Annual, Personal and Long Service Leave in Australia vs Leave in Italy

Australian staff get four weeks of annual leave, ten days of personal/carer’s leave and, after years of service, long service leave under state law. Italian staff get four weeks of leave too, but with more public holidays, extra paid hours off from the CCNL, sick leave without a fixed day count, and no long service leave. Full comparison on Italy vs Australia .

Annual leave  

Australia. Full-time and part-time employees accrue 4 weeks of annual leave a year based on ordinary hours (Fair Work Ombudsman). Some shiftworkers get a fifth week under their award. Leave loading, where it applies, comes from the award or agreement. Cashing out is possible only within the rules of the award or agreement.

Public holidays  

Italy has 12 national holidays that can fall on a workday from 2026, including 4 October restored by Law 151/2025, plus Easter Monday and the local patron saint’s day. Work on a holiday is paid at a premium or replaced by a day off according to the CCNL. Australia’s NES give public holidays set by state and territory law.

Personal (sick) leave  

Australia. Full-time employees get 10 days of paid personal/carer’s leave a year, pro rata for part-time, carried over if unused. The employer pays the full rate.

Italy. There is no fixed number of days. An employee who is sick is paid from day one with an online medical certificate sent by the doctor to INPS:

• Days 1–3: paid by the employer under the CCNL (often 100%).
• Days 4–20: INPS pays 50%, the employer tops up per the CCNL.
• From day 21 up to 180 days: INPS pays 66.66%, topped up per the CCNL.
• Industry white-collar staff get no INPS sick pay: the employer pays in full per the CCNL.

The job is protected for a comporto period set by the CCNL (often around 180 days in a year). INPS can send a doctor to check the employee at home during set hours. The cost to the employer is shared with INPS, but absence is open-ended until the comporto ends.

Carer’s leave in Italy takes different forms: paid days for relatives with severe disabilities (Law 104/1992), illness of a child, and CCNL leave for family reasons.

Long service leave  

Australia. Most employees get long service leave from state or territory law, for example after 7 years (it varies by state), and it is paid out on exit in many cases. The NES preserve these entitlements.

Italy. There is no long service leave. Seniority shows up instead in CCNL pay increments (scatti di anzianità), longer notice periods and the growing TFR balance. Budget for TFR rather than LSL (see notice and redundancy pay vs TFR ).

Working time  

The NES cap ordinary hours at 38 a week plus reasonable additional hours. Italy sets a 40-hour standard week, a 48-hour weekly average including overtime, and 250 hours of overtime a year unless the CCNL sets a different cap (D.Lgs 66/2003). There is also a right to 11 consecutive hours of rest a day and a weekly rest day.

Side by side  

Common questions from Australian companies  

Can we offer unlimited leave? You can offer more than the minimum, but the four weeks must actually be taken and tracked. Unused minimum leave is a liability and an INPS issue.

Do Italian employees work in August? Many companies close for two or three weeks in August; collective leave is allowed if planned.

What about leave loading? No general equivalent; the 13th and 14th month play a similar role in the annual pay structure.

Planning leave for an Italian team member  

When you build a leave policy for Italy, start from the CCNL rather than from your Australian handbook. Check how many ROL and ex-holiday hours the CCNL grants, whether the company will close in August or over Christmas, and how leave requests are approved and recorded. Italian payslips show accrued and used leave and ROL balances every month, so the employee can see their position at any time. Remember that unused minimum leave cannot simply be paid out at the end of the year, and that accrued leave is paid out on exit together with TFR. For sick leave, agree an internal process for the employee to send the INPS certificate protocol number on the first day of absence, and accept that the employer cannot ask about the diagnosis. Long absences should be monitored against the comporto period in the CCNL, because once it is exceeded the employer may dismiss, while before that point dismissal for sickness is not allowed.

What this means if you hire through an EOR  

The EOR tracks leave, ROL and sick leave, receives INPS certificates and applies CCNL top-ups through payroll. You approve time off as with any team member. See the Italian employment contract , other countries , the cost calculator or contact us .

Related guides for Australian companies  

• Paid Parental Leave vs Italian maternity and parental leave
• Modern awards and the NES vs the Italian CCNL
• Superannuation and PAYG vs INPS and IRPEF

General information, not legal advice.