Notice period calculator

This calculator gives the statutory minimum notice an employer must give to end a contract, based on the country and the length of continuous service, for the three regimes with clear legal formulas: the United Kingdom, Ireland and Germany. It answers the practical question a redundancy, dismissal or resignation raises straight away, which is how much time, or how much pay in place of that time, the law guarantees. The consistent principle across these systems is that notice rises with service: the longer someone has worked, the more warning the law says they are owed, on the reasoning that a long-serving employee has more to reorganise and a harder search ahead. The United Kingdom rule, set by section 86 of the Employment Rights Act 1996, is the cleanest to state. Once an employee has a month of continuous service, the employer must give at least one week. That single week holds until two years of service, after which it becomes one week for every complete year worked, and it keeps climbing until it reaches a ceiling of twelve weeks at twelve years. Someone with five years is owed five weeks; someone with fifteen years is still owed twelve, because the cap bites. The employee side is far simpler: after a month, a worker must give the employer one week, and that does not grow with service, so a twenty-year veteran only owes a week under statute even while the employer owes them twelve. Ireland, under the Minimum Notice and Terms of Employment Act 1973, uses steps rather than a per-year climb. Below thirteen weeks of service there is no statutory notice; from thirteen weeks to two years it is one week; from two to five years, two weeks; from five to ten years, four weeks; from ten to fifteen years, six weeks; and beyond fifteen years, eight weeks. As in the United Kingdom, the employee owes a flat one week once past thirteen weeks of service. Germany, under section 622 of the Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch, is the most generous of the three and switches units as service lengthens. In the first two years the employer notice is four weeks, and it must run to either the fifteenth of the month or the end of the month rather than to any date. From two years it becomes one month to the month end, then two months at five years, three at eight, four at ten, five at twelve, six at fifteen and seven months at twenty years of service. The German system is also openly asymmetric: an employee can generally resign on four weeks whatever their length of service, while dismissing that same long-serving employee can require several months. Seeing these three side by side shows how differently comparable economies weight job security. The most important thing this calculator is not is a substitute for reading the contract, because the statutory figure is a floor and a written contract very often sits above it. Senior and specialist roles frequently carry one, three or six month contractual notice regardless of service, and where the contract is more generous than the statutory minimum, the contract governs. Collective agreements can lengthen notice too, and in Germany they can in narrow cases shorten it. A few boundaries are worth stating plainly. Statutory minimum notice does not apply during a lawful probationary period in the way it does afterwards, and gross misconduct can allow summary dismissal without notice altogether, which no length-of-service formula overrides. Notice is separate from redundancy or severance pay, which are their own entitlements with their own service thresholds, so a long-serving employee made redundant may receive both a notice sum and a separate redundancy payment. Employers can also offer pay in lieu of notice, ending the job immediately but paying for the notice period, where the contract allows it. And the United States sits outside this picture entirely: most American employment is at will, with no statutory notice on either side, which is why it is not one of the options here. Use this when facing redundancy or dismissal and needing to know the minimum warning or pay-off the law guarantees, when resigning and working out what you owe, or when an employer needs to plan a lawful exit. Choose the country, enter the completed years of continuous service, and the result is the statutory minimum notice from the employer, which your contract may lengthen but cannot cut.

How it works

1. Choose the country whose employment law applies, from the United Kingdom, Ireland or Germany.
2. Enter the completed years of continuous service with the employer.
3. The calculator applies that country's statutory formula for the minimum notice an employer must give.
4. It shows the notice amount, the country, and the law it comes from.
5. Below the qualifying period it reports that no statutory minimum applies yet, though a contract still might.

Statutory minimum employer notice after 10 years of service

Key facts

• Statutory notice rises with length of service in all three countries covered here.
• The United Kingdom gives one week per complete year from two years, capped at twelve weeks.
• Germany is the most generous, reaching seven months of employer notice at twenty years of service.
• The notice an employee must give is usually shorter and does not climb with service.

Tips

• Read your contract: senior roles often set longer notice than the statutory minimum regardless of service.
• Remember notice is separate from redundancy pay, which a long-serving employee may also be owed.
• Check whether pay in lieu of notice applies, which ends the job at once but pays the notice out.
• Count continuous service accurately, since a single completed year can move you into the next band.

Frequently asked questions

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