Leave management systems
- Accrued and not yet taken, days
- 5
- Full-year entitlement, days
- 28
- Accrued so far this leave year, days
- 14
Every figure on this page is computed from the inputs you enter, by the method stated below it. The statutory figures the page names are read from GOV.UK and sourced: 5.6 weeks' paid holiday a year for almost all workers, statutory entitlement limited to 28 days, bank holidays allowed to count inside it, and notice of at least twice the leave requested plus one day. Everything else is yours.
Leave management systems are sold to two very different buyers, and the confusion between them is what makes the category hard to shop. A large employer buys a system that sits inside an HR platform, integrates with payroll and manages every kind of absence for thousands of people. A small employer with a wall chart needs a system that does one thing well: holds each person's annual leave entitlement, takes every approved request off it, shows the team who is off when and warns before the leave year closes. This guide compares the shapes a leave management system comes in, what each costs at the small end, and what a small employer should refuse to pay for. The free holiday leave calculator on this site works out the accrual any of them starts from.
Try the free annual leave calculator Free to use. No account, no card, no sign-up.
Three shapes: the spreadsheet, the leave-only system and the HR suite
The spreadsheet is free and fails at the first overwritten formula. The HR suite does everything and is priced per user for it. The leave-only system in between holds employees, entitlements, requests and balances and nothing else, and for a team under fifty it is the shape that fits: cheap enough to keep, narrow enough that everyone uses it.
Judge a system by what it does at the year end
Any system can record a request in June. The test is March: does it show every untaken balance while there is still time to book, apply the carry-over rule the policy states, and reset the new year's entitlement without losing the old one? A system that needs the entitlements retyped each April is a spreadsheet with a login.
Check the entitlement arithmetic, not the screenshots
Enter a part-timer who started in July and see whether the system works out the pro rata figure on the statutory 5.6 weeks or asks you to type a number. Enter a leaver and see whether it shows the untaken balance to pay. The arithmetic is where the errors live, and the free calculators on this site show what the right answers are.
Price the whole team, not the seat
Per-user pricing is how a leave system for twelve people ends up costing more than the accountant. One price for the whole team is the shape this site sells, and the arithmetic stays free either way; pay for the record and the reminders, never for the calculator.
Leave management systems: common questions
What does a leave management system record?
Each employee's days a week and entitlement, the leave year dates, every request with its dates, days and status, the running balance, and the carry-over the policy allows. The wall chart view and the balance view are the two screens the employer actually uses.
Do small businesses need a leave management system?
A team of three can keep a spreadsheet. Past ten people the spreadsheet is a single point of failure: one person maintains it, nobody else can see a balance without asking, and a request approved by text is applied late or not at all. That is the point at which a system pays for itself in one avoided double booking.
Should a leave management system include sickness and other absence?
Only if you will keep it up to date. Annual leave is planned and approved in advance, so the record is naturally complete; sickness is recorded after the fact and is a different discipline. This site keeps annual leave only, and does it properly, rather than a little of everything.
Will it do what you need for Leave management systems?
Tell us what your team needs and we will tell you straight whether WallChartBook Pro does it today, whether it is coming, or whether you are better off with something else. A person reads these and replies.