So someone who works three days out of five gets three-fifths of the bank holidays. If your full-timers get the standard eight bank holidays, the three day counterpart gets 4.8 days a year and that's always rounded up to the nearest half day so they should be given 5.
That's how it works in writing but for ease, this calculator works it out for different scenarios:
What if my part timer doesn't work Mondays?
Most UK bank holidays fall on a Monday so if your business closes on those days it's the people who are scheduled to work who would get the advantage. That's why you still need to give the part timer their bank holiday allowance so they get the same time off in total.
The easy way to think of it is as a total rather than particular dates that staff may or may not work. Give each part-timer their pro-rata number as a pot of days (or hours) they can take whenever they like and everyone gets their fair share.
If your part-timers work uneven hours
A lot of part time staff are flexible and don't always work on set days. Whatever hours they're contracted, use those to make a similar calculation. 3 out of 5 days becomes 24 out of 40 hours. Both end up with the same 5 days (or 40 hours) bank holiday allowance assigned to them.
You can flip our calculator to hours and it'll do the maths for you still.
Do I have to pay more to staff working bank holidays?
Whether your team are full or part time, there's no legal uplift to pay if work happens to be on a bank holiday. Some employers add a premium that's usually written into contracts but that's a choice rather than an obligation.
Using Book Time Off to handle part-time staff and bank holidays
Once you know your part timer's allowance using the calculator above, a tool like Book Time Off shows you who is in and who isn't, at a glance, every bank holiday. You've got the facility to request and approve leave easily, with every UK bank holiday already on the calendar and never eating into anyone's allowance. It's the simple way to take the guesswork out.
Set the number once, then forget it
Book Time Off holds each person's allowance, full-timer or part-timer, and counts the days remaining as leave is booked. The UK bank holidays sit on the shared calendar automatically and never come off anyone's balance, so part-time totals stay right all year without a spreadsheet to maintain.
Start your free trialQuick answers
Do part-time staff get bank holidays off?
Only if your full-timers do. There's no automatic right for anyone. If full-timers get them as paid leave, part-timers must get a pro-rata share, even when a bank holiday falls on a day they don't work.
How many bank holidays does someone on 3 days a week get?
4.8 of the 8 England and Wales bank holidays (three-fifths of eight). Scotland has 9 and Northern Ireland 10.
What if a bank holiday falls on a day off?
They still get the value. That's the whole point of giving it as a pot of days or hours rather than tying it to the dates.
Do we round up or down?
Round part-days up, in the worker's favour, especially in their first year.
Sources
- Holiday entitlement (GOV.UK, checked July 2026)
- Bank holidays and holiday entitlement (ACAS, checked July 2026)
- Part-time Workers (Prevention of Less Favourable Treatment) Regulations 2000
- UK bank holidays (GOV.UK, checked July 2026)