Annual leave and rest days under Kenyan law
How much annual leave and how many rest days a Kenyan employer must give under the Employment Act, the records to keep, and the limits of Achekam's leave.
By Achekam · · 4 min read · For Running a business businesses in Kenya
A shop manager in Kisumu asks for two weeks off in December. The owner agrees, then wonders: how much leave has she actually earned this year? Did the days she took at Easter count? And is it a problem that the shop's cashiers have worked every Saturday and Sunday for a month during the stock-take?
Small Kenyan employers often run leave on memory and goodwill until a dispute or a labour inspection forces the question. The Employment Act sets clear minimums for annual leave and rest days, and equally clear rules on the records an employer must keep. This article sets out those minimums, the records, how Achekam's payroll handles leave, and the limits a Kenyan employer needs to know about.
Twenty-one working days after twelve months
The Employment Act, as published on Kenya Law, entitles an employee to at least twenty-one working days of leave with full pay after every twelve consecutive months of service. That is a minimum: a contract can give more, but not less.
Three points are easy to get wrong:
- Working days, not calendar days. The entitlement is expressed in working days, so count leave in the days the employee would otherwise have worked.
- Full pay. Annual leave is not paid at a reduced rate.
- After twelve consecutive months. The entitlement is built up through continuous service; agree in the contract how leave accrues during the first year and whether it can be taken before the year is complete.
The Act on Kenya Law's Employment Act page sets out sections 27 and 28 in full, together with the rest of the minimum terms of employment and the records employers must keep, and it is the text to check against your own contracts.
One rest day in seven
The same sections of the Act entitle an employee to at least one rest day in every seven days. For a business that trades seven days a week, such as a shop, a restaurant or a security company, this means planning rosters so that every employee has a full day off each week, even if that day is not always a Sunday.
During busy periods, it is tempting to let staff work through. Keep a roster that shows each employee's rest day for every week, so you can see at a glance when someone has missed one and make it up promptly.
Leave records the law requires
The Act requires an employer to keep a written record for each employee that includes, among other things, leave taken and leave due, maternity and sick leave, rest days and warning letters. It also requires the employer to let an authorised officer inspect the records for the preceding thirty-six months.
In practice, that means:
- a leave record per employee, showing the balance due and every day taken, with dates;
- a record of rest days, which the roster can provide if it is kept;
- sick leave records alongside the medical certificates. Under the Act, an employee with two consecutive months of service is entitled to at least seven days of sick leave on full pay and then seven days on half pay in each twelve months, on production of a medical certificate, which is covered further in sick leave in Kenya;
- records kept safely for at least the thirty-six months an officer may inspect.
Leave accruals and approvals in Achekam
Achekam's payroll keeps annual, sick, family responsibility and unpaid leave with monthly accrual, so an employee's annual leave balance builds up month by month rather than appearing all at once. A line manager approves their own team's leave, and nobody approves their own. Unpaid leave does not cut pay automatically; payroll is warned and decides.
There is no maternity, parental or study leave type, and new leave types cannot be added, so those kinds of leave need to be tracked outside the leave module for now. Maternity and paternity leave in Kenya covers what the law requires for them.
Public holidays and the South African defaults
This is the limit a Kenyan employer must plan around. In Achekam, leave days are counted against South African public holidays, and the built-in entitlements follow South African law, even for a Kenyan employer. Achekam's business calendar does include Kenya's fixed-date national public holidays and, for 2026 only, the movable holidays officially declared or confirmed for that year, applying Kenya's Sunday substitution rule. But that calendar is not what the leave module counts against.
So, until the leave module follows Kenyan holidays and entitlements:
- Check leave that spans a Kenyan public holiday and adjust the days taken by hand where a Kenyan holiday was counted as a leave day, or a South African one was skipped.
- Compare each employee's annual entitlement with the Act's minimum of twenty-one working days, and keep a note of any difference.
- Keep your own leave register as the record of entitlement under Kenyan law, using Achekam's balances as a starting point rather than the final word.
The wider list of Nigerian and Kenyan payroll gaps is set out in payroll gaps for Nigeria and Kenya.
A year-end leave review
Once a year, before the busy season:
- list each employee's leave due, taken and remaining, checked against the Act's minimum;
- agree dates with anyone who has a large balance, so leave is taken rather than piling up;
- check the roster for the past year for missed rest days;
- file the year's leave and rest-day records where an officer could inspect them.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
