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LIVING IN AUSTRIA

EXPLAINED: How to maximise your annual leave in Austria in 2023

It's time to start planning your 2023 holiday year before your colleagues snap up all the most coveted days. Here are our tips for making the most of your annual leave in Austria.

Published: 23 December 2022 14:59 CET
Updated: 1 January 2023 08:03 CET
EXPLAINED: How to maximise your annual leave in Austria in 2023
(Photo by Eliska Trnavska / Pexels)

Austria can already boast some of the most generous annual leave worldwide, with 25 days minimum for full-time employees and an additional 13 public holidays. 

As in many European countries, but unlike the UK, for example, most Austrian holidays are tied to specific dates rather than weekdays. If they happen to fall on a weekend, you do not get a day off in lieu.

That means that 2023 actually offers eleven weekday public holidays, while one of the three ‘de facto’ public holidays (which employers are not obliged to give as days off, but many do) also fall on weekends, so most employees will get 11 days off work in addition to their annual leave.

In 2022, just ten of the 13 public holidays fell on weekdays, making it harder for people who wanted to take longer holidays, especially at the end of the year, when both Christmas and New Year’s Day 23 fell on Sundays..

READ ALSO: Why everything in Austria is closed on Sundays – and what to do instead

Some savvy annual leave planning can help you maximise your days however, for example by taking advantage of four possible four-day weekends throughout the year, which only require one day of annual leave each. Plus, Christmas Day and St. Stephen’s Day give you a four-day weekend as they fall on Monday and Tuesday respectively.

It’s worthwhile thinking about this early in the year, because forward planning is almost a national sport in Austria, so you don’t want your colleagues to snag all of the best days off before you.

January

Sunday, January 1st (New Year’s Day)

The public holiday year of 2023 doesn’t get off to a great start, with the first holiday lost to the weekend – and a Sunday at that. A large number of employers offer December 31st as a day off, though they’re not obliged to, so maybe you’ll enjoy some time off if you work weekends.

Friday, January 6th (Epiphany)

Your first chance at a longish weekend comes in the first week of the year, with a three-day weekend as January 6th falls on a Friday. 

READ ALSO: Reader question: What happens in Austria when a holiday falls on a weekend?

April

Monday, April 10th (Easter Monday)

Good Friday (Friday, April 7th in 2023) isn’t a public holiday in Austria, but many employers still give their workers the day off without needing to use annual leave. If that applies to you, you can book time off from April 3rd to get nine days off in a row with four requested annual leave days.

May

Monday, May 1st (Labour Day)
Thursday, May 18th (Ascension Day)
Monday, May 29th (Whit Monday)

Besides the long weekend by taking Friday, May 19th, off, you can also get a good break at the end of the month. From May 18th to May 30th, you can get a twelve-day holiday by using only six days of annual leave.

June

Thursday, June 8th (Corpus Christi)

Another Thursday public holiday gives the chance to take a ‘bridge day’ and get a June long weekend.

More on working in Austria from The Local:

August

Tuesday, August 15th (Assumption of Mary)

If you take Monday off, you get a long summer weekend.

October

Thursday, October 26th (National Day)

Another opportunity to have a four-day weekend, if you take the Friday, October 27th, off. 

READ ALSO: EXPLAINED: What is the Austrian National Day and how is it celebrated?

November

Wednesday, November 1st (All Saint’s Day)

Wednesday holidays are not easy to “bridge”, but if you plan on taking a longer holiday around October/November, keep the November 1st in mind.

December

Friday, December 8th (Feast of the Immaculate Conception)
Monday, December 25th (Christmas Day)
Tuesday, December 26th (St Stephen’s Day)

December 2023 will be a great time for holidays. It starts out with a three-day weekend, and there’s a four-day weekend after Christmas that you won’t need to take any annual leave days to enjoy. 

If you go on holidays on December 22nd, after work, and return on January 2nd, you’ll get a ten-day break using only three days of annual leave.

You can check all the holidays (plus regional celebrations) for 2023 HERE.

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For members

HEALTH

Patients in Vienna face long waits for specialist health appointments

Waiting times to get appointments with health specialists in Vienna have increased significantly, a new study has revealed.

Published: 17 May 2024 09:56 CEST
Patients in Vienna face long waits for specialist health appointments

Accessing essential healthcare within a reasonable timeframe is becoming increasingly difficult for Viennese residents.

The Vienna Medical Association presented their new study this week which shows that waiting times for appointments with health specialists have increased significantly in recent years.

The study, which involved contacting over 850 doctors’ practices via so-called “mystery calls,” revealed that child and adolescent psychiatry currently had the longest waiting times in the city.

Patients can expect to wait an average of 90 days for an appointment.

Other specialisations where patients have to wait long to receive help include radiology (57 days), neurology (45 days), ophthalmology (44 days), pulmonology (36 days), internal medicine (33 days), and dermatology (28 days).

The waiting time for seeing a gynaecologist has increased fourfold since 2012, with patients now waiting an average of 32 days.

READ MORE: Why are there fewer public sector doctors in Austria?

No new patients accepted

In certain specialist areas, there is no capacity to accommodate new patients. The situation where no new patients are accepted occurs particularly often in paediatric practices, where more than half of the public healthcare practices have put a freeze on admissions.

In child and adolescent psychiatry, 40 percent do not accept new patients, and among gynaecologists, it is almost a third (30 percent). Family doctors also struggle with welcoming new patients, and many of their practices have already reached full capacity.

The Medical Association calls for immediate action, urging the health insurance sector to become more attractive and receive better funding. This could involve measures to incentivise doctors to work within the public system, potentially reducing wait times and improving patient access to care.

During the study presentation, Johannes Steinhart, president of the association, described the increased waiting times as the result of neglect within the established health insurance sector. He said he believes that the public health system is massively endangered.

Naghme Kamaleyan-Schmied, chairwoman of the Curia of the resident doctors in the association, pointed out that while the population of the federal capital has grown by 16 percent since 2012, the number of public doctors has fallen by 12 percent in the same period.

The association now wants to make the public healthcare system more attractive to doctors, which could cut down waiting times and make it easier for patients to receive care. The association’s demands for this to happen include increasing flexibility in contract options, integrating health and social professions in individual practices, reducing bureaucracy, and improving fees.

ÖGK, Österreichische Gesundheitskasse, Austria’s largest public healthcare fund, is currently creating 100 additional public health positions, with almost two-thirds of the positions already having applicants, as well as planning for another 100 positions. They also aim to create a central telemedicine service and a platform for making appointments by phone and online, which is meant to reduce waiting times and improve access to care.

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