Japanese law sets a floor for leave: annual paid leave, maternity and childcare leave, caregiver leave, and a handful of others. Anything above that is special leave, granted by the employer's own rules. The most common types are bereavement and celebration leave, usually a few days for a wedding or the death of a close relative; summer leave; refresh leave at service milestones such as ten or twenty years; and leave for volunteering, birthdays or medical treatment. Many Japanese companies have no paid sick leave at all, so a sick-leave allowance, where it exists, is also special leave. In the ministry's General Survey on Working Conditions for 2025, 60.3% of companies with 30 or more employees had some form of special leave: 41.5% had summer leave, 28.4% sick leave and 15.4% refresh leave.
Whether it is paid, how many days, who qualifies and how to apply are up to the employer. But leave is one of the matters the Labour Standards Act requires the work rules to cover, so once special leave is written there, it becomes part of the terms of employment. Removing or reducing it is a disadvantageous change that needs a reasonable justification.
That has a practical consequence. Since April 2019, employers must ensure employees take at least five days of annual leave a year. Some employers responded by turning existing special leave, such as summer days, into annual leave days to meet the five-day requirement. The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare has said that abolishing special leave and replacing it with annual leave goes against the aim of the reform, and that changes to working conditions such as special leave should in principle be agreed with employees. A change made without agreement through the work rules has to pass the reasonableness test for disadvantageous changes. Days of special leave taken also cannot be counted towards the five days.
What it means for a foreign employer
- Candidates count it. A Japanese company offering summer leave, refresh leave and paid sick days can beat a foreign employer's headline annual leave once everything is added up. Compare the full package.
- It is hard to take back. Write special leave carefully the first time, because reducing it later needs justification and often consultation.
- Sick leave is a gap to fill. Without paid sick leave, employees use annual leave when ill. A few paid sick days is an inexpensive differentiator.
- Global policies need translating into the work rules. A leave benefit in a global handbook that is not in the Japanese work rules creates ambiguity about whether it is binding.
Sources
- Labour Standards Act, Article 89 (work rules must cover leave).
- Labour Contract Act, Articles 9 and 10 (changes to work rules).
- Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, guidance on the obligation to ensure five days of annual paid leave (2019), and leaflet to employers on converting special leave.
- Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, General Survey on Working Conditions 2025 (special leave systems).