UK Notice Period Calculator

UK Statutory Notice Periods Explained

Statutory notice is the minimum your employer must give you under the Employment Rights Act 1996. The rules are simple but they are often misunderstood — particularly by employees who assume their employer can just tell them to leave immediately.

The statutory minimums for employer-to-employee notice are:

- Less than 1 month of service: No statutory entitlement (but most contracts specify something)
- 1 month to 2 years of continuous service: 1 week minimum
- 2 years of continuous service: 2 weeks
- 3 years: 3 weeks
- And so on, up to: 12 weeks for 12 or more years of service — this is the cap

For employee-to-employer notice, the statutory minimum is always 1 week once you have been employed for a month — regardless of how long you have worked there.

Here is the important nuance: your employment contract almost certainly specifies a longer notice period, and that contractual period overrides the statutory minimum (as long as it is at least as long). So if your contract says 3 months, your employer must give you 3 months even if the statute only requires 6 weeks. Read your contract carefully — the notice clause is usually towards the end of the document.

During the notice period you remain a full employee: you continue to accrue holiday, your employer must continue paying your salary and benefits, and dismissal rules still apply. Breaching the notice period — on either side — is a breach of contract.

Pay in Lieu of Notice (PILON)

Pay in lieu of notice (PILON) is when your employer pays you your salary for the notice period without requiring you to actually work those weeks. It ends your employment immediately rather than keeping you on for the full notice period.

Whether your employer can require PILON (rather than letting you work your notice) depends on your contract. If your contract contains a PILON clause, the employer has the explicit right to invoke it. If it does not, paying PILON technically constitutes a breach of contract — the employer is paying you off rather than honouring the employment relationship.

Tax treatment changed significantly in April 2018. Before 2018, non-contractual PILON was sometimes structured as a tax-free payment (below £30,000). The post-employment notice pay (PENP) rules introduced by HMRC now require that a portion of any termination payment equivalent to notice pay be taxed as income, regardless of whether a PILON clause exists. In practice, this means most PILON payments are fully taxable as earnings.

If you receive PILON, check your pension contributions are handled correctly — some employers stop pension contributions on PILON, which could be a breach of your pension scheme rules. Also confirm that any benefits (private medical, life assurance) that lapse on termination of active employment are addressed in your exit settlement.

Garden Leave in the UK

Garden leave is a specific arrangement where your employer asks you to stay away from the workplace — and often prohibits you from contacting clients or colleagues — while you serve out your notice period. You remain employed, continue to be paid, and your benefits continue, but you are not expected to perform any work.

Why do employers use it? Primarily to protect commercially sensitive information and client relationships. For senior roles, someone who has resigned to join a competitor is a security risk — they could take client lists, pricing data, or strategic plans with them. Garden leave prevents that access.

There is an important consequence for employees: restrictive covenants run from the start of garden leave, not the end. If your contract includes a 6-month post-employment non-solicitation covenant and your garden leave period is 3 months, your effective restriction is only 3 months after you actually leave. Courts have held that employers cannot "double-stack" the garden leave and the covenant period as separate restrictions — the garden leave counts.

You generally cannot refuse garden leave if your contract permits it, though courts will not enforce it indefinitely — usually not beyond 6 months. If your employer puts you on garden leave but stops paying you or removes benefits, you may have a repudiatory breach of contract and be entitled to treat yourself as dismissed.

What Happens If Notice Is Not Given?

If your employer dismisses you without giving proper notice — and without PILON — you have been "wrongfully dismissed." This is a legal concept distinct from unfair dismissal (which requires two years' service and goes to an Employment Tribunal). Wrongful dismissal is a breach of contract claim and can be brought in the civil courts or the Employment Tribunal.

Your remedy is damages equivalent to what you would have earned during the notice period — salary, pension contributions, and the value of benefits. Courts will reduce the award if you failed to mitigate by seeking new employment.

If you leave without giving proper notice, your employer can:
- Deduct from any outstanding pay (holiday pay, final salary) up to the actual loss they suffered
- Bring a breach of contract claim for damages — though this is rare for staff-level employees and usually only happens in senior or specialist roles where the departure caused quantifiable loss
- Report the breach to a regulator if you work in a regulated industry

In practice, most employees leave without serving full notice and most employers do not pursue it — but it remains a legal risk. If you are mid-project or in a senior role, take the risk seriously. Agreeing a shorter notice period in writing with your manager before leaving is always cleaner than simply not turning up.