Breaks At Work: Laws and Employer Obligations

Understanding UK Break and Lunch Laws

Taking regular breaks at work isn’t just good for productivity and employee wellbeing, it’s a legal requirement in the UK. Under UK work break laws, employees are entitled to rest breaks and periods away from work to protect their health, safety and overall work-life balance.

Here, we’ll explore everything employers need to know about UK work break laws, including what the regulations say, who they apply to and how to stay compliant.

What are the Working Time Regulations 1998 (WTR)?

The Working Time Regulations 1998 (WTR) are the key piece of legislation which sets out employees’ and workers’ rights to breaks. They are a fundamental part of UK employment law and were introduced to implement the European Working Time Directive. Under these regulations, employers must adhere to specific rules about:

• The maximum number of hours employees can work per week
• Rest breaks during the workday
• Daily and weekly rest periods
• Paid annual leave entitlements

The regulations are in place to prevent overwork and reduce the risk of work-related stress, fatigue and accidents.

Break Entitlements

Whilst the WTR set out the minimum break entitlements for workers in the UK, obligations can still vary depending on several individual and job-specific factors. As an employer, you must consider these carefully to avoid unintentional breaches. Here are the key things to consider that influence break entitlements.

Length of working day

The number of hours an employee works per day will directly affect their entitlement to rest periods.

Workers who work more than 6 hours a day are entitled to a 20-minute uninterrupted rest break. This must be taken during the working day—not at the start or end—and should allow the employee to rest away from their workstation. Longer or split-shifts may also require you to offer additional breaks, particularly where fatigue could become a health and safety concern.

Type of employment contract

Whether a worker is full-time, part-time, on a zero-hours contract (although these workers will shortly be offered guaranteed hours under the Employment Rights Bill), or working under an agency agreement, can impact how and when their break entitlements apply. A part-time worker, for example, doing a four-hour shift, may not qualify for a rest break under WTR, but they must still be given adequate time off between shifts.

Employers should review what is promised in the employment contract, as it may provide for more generous break allowances than the legal minimum.

Employee age and circumstances

Break entitlements also differ for young workers, particularly those under 18, and for employees with specific needs such as pregnant workers.

• Workers under 18 are entitled to longer daily and weekly rest periods (see further below), as well as a 30-minute break if they work more than 4.5 hours.
• Pregnant employees may require more frequent or longer breaks to support their wellbeing and reduce health risks—this is a legal duty under health and safety law.

Failing to account for these differences could not only breach WTR, but also risk claims under equality or health and safety regulations.

Industry sector

There are also certain industries such as transport, emergency services and healthcare, who have industry specific rules that may override standard WTR. In these cases:

• The law allows for exceptions, especially where continuous service is essential.
• However, employers are generally required to offer compensatory rest in place of missed breaks.

Employers must stay informed about the regulations that apply within their sector and ensure that operational needs don’t override legal responsibilities.

Working environment

The nature of the role and the working conditions can also affect whether the minimum legal break is enough. For example:

• Physically demanding roles (e.g. manual labour, lifting, standing for long periods)
• Monotonous or repetitive tasks (e.g. data entry, production lines)
• Extreme environments (e.g. high heat, cold, noise)

All of which may require additional or extended breaks to protect worker health and safety. In such cases, employers should conduct risk assessments and update policies accordingly.

Legal Breaks for UK Employees: Key Requirements

Workers over the age of 18 are entitled to three types of breaks: rest breaks, daily rest periods and weekly rest periods. Different rules apply to workers under the age of 18 years of age. Here’s a breakdown of the key legal break requirements for workers in the UK.

Rest Breaks

Workers have the right to one uninterrupted 20 minute rest break during their working day, if they work more than 6 hours a day. This could be a tea or lunch break.

The break doesn’t have to be paid, but some employers do choose to pay their staff for this period. Details of whether or not it will be paid should be set out in the worker’s employment contract. This break should also be clearly scheduled and free from work duties i.e., employees shouldn’t be required to stay at their desk, take calls or check emails.

Daily Rest Periods

Workers have the right to 11 hours of uninterrupted rest between working days, e.g. if they finish work at 8pm, they shouldn’t start work again until 7am the next day. This is to ensure they have adequate recovery time to help reduce fatigue, and promote better health outcomes.

Weekly Rest Periods

Workers have the right to either:

• an uninterrupted 24 hours without any work each week; or
• an uninterrupted 48 hours without any work each fortnight

It is up to the employer to ensure whether their worker receives either the weekly or fortnightly minimum rest period. This can be to ensure employees rest fits in with business demands or industry-specific rules.

Young Workers

Workers under the age of 18 are usually entitled to:

• A 30 minute rest break if they work more than 4.5 hours (if possible this should be one continuous break).
• A daily uninterrupted rest of 12 hours between each working day.
• A weekly uninterrupted rest of 48 hours per week.

These rules are in place for those under the age of 18 to give them extra protection as their physical and mental resilience may still be developing.

Pregnant Employees

Employers have a duty to provide pregnant employees with a safe place and method of working under health and safety legislation. This may require providing additional breaks for pregnant employees and/or ensuring they are not standing for too long or doing tasks which involve heavy lifting, etc.

If a pregnant worker’s role poses health risks or involves excessive fatigue, employers should adjust their break arrangements accordingly.

Monotonous or Physically Demanding Roles

Where an employee does a job that involves physically demanding work, working in cold or hot environments or involves monotonous tasks, an employer will need to consider whether they need to be provided with additional breaks in order to maintain their health and safety. 

Whilst these breaks aren’t specified by law, they may be required under general health and safety obligations and conducting risk assessments can help determine the appropriate break structure.

Exceptions

The law allows for exceptions from the normal rules around breaks in certain circumstances. This includes for workers in certain industries (transport, emergency services, etc) who will generally have industry-specific regulations that have to be followed. 

There are also exceptions allowed in the cases of emergencies or where work cannot be interrupted on technical grounds. Generally in these cases employees must be given “compensatory rest” of the equivalent period of that rest period that was missed, as soon as is practicable. 

There are also exceptions for employees whose working time is not measured, such as managing executives who have complete autonomy over the hours they work.

How can SMEs Ensure Compliance with Break and Lunch Laws

For SMEs, ensuring compliance with the UK work break laws isn’t only a legal obligation under the WTR, but also key to fostering a productive, safe and healthy workforce. But how can you ensure you’re staying compliant? Here are four practical steps you can take.

Create a Clear Break Policy

You should have a written break and rest policy that should also be part of your employee documentation. Your policy should outline the types and lengths of breaks, whether breaks are paid or unpaid, expectations around how breaks are scheduled or requested, as well as any role-specific guidance for different teams.

This policy should be clearly communicated to employees, perhaps during their onboarding or within your HR platform so they can understand their entitlements. Make sure to regularly review and update your policy in line with any recent changes in law, working patterns or business operations.

Educate Employees On Their Rights

It’s crucial that you ensure your employees know and understand their rights and awareness is key to that. Your employees should understand:

• Their right to rest breaks, daily and weekly rest periods
• The purpose of breaks
• How to raise concerns if they feel their rights are being ignored

You should incorporate break entitlements into things like your onboarding process and employee handbook, so employees can look up what their rights are anytime.

Use time tracking systems

Time and attendance software can be a great tool in ensuring accurate recording of work and break periods; especially for hourly-paid staff, remote workers and shift-based roles.

This can help you to monitor whether staff are taking the breaks they’re entitled to whilst also demonstrating compliance in case of an audit or employment tribunal dispute.

Ensure breaks for customer-facing roles are well managed

Depending on your industry, scheduling breaks without disrupting service can be tricky, such as in customer service, retail, hospitality or healthcare. To manage this effectively you can:

• Use rotas or staggered shifts 
• Cross-train team members to cover for one another
• Monitor workloads to ensure no one is skipping breaks during busy periods

As an employer, you should also be vigilant about your employees taking breaks away from their work stations, to ensure their breaks are truly restful.

Common challenges for SMEs and how to overcome them

There can be complexities to complying with UK work break laws for SMEs, but here are some common scenarios many employers encounter and how to navigate them whilst staying compliant.

My employees have their rest breaks at their desk, is that ok?

Employees should not be required to perform work during their break and should be allowed to leave their workstation. A requirement that they have their lunch at their desk and/or remain available to answer emails or take calls, etc is therefore likely to be unlawful.

My employees choose not to take a rest break, is that alright?

So long as it has been made abundantly clear to employees that they are entitled to a break, and the employee freely chooses to work through it, the employer will not have breached the Working Time Regulations.

However, an employer may have breached its duties under health and safety legislation if the fact that an employee did not take a break poses risks to their (or other people’s) health and safety. Employers should therefore strongly encourage all employees to take breaks and (where they foresee a health and safety risk) mandate that breaks are taken. 

My employees take too many breaks, what can I do?

Aside from the rules regarding breaks set out above, employees have no other rights to breaks. There is, for example, no right for an employee to have a cigarette or coffee break outside what is set out above. 

Employers need to ensure they provide all employees with a safe place of work which means that employees should be free to take adequate breaks to go to the toilet, to get a drink of water, etc but outside of this, an employer should be able to set rules around breaks as they wish.

It is a good idea to have a workplace policy which deals with rules around breaks. If an employee does not follow the rules set out in the policy, and (for example) takes breaks when they are not permitted to, this can be treated as a disciplinary matter and can lead to the employee being issued with a formal warning or being dismissed.

Employer Responsibilities

Employers in the UK have a legal responsibility to ensure they’re not only offering the correct breaks, but also actively managing them in line with the Working Time Regulations 1998. Non-compliance can result in employment tribunal claims, reputational damage or regulatory scrutiny.

Here are the key responsibilities you should be aware of:

• Monitor and record breaks
• Review break policies regularly
• Carry out risk assessments
• Provide compensatory rest where required
• Keep staff informed and trained

Make break law compliance easy with Employment Hero

Staying compliant with UK work break laws doesn’t have to be complicated. With the right tools in place, you can accurately track employee hours, ensure breaks are being taken and protect your business from potential non-compliance.

Employment Hero’s Time and Attendance Software makes it easy to monitor work patterns, manage shifts, and keep detailed records–all in one place. Whether you’re running a remote team or managing shift-based staff, our solution helps you stay in control and fully compliant.