Public Holidays Ireland

Public holidays in Ireland, a well earned day off for staff and a headache for payroll.

There are 10 public holidays in Ireland:

However, the following are not public holidays and you should treat them as annual leave if not worked:

Point 1, an employee is entitled to the employers choice of the following in respect to the day:

OK, straight forward enough. Here’s where it gets tricky…

Full-time employees are immediately entitled to the full benefit of the public holiday, even if they started work the day before.
Part-time/casual employees must have worked at least 40 hours in the 5 weeks ending on the day of the holiday.

And trickier still…

When an employee normally works, or is scheduled to work, on the day of the public holiday:
- Full time staff are entitled to one of the benefits under Point 1.
- If they are part time, and have worked 40 hours in 5 weeks prior to the public holiday, they are entitled to a pro rata of one of the benefits under Point 1.
When they are not normally scheduled to work the day of the public holiday:
- Full-time staff are entitled to 1/5th of their normal working week.
- Part-time variable pay staff are entitled to 1/5th of their normal weekly pay even if they do not normally work on that particular day. The amount of pay due is subject to a maximum of a normal days pay calculated over a period of 13 weeks ending immediately before the public holiday, OR the 13 weeks before the last worked day.

Regular or normal weekly pay includes regular bonuses, allowances etc but excludes overtime.

These rules cover most scenarios for you. However, there is further information available at Citizens Advice. Other topics covered are: