October is the 'Annual Paid Leave Promotion Period'

To promote the creation of an environment where it is easier to take annual paid leave (hereinafter referred to as "annual leave"), including the introduction of the planned annual leave granting system*, the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfareconducts intensive public relations activities every October as the "Annual Paid Leave Promotion Period."

✅ Implementation Items

Requests for awareness-raising to prefectures and nationwide labor-management organizations (222 organizations), internet advertising, poster displays at train stations (705 locations), a "Special Website for Promoting Annual Paid Leave," public relations via the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare email newsletter and the monthly magazine "Kosei Rodo," and awareness-raising by prefectural labor bureaus, etc.

Regarding annual leave, the Outline for Measures for a Society with a Declining Birthrate (Cabinet Decision on May 29, 2020) and other documents set a target of achieving a 70% acquisition rate by 2025. On the other hand, although the annual leave acquisition rate reached a record high of 56.3% in 2019, there is still a significant gap from the 70% target set by the government. Under these circumstances, as part of efforts to promote the acquisition of annual leave, the revised Labor Standards Act mandated that, starting from April 2019, employers must ensure that all employees (Note 1) who are granted 10 or more days of statutory annual leave "take at least 5 days of annual leave per year" (Note 2).

Note 1: "10 or more days of statutory annual leave" refers to the number of days of annual leave newly granted in that year; carried-over annual leave days are not counted. Furthermore, "all employees" includes not only regular employees (including managers and supervisors) but also part-time workers and other employees with fewer scheduled working days per week, provided thatemployees who are granted 10 or more days of annual leave per year are subject to the obligation of the employer to designate the timing of annual leave.

Note 2: "It is necessary to ensure that 5 days of annual leave are taken every year" means that employers must have employees take at least 5 days of annual leave through one of the following methods: "designation of timing by the employer (Note 3)," "request and acquisition by the employee themselves," or "acquisition through the planned annual leave granting system." Once the total number of annual leave days taken by an employee through any of these methods reaches 5 days, the employer is not required to, and cannot, designate the timing. Note that annual leave taken in hourly units cannot be deducted from the 5 days that must be ensured.

Note 3: "Designation of timing by the employer" means that the employer must, for each employee, withinone year from the date the annual leave was granted (reference date), designate the timing for 5 days and have the employee take the annual leave.
When designating the timing, the employer must hear the opinions of the employees and must strive to respect those opinions so that the timing of the leave meets the employees' wishes as much as possible.

In addition, the Ordinance for Enforcement of the Labor Standards Act was revised, and from April 2019, employers must create an annual paid leave management record (Note 4) for each employee and keep it for three years. Employers are expected to use this annual paid leave management record to inform employees and their supervisors of the status of annual leave acquisition, and for supervisors to make labor management improvements, such as reducing the workload of employees who are not taking enough leave, thereby leading to the promotion of more annual leave acquisition.

Note 4: "Annual paid leave management record" is a document that clarifies the timing, number of days, and reference date for each employee, and it can be prepared together with the employee roster or wage ledger. It is also acceptable to manage it on a system, provided that it is set up so that it can be output whenever necessary.

The introduction of the planned annual leave granting system is useful for taking annual leave and is also effective from the perspective of complying with the Labor Standards Act. Therefore, the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare states that it will continue to strive for awareness-raising and public relations so that an environment where it is easier to take annual leave can be created, including the further introduction of the planned annual leave granting system, based on the current situation.

* "Planned annual leave granting system"... A system that allows for the planned allocation of annual leave days for the remaining days after excluding 5 days from the total number of granted annual leave days, provided that a labor-management agreement is concluded. (Article 39, Paragraph 6 of the Labor Standards Act)

The current situation where the annual leave acquisition rate is low due to reasons such as hesitation to bother colleagues or reluctance to request annual leave led to this revision of the Labor Standards Act. Therefore, it does not mean that "it is enough to just have them take 5 days of annual leave every year."

Granted annual leave should essentially all be taken. Let's work toward taking more annual leave by implementing "Plus One Leave," which combines annual leave with Saturdays, Sundays, or holidays to create consecutive leave, and by introducing the planned annual leave granting system. (The government's numerical target is to achieve a 70% annual leave acquisition rate by 2025.)