The Holidays Act 2003 is replaced on 6 August 2028. Leave will build up by the hour against each employee’s standard hours, and where those hours cannot be read from the agreement, a written notional roster fills the gap. What a small employer should do now, and what can wait.
The Holidays Act 2003 has an end date. The Employment Leave Act 2026 became law on 6 August 2026 and takes over on 6 August 2028, two years later. Until then nothing changes: Employment New Zealand's advice for the first months is that no action is required and the Holidays Act still applies (How employers can get ready).
Two years is still not long for a change that reaches into agreements, payroll and rosters. This guide covers what is known today, what the notional roster is, and the small amount of preparation that is worth doing early.
This is general information, not legal advice. For specific situations, talk to an employment law specialist or your advisor.
Leave moves from weeks and days to hours. Under the new Act, annual leave builds up at 0.0769 hours for every standard hour, and sick leave at 0.0385 hours for every standard hour.
The arithmetic shows what those rates are aiming at:
| Standard hours | Annual leave built up in a year | Sick leave built up in a year |
|---|---|---|
| 40 hours a week (2,080 a year) | About 160 hours, which is four 40-hour weeks | About 80 hours, which is ten 8-hour days |
| 20 hours a week (1,040 a year) | About 80 hours, which is four 20-hour weeks | About 40 hours |
For someone with fixed hours the result looks familiar. The change is in how you get there. Everything is counted against the employee's standard hours, so those hours have to be known and written down.
How extra hours beyond the standard ones, and casual work, are treated is set out in the Act and in guidance that is still to come. We do not cover it here.
For many employees the standard hours are in the employment agreement: Monday to Friday, 8:30 to 5:00. For others they are not. The agreement says hours as rostered, or gives a minimum with more by arrangement.
That is where the notional roster comes in. Where an employee's standard hours cannot be determined from their employment agreement, the Act uses a written notional roster to establish them. In plain terms, it is a written statement of the pattern the person is treated as working, so that leave can be counted against something.
The detail matters and it is not all published yet. Employment New Zealand's guidance timeline puts employer guidance on agreements, converting existing leave, hours and rosters, and payment scenarios between November 2026 and January 2027. Until it arrives, treat any confident description of how to write a notional roster with caution, including from software companies.
Employment New Zealand has published what it will release and when:
Its suggested preparation follows the same rhythm: learn about the changes now; work out which agreements, policies and processes will need updating from late 2026; plan the updates and review your payroll and employment data for gaps in the first half of 2027; update agreements and processes from August 2027; and finish before August 2028. If you update an agreement early, it should say that the current entitlements apply until the new law starts.
Employment New Zealand lists the systems an employer should review: payroll, time and attendance, pay information, onboarding and rostering, and records and leave tracking, along with employment agreements and workplace policies.
Rostering and time and attendance are on that list for a reason. Once leave is counted in hours against standard hours, the pattern you agree with each person and the hours they actually work become inputs to leave, not just to pay.
None of this needs the new guidance, and all of it is useful under the current law too.
Clockie does not calculate leave entitlements, and it will not. Your payroll system does that, under this Act and the next one.
What Clockie holds is the evidence underneath. The Clockie roster keeps each published week per location. The time clock keeps the hours actually worked, verified at the kiosk by PIN, photo or face. The Rostered vs Actual report puts the two side by side with a CSV export, and a read-only API lets another system fetch the roster. If you start a week from what actually happened, Clockie drafts it from the last eight weeks of clock-ins and gives the reason for each shift, which is a quick way to see what someone's real pattern is.
If you have no roster on record at all, start one. The free roster generator makes a week with breaks and public holidays marked, and the public holiday planner has the 2026 and 2027 dates.
This is general information, not legal advice. For specific situations, talk to an employment law specialist or your advisor.
Try Clockie free and start keeping rostered and actual hours side by side.
Clockie is NZ-built time clock, roster and visitor sign-in software with PIN/face verification, offline sync, and direct Xero & Crystal Payroll integration. Built for New Zealand businesses that want accurate hours without the paperwork.
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