In Belgium, the law states that a worker is entitled to a minimum of 4 weeks' leave after a full year's work. This is known as statutory leave. One year ago, new legislation came into force aimed at strengthening workers' rights to paid leave. In accordance with European legislation, workers who are unfit for work during their holidays have the option of postponing or carrying over their leave. This change marks a break from previous practice, where any days you were sick during your leave were considered lost days. The Expat Welcome Desk explains when and how you can carry over your leave.
The principle:
By law, you must take your statutory leave before 31 December of the ongoing/holiday year. It is therefore forbidden to carry over unused days of statutory leave to the following year. Waiving your entitlement to leave or taking next year's leave early is also impossible.
Exceptions:
You can only carry over your statutory leave if you were unable to take your leave during the year.
However, this option is only available in the following cases where the employment contract is suspended:
When and how can you carry over your leave?
A worker who is unable to take all of his leave during the year may carry over this leave for a maximum period of 24 months. The employer must grant this deferral at all times.
For example:
In December 2024, you are still entitled to 4 days of statutory leave.
You are ill for the whole of December.
You cannot therefore take your last 4 days of statutory leave, but you can carry them over until 31 December 2026.
If you change jobs during these 2 years, you can take the statutory leave days you carried over with you to your new employer.
In practice, this means that if a worker wants to carry over statutory leave, he must inform his employer immediately that he is unfit for work and also provide a home address if he is not at home (for example, if he is abroad).
They must also always submit a medical certificate to their employer.
What about holiday pay?
Your current employer must pay you holiday pay for any statutory leave you did not take. This must be paid to you by 31 December at the latest.
The leave you carried over is therefore paid in advance: you will not be paid when you take the statutory leave you carried over.
So remember to set aside your holiday allowance as soon as you receive it so that you don't end up with nothing when you take your statutory leave.
What about extralegal leave?
Extra-legal leave is leave that an employer offers its employees in addition to paid leave. The conditions for entitlement to leave depend on either the sectoral collective bargaining agreements or on the company's own working regulations. Examples include seniority leave, end-of-career leave, etc. There are no legal provisions governing the carry-over of these days. In such cases, the terms and conditions for granting such leave, and in particular any rules for carrying over leave as laid down in working regulations, in a collective bargaining agreement or in the individual employment contract, shall apply. Depending on the case, you may or may not be able to carry over your statutory leave.
Good to know:
However, companies that have a workforce of fewer than 50 employees on 1 January of the current year may deviate from this rule, applying their working regulations (or a collective bargaining agreement) instead.
This is why some workers, typically young workers who are fresh out of school or college, are not entitled to paid leave during the first calendar year of their first job. As they did not work the previous year, they are not entitled to statutory leave. On the other hand, there are two systems for workers who are not entitled to holiday or who are entitled to less than 4 weeks' holiday:
For more information : FPS Employment
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