The answer to the seemingly straightforward issue of how many working days there are in a year actually depends on who you ask. A business’s number of working days varies greatly from one company to another, and an employee’s number is also varied.
To put it succinctly, Google is unable to provide a definitive response. You will need to continue reading if you wish to discover the answer.
Knowing the precise number of working days in your year is crucial for small business owners and managers since it affects project management, payroll, leave administration, and turnaround times.
To make sure your company has enough employees to run well on all of its working days without violating any leave regulations or overworking anyone, you should also know how many working days each employee has in a year.
2 + 2 = ….?
It seems so easy to figure out how many working days there are in a year. A 5-day workweek equates to 260 working days as there are 52 weeks in a year. Simple.
Not exactly.
Due to the numerous leave benefits that every employee is entitled to, the majority of us will not work 260 days a year. Assuming you don’t take any prolonged time off, such as parental or study leave, it’s likely closer to 220 for the majority of full-time employees. Companies also have “working days,” or days when they are “open,” serving clients or customers, and running their businesses, thus “working days” aren’t limited to employees.
Not every business operates from 9 to 5 every day. Some are open all year round. Others are only open for business during a three-month “summer” (we should be so fortunate!) and then close for the remainder of the year.
Given that they may only have 24 “working days” in a year, we can’t imagine that the Christmas tree dealers see much business in August. The concept of a “normal” 5-day workweek is quickly becoming obsolete, even for office occupations, as hybrid and more flexible working patterns become increasingly prevalent.
Then another spanner is being developed. bank holidays.
Bank holidays
In order to extend the weekend, bank holidays, which are national public holidays, typically fall on a Monday or Friday. Some of them are “common law” or religious holidays, such as Easter Sunday, Good Friday, and Christmas Day in the UK, as well as many saints’ days throughout Europe.
In the good old days, the Bank of England celebrated religious festivals and a healthy number of saints’ days as holidays. Later, this was lowered to just four (ouch!), most likely as a result of nobody finishing any work.
The concept of paid public holidays was established in 1871 by the Bank Holidays Act, and as of right now, England and Wales have eight of them annually, Scotland has nine, and Northern Ireland has ten (yeah!). Many businesses (though not all, it’s crucial to note) will close on these days, and instead, their employees will relax and read books.
Bank holidays may or may not be regarded as working days, depending on the type of business you run and its industry. These holidays may be closed because all of your employees are taking paid time off (for example, most office-based businesses and some retail positions), or they may be one of your busiest days of the year (for example, hospitality, serving all of the office workers who would otherwise be seated at their desks!).
Bank holidays give workers the most sought-after perk of all: a four-day workweek. An additional day to do all the tasks that cannot be completed in a typical weekend. A BBQ in the sun, maybe.
gatherings with relatives and friends. a full calendar of events and sports. DIY and life management. Or perhaps a restful day with a much-needed nap.
A bank holiday can be spent in a variety of ways, but working is the one activity that many people will not be doing. Fantastic for employees, but a possible trip hazard for managers and owners of small businesses.
How to calculate your working days
The number of days that a small business is “open” each year is known as its working days. Whether you work four or seven days a week, this is your normal workweek less any bank holidays you intend to observe.
Some bank holidays may be considered working days, while others may not be. You have a choice. Businesses are not required by law to close on all bank holidays. Major religious holidays might allow you to close, but other bank holidays wouldn’t. You may close for Easter but take a break for Christmas. It’s less of a problem because you might not be open on Mondays anyhow.
Because you might have to pay employees more to work on a public holiday, how you handle bank holidays will mostly depend on your sector and whether opening is cost-effective.
Opening on bank holidays, especially sunny ones, is definitely worthwhile if you run a restaurant or pub. However, if you sell office supplies to large corporations, you’re unlikely to make many sales and might as well enjoy the relaxation.
Coping with bank holidays as a small business
Even though Quality Street is practically inundated with Christmas-related signs starting on September 1st, bank holidays sometimes seem to appear out of nowhere. They feel more like buses in the UK since they are surprisingly not uniformly spaced out throughout the year. There are none for months at a time, and then it seems like there is one every other week (May is everyone’s favorite month for a reason).
If you don’t figure out how many working days you have in a year, as a small business owner, they might catch you off guard and lead to a variety of issues, such as missed deadlines and returned payments. Most significantly, it may result in missed chances for relaxation, with cranky employees putting in extra hours when they intended to be at the park.
Bank holidays may be especially challenging for companies in industries with quick turnaround times, and missing a day of work can be disastrous. When those 4-day weeks come around, you’ve lost 20% of your workforce if you use a 5-day delivery strategy.
When you try to fit five days of work into four, the excitement of the bank holiday might quickly fade if you haven’t factored that in. Knowing you’ll be on the defensive before you’ve even entered the room makes the Sunday scaries go all out.
Since all banking organizations are normally closed on these public holidays, the term “bank” holidays was coined. These days, this isn’t always the case with Internet banking.
In order to prevent employees from running out of money during the long weekend and direct debits from bouncing due to a delayed payment, you might need to arrange some earlier payments or modify your payroll around holiday periods.
Key takeaways
We now know that figuring out how many working days there are in a year is more complicated than it first appears. There are a number of things to think about, such as your company’s “normal” workweek, the industry you operate in, any seasonality, and any bank holidays you must take into account.
However, as the recent shift to 4-day work weeks has demonstrated, a missed working day—even two!—need not spell disaster if one applies a little ingenuity and makes use of all the wonderful technology available to us today. All you have to do is know it’s coming.
All national holidays will be marked for you by good leave management software, allowing you to anticipate them and modify your personnel, workload, or deadlines accordingly.
You can prevent overstretching yourself if you keep track of how many working days you have in a year and which months you’ll have fewer than normal. In this manner, everyone, working or not, makes the most of their days and neither your clients nor your employees will be taken advantage of!
