Somewhere in your team, there's a good chance someone is quietly fitting work around caring for a parent, a partner or a child with a long-term condition. The government estimates that around 3 million people in the UK balance paid work with unpaid care.
Since April 2024, carer's leave in the UK has given those employees a legal right to take time off to give or arrange care for someone who depends on them. It's unpaid, it's flexible, and it's often misunderstood. It's also under government review. Here's what you need to know now.
What is carer's leave?
Carer's leave is a statutory right created by the Carer's Leave Act 2023. It came into force on 6 April 2024 and applies in England, Scotland and Wales.
The key points:
- It's a day-one right, so employees can take it from their first day with you
- It applies to employees, not to workers or contractors
- It's unpaid by law, although you can choose to pay it
- It's for planned care, not emergencies (more on that below)
Who counts as a dependant?
The employee must be giving or arranging care for a dependant with a long-term care need. A dependant can be:
- a spouse, civil partner, child or parent
- someone who lives in the same household (but not a lodger, tenant or boarder)
- anyone else who reasonably relies on them for care, such as an elderly neighbour
The dependant doesn't have to be family. They have a long-term care need if they have:
- an illness or injury, physical or mental, that's expected to need care for more than three months
- a disability as defined by the Equality Act 2010
- care needs relating to old age
ACAS gives examples such as taking a disabled child to a hospital appointment or moving a parent with dementia into a care home. It isn't meant for general childcare.
How much carer's leave can employees take?
Up to one week in any 12-month period. A week means the employee's normal working week, so someone who works five days a week can take five days, and someone who works three days can take three.
It can be taken as half days, full days or a whole week in one go. That flexibility is the point: most carers need the odd morning for an appointment rather than a solid block.
If an employee cares for more than one person, they don't get a week per dependant. It's one week in total, which they can use across everyone they care for.
One thing to watch: the 12 months is a rolling period, not your holiday year. Keeping a record of exactly when carer's leave was taken is the only reliable way to know what's left.
How much notice do employees need to give?
- For half a day or a full day: at least three days' notice
- For anything longer: at least twice the length of the leave, so two days off needs four days' notice and a full five-day week needs ten
Notice is counted in full days, even when the request includes a half day. The request doesn't have to be in writing, and the employee doesn't have to give you any evidence of their dependant's care needs.
ACAS encourages employers to be as flexible as they can, because caring rarely runs to a timetable.
Can you refuse a carer's leave request?
No. You can't turn it down, but you can postpone it if the employee's absence would cause serious disruption to the business. If you do, you must:
- agree a new date within one month of the date they originally asked for
- put the reason and the new date in writing within seven days of the request, and before the leave was due to start
Use it sparingly. Moving someone's leave away from their mum's hospital appointment is a hard thing to justify.
Do you have to pay carer's leave?
No. Statutory carer's leave is unpaid. Some employers choose to pay it anyway, as a way of keeping good people who might otherwise cut their hours or leave.
What you can't do is treat someone worse for taking it. Their employment rights carry on while they're off, including holiday building up as normal, and they're entitled to come back to the same job. Treating someone unfairly because they've taken carer's leave counts as a detriment, and dismissing them for it is automatically unfair.
Carer's leave, time off for dependants and compassionate leave
These three often get muddled, so here's the short version:
- Carer's leave is for planned care for someone with a long-term need, with notice, up to a week a year
- Time off for dependants is for genuine emergencies, like a carer not turning up or a sudden fall, with no notice needed and a "reasonable" amount of time off. You don't have to pay it either
- Compassionate leave is usually about bereavement or a serious family crisis, and beyond statutory parental bereavement leave it's largely down to your own policy
If an employee can't give the notice carer's leave needs, time off for dependants may cover it instead. We've written separately about compassionate leave and how to word a compassionate leave letter.
What could change: the 2026 review
The government opened a consultation on employment rights for unpaid carers on 9 June 2026, and it closed on 1 September. The options on the table include:
- extending unpaid carer's leave beyond one week, with six to ten days floated
- introducing a short period of paid carer's leave, with pay options ranging from 90% of earnings down to Statutory Sick Pay rates
- a new right to return to work after a longer period of unpaid caring leave
At the time of writing, the government is still working through the responses. For now, one week of unpaid leave is the law.
A carer's leave checklist for UK employers
- Put it in your policy. Add carer's leave to your staff absence policy so people know it exists and how to ask for it.
- Brief whoever approves leave. The two things most often got wrong: you can't refuse it, and you can't ask for proof.
- Decide on pay. Unpaid is the legal minimum. If you pay it, say so, and say how much.
- Record it separately. Keep carer's leave apart from annual leave and sickness, so nobody's holiday gets quietly eaten up and your absence records stay meaningful.
- Put postponements in writing. Every time, within seven days.
Keeping track without the spreadsheet
Carer's leave is exactly the sort of absence that goes missing in a spreadsheet: a half day here, a morning there, spread across a rolling year. In Absently you can set carer's leave up as its own leave type, so it shows on the team calendar alongside holidays and sickness, and you've got a clear record of who took what, and when.
Absently costs £1 per person per month, and you can start your free trial today. It's 30 days free, with no credit card needed.