Annual Leave Calculator

Under the National Employment Standards (NES), full-time and part-time employees get 4 weeks of paid annual leave a year, based on their ordinary hours. Some shift workers get 5 weeks: those their award or agreement defines as shift workers, or, if neither covers them, those who work continuous 24/7 shifts and are regularly rostered on Sundays and public holidays.

Leave builds up bit by bit from your first day. It isn't handed out in one lump each year, and anything you don't use rolls over to the next year.

• Casuals don't get paid annual leave. The 25% casual loading is paid instead.
• Overtime doesn't earn extra leave. Only ordinary hours count.
• Paid leave (annual leave, sick leave, long service leave) keeps accruing leave. Most unpaid leave, such as unpaid parental leave, doesn't.

Four weeks out of 52 means you earn about 0.0769 hours of leave for every ordinary hour you work. On 38 hours a week that's 2.92 hours a week, or 152 hours a year. Shift workers with 5 weeks earn 3.65 hours a week, or 190 hours a year.

Part-time leave works the same way, just on fewer hours. Someone working 22.8 hours over 3 days a week earns 1.75 hours a week, which is 91.2 hours or 12 of their 7.6-hour days a year. That's still 4 weeks off, because a week for them is 3 days.

Payslips usually show leave in hours. To turn hours into days, divide by the hours in your normal working day. The calculator does this for you from your hours and days per week.

Your projected leave balance is what you have now, plus what you'll accrue, minus any leave you've already booked. For example, a part-time employee on 22.8 hours over 3 days with 5 days banked today will have about 17 days in 12 months. Use the trip planner to see the date you'll have enough for a holiday.

If you want time off before you've earned it, you can ask to take leave in advance. Your employer doesn't have to agree. Most awards need a signed written agreement, and it usually says whether any negative balance can be taken out of your final pay if you leave early.

Holding a lot of leave has limits too. Under most awards, if you have more than 8 weeks (10 for shift workers), your employer can take steps to make you use some of it.

Leave loading is an extra payment while you're on annual leave, usually 17.5% of your base pay. It is not part of the NES, so you only get it if your award, enterprise agreement or contract says so. Some awards pay shift penalties instead if those would be higher.

Using the calculator, 10 days of leave on an $85,000 salary is worth about $3,269. With 17.5% loading it's about $3,841. Tick the leave loading box to include it.

Purchased leave (sometimes called 48/52 leave) lets you buy extra weeks off by taking a lower salary. It isn't an NES right. It depends on your employer's policy or agreement, and you usually apply once a year.

The cost is normally spread evenly over the year rather than taken in one hit. On an $85,000 salary, buying 2 weeks cuts your pay to 50/52 of the full amount: $81,731 a year, or about $126 less per fortnight before tax. Because you pay less tax on a lower salary, the drop in take-home pay is smaller. Choose the weeks under "Purchased leave" in the take-home pay calculator to see the drop after tax.

Check how your employer handles super and leave accrual on purchased leave. Some pay super on the full salary, others on the reduced amount.

Award-covered employees can only cash out annual leave with a signed written agreement each time. You must keep at least 4 weeks in your balance afterwards and can't cash out more than 2 weeks in any 12 months. You must be paid what you'd get if you'd taken the leave. Award-free employees also need a written agreement and must keep 4 weeks, but there's no 2-week limit.

Cashed-out leave is taxed as normal income. On $85,000, cashing out 38 hours gives about $1,635 before tax and $1,112 after about $523 of extra tax (32%).

When your job ends, any unused annual leave must be paid out. If you'd get leave loading when you take leave, it must be paid on the unused balance too. On resignation it's usually taxed at your normal rates. On a genuine redundancy it's taxed at no more than 32%. See the redundancy calculator.