There has been a surprise drop in the number of annual leave days that financial and insurance workers are taking off despite a rise in leave allowance, according to analysis of 122,000 UK employees.

New analysis suggests that the financial and insurance sector has seen one of the biggest dips in people taking annual leave in the last two years.

The drop in annual leave days taken between 2020 and 2022 of nearly 5% has come at the same time as firms have promoted employee wellness and, in many cases, increase leave.

The annual leave report has been carried out by HR systems specialist Access PeopleHR and looked at the absence leave data of over 122,000 employees over the last three years. 

In the financial and insurance sector, the number of annual leave days has dropped by 4.97% in the last two years. This is despite the average allowance in the sector rising by 8% - from 30.5 to 33.2 days, including bank holidays. 

The reasons for the drop are not entirely clear but the data covers most of the pandemic period when many people worked from home. AccessPeopleHR says that with staff shortages some employees may be prioritising work commitment over personal time off to keep up with workloads.

There may also have been busy periods when employees found it difficult to take time off and an element of “blurred lines” where the rise of hybrid working - following the Coronavirus pandemic - might have blurred the boundaries between work and personal lives, making it challenging for employees to disengage and take time off completely.

Nationally, Access PeopleHR found that the average entitlement offered to all staff is now 34 days a year, including bank holidays. This is up by five days annually since 2020, when it was 29. 

The industries with the biggest drops of people using annual leave: 

Source: AccessPeopleHR

Charles Butterworth, managing director, Access PeopleHR, said: “Whether it’s financial worries, busy work schedules or simply not having enough booked in your calendar to justify annual leave, there’s hundreds of complex reasons why some staff in the financial sector may not be utilising all of their annual leave. 

“This report into the current status of annual leave across multiple industries in the UK highlights how important it is for employers and companies to have a stringent HR system in place that makes it easy for staff to book holidays, but also simple for managers to spot those that haven’t booked enough, and encourage them to set aside dates in the calendar for time off. 

“The fact that holiday entitlement has grown so much in recent years is promising, however it will become pointless if they’re seen as job perks - but people are too busy to take them. Companies need to take action to identify the reasons for the lack of holiday requests and ensure that they implement ways of working that rectify this.”

Those in recruitment fared the best in terms of UK employment sectors with a drop in leave taken of just 0.26%. Those in the recruitment sector also took the fewest days of sick leave.

Entitlement in the arts industry also rose the most, by over a fifth (21%), with the average employee having 36 days of annual leave, up from 29 in 2020 and 31 in 2021.

Access PeopleHR reviewed absence leave data taken from 122,000 employees at 3,175 companies, in 18 sectors. It took data for the full years of 2020, 2021 and 2022. Data correct as of July 2023.

• The Full Report is available here: https://www.peoplehr.com/en-gb/resources/blog/uk-annual-leave-report-by-industry/