---
title: 'Public holidays'
summary: 'A statutory non-working day declared by a country or region. Fed into expected-hours and leave-balance computations.'
section: features
tags:
  - crud
  - tempus
  - calendar
  - holidays
updated: '2026-06-17'
---

> A **public holiday** in Tempus is a statutory non-working day declared by a country or region, such as New Year's Day or Christmas. Each entry is one date attached to one country.

## Overview

Public holidays are the legal background: dates everyone in the country gets off regardless of contract or company. They differ from [holiday calendars](tempus_holiday_calendars.md) (company-specific extra off-days) and [absences](tempus_absences.md) (per-employee leave). Most tenants populate the table once a year using the Fetch button.

## What it does

A public holiday is keyed by country and date, so Christmas 2026 in Luxembourg and in France are separate rows, as are Christmas 2026 and 2027. Employees are matched by their contract's location country.

On a matching public holiday:

- Expected hours drop to zero for that day.
- The day is marked on the calendar view.
- Overtime worked is valued at the configured pay percentage (100% standard, 150% time-and-a-half, 200% double).
- The leave balance is credited only if the company's **Add public holidays to balance** setting is on.

The **Fetch** action calls an external service and inserts every officially declared holiday for a country and year (or a range of years) in one call. Entries for the same date and country are upserted, not duplicated.

> [!WARNING]
> Adding or editing a holiday does not recompute closed overtime periods. Add holidays ahead of the period.

> [!NOTE]
> Fetch covers most Western European countries. For others, add holidays manually.

## See also

- [Holiday calendars](tempus_holiday_calendars.md) - company-specific extension of the public-holiday set.
- [Companies](tempus_companies.md) - the country setting that selects which public holidays apply.
- [Contracts](tempus_contracts.md) - the add public holidays to balance behavior.
- [Absences](tempus_absences.md) - the per-employee leave-entry path.
- [Time point overviews](tempus_time_point_overviews.md) - where holidays appear marked.