ANNUAL LEAVE

In accordance with Annex V of the Staff Regulations, all officials/agents shall be entitled to 2 working days' leave per complete month of service (article1). This annual leave may be taken all at once or in several periods as desired by the official/agent and according to the requirements of the service. It must, however, include at least one period of two consecutive weeks (article 2).

CARRY OVER OF ANNUAL LEAVE

In accordance with article 4 of Annex V of the Staff Regulation, a maximum of 12 days* of untaken annual leave may be carried over to the following calendar year for reasons other than the requirements of the service. This transfer is automatically done by the TIM module of Sysper2 for all officials/agents concerned. Therefore, no individual requests are required.

* 14 days according to article 7 of annex X of the Staff Regulations (exceptional provision applicable to officials/agents serving a third country).

Additional Procedure

The provisions of Annex 5 of the Staff Regulations and the Commission decision on leave foresee that the carry-over of more than 12 days of annual leave to the following calendar year can only be authorized if it has been established that the staff member has been unable to take them during the calendar year in progress for reasons exclusively linked to the interest of the service (to be duly justified by the hierarchical superior). Consequently, and in order to avoid an excessive accumulation of unused annual leave at the end of the year - and potential conflicts which could result from this - an attentive scheduling of the holidays is important.

Recuperation of surplus of working hours within the flexitime arrangements is not considered to be an argument for refusing the carry-over of unused annual leave. Nevertheless, the sole fact that there has been an accumulation of unused annual leave which could result from the use of such recuperation will not in itself be regarded as a service reason.

All requests for a carry-over of more than 12 days have to be submitted in TIM Sysper2 for approval at the beginning of the new calendar year. A temporary "carry-over request" button remains accessible to all staff until 31 January of the year in question.

In order to avoid potential conflicts on this matter, staff is encouraged to use their annual leave entitlements fully and are reminded that only service-related reasons having prevented them from taking their annual leave will be accepted to authorize a carry-over of more than 12 days of annual leave.
All Directorates-General and Services are bound to respect these statutory provisions, and these statutory provisions apply to all staff, regardless their grades and function groups.

Special Provisions

The Commission Decision on leave has been revised and adopted on 5th November 2010. These implementing provisions enter into force as from 1st January 2011 and foresee that a carry-over in excess of 30 days’ annual leave must be accompanied by a plan to use up the leave drawn up by mutual agreement between the official/agent and his/her appointing authority. For carry-overs of between 30 and 90 days, the plan may not cover a period of more than three years. For carry-overs of more than 90 days, it may not exceed 5 years.