Holiday when you work in Denmark
This information is for EU citizens only.
Apply for frozen holiday funds
The current Danish holiday law entered into force on the 1 September 2020. According to the new law, holidays are accrued at a rate of 2,08 holidays per month and can be used the following month. Under the previous law, holidays were accrued over a period of 16 months and were made available on the 1st of May. This means that there will be an overlap for the holiday year 2019-2020 where almost two years paid holiday (10 weeks) will be frozen and put into the fund Lønmodtagernes Feriemidler. This fund will keep the money until you either leave the Danish labour market, or retire.
Apply for some of your frozen holiday funds and read more at borger.dk
The right to five weeks of holiday when you work in Denmark
If you work in Denmark, you are covered by the Danish holiday legislation called "Ferieloven". The Annual Holidays Act gives all employees the right to five weeks' holiday. But the right to holiday doesn't automatically mean that you have the right to receive a salary during the holiday. The Annual Holidays Act is a so-called minimilag (minimum law), you can always negotiate better conditions than those laid out in the Annual Holidays Act, but never worse.
Care days and holiday days off
It is the employer's duty to pay holiday pay and it is the employee's duty to use the holiday that the holiday pay covers. In some work places there are also rules, which give employees the right to so-called care days and an extra five days of holiday. These are extra days that you can take in addition to your holiday allowance. Check with your employer to find out what agreements there are in force at your work place.
How to take holiday
- You order your holiday pay, called feriepenge, by logging in with your MitID at borger.dk. At the website you can also check how many days of holiday you have left.
- If you do not have MitID, you can order your feriepenge by filling in a form at borger.dk.
- In some cases, your holiday is administrated by your employer instead of by Feriekonto.
Order feriepenge with MitID på borger.dk
Order feriepenge without MitID
Create a NemKonto in order to get your holiday pay
Your holiday compensation/holiday pay is paid into a NemKonto. A NemKonto is one of your ordinary bank accounts, which is mainly used by the government when they need to pay you money. Examples of this are if you are paid a tax refund, or receive child benefit or a pension. When you want to get a NemKonto, you can ask at your Danish bank or read about how to do this on nemkonto.dk.
Holiday - when you stop working in Denmark
If you no longer want to work in Denmark, you have the right to be paid any feriepenge you have saved and not used. In most cases, you must contact the Feriekonto yourself, because they do not automatically receive contact information for people who are not registered as living in Denmark. You can find out more about how to proceed on borger.dk.
Read more on borger.dk - Ferie
Important: you must apply for your holiday pay no later than 6 months after you finish working and have possibly removed your details from the public register (folkeregistret). Otherwise you may lose your holiday pay.
