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As announced earlier in the year, Sussex staff have been given an additional Minimum Service Day on Friday 2 January 2026, and the Vice-Chancellor recently announced that 22 and 23 December 2025 will also be Minimum Service Days.

Staff will now receive their December pay on Friday 19 December 2025.

You can see the full list of scheduled Minimum Service Days on our term dates webpage.

As these are additional, non-contractual days, staff will not be required to use the MyView absence booking system and no re-adjustment of staff annual leave entitlement will be needed. If you have already booked 22 or 23 December as annual leave, please cancel them on MyView.

Staff who were not going to work on 22 and/or 23 December due to their normal working pattern (i.e. it is a non-working day), will need to agree an alternative day(s) locally with their line manager. Staff who are unable to take the additional days on 22 and or 23 December due to work requirements will need to either tack it on to the start or end of the winter break (preferred) or arrange a convenient time with their line manager.

Further guidance on the 22 and 23 December Minimum Service Days

Part-time staff whose normal working pattern would mean them working on the newly-announced Minimum Service Days will receive the day off, without the need to use any of their annual leave allowance to ‘make up’ the hours for the day.

If you would not normally work on either or both of these days, you will have the day(s) tacked on to the start or end of the winter break leave period. If this is not possible due to operational requirements, or if the next day is a day where you would not normally be working, then you should seek to agree an alternative date with your line manager, bearing in mind the corresponding working hours information below.

If you are required to work on 22 and/or 23 December due to the operational requirements of the service or School you work in, then, again, the additional day(s) should be tacked on to the end of the winter break, or taken before the winter break starts. If this is not possible, either due to working patterns or operational need, please seek agreement from your line manager for an alternative date.

For part-time staff, where the working patterns for 5/6 January (or 18/19 December if taking the leave before the winter break) do not match the working pattern on 22/23 December (i.e. where the normal working hours across those days are different), days off corresponding to the normal working hours for 22/23 December should be granted at another time. Line managers are asked to accommodate these requests wherever possible or agree to an alternative.