Hajj and Umrah leave in the Saudi labor system is a right guaranteed to every employee or worker in the public and private sectors. Therefore, Saudi law regulates all the details related to this leave, and also sets all the conditions that must be met by an employee wishing to obtain this type of leave, in addition to… To determine its duration, in order to guarantee the rights of the employer and the employee, and to prevent the outbreak of any disputes between them.

 

What is Hajj and Umrah leave in the Saudi labor system?

 

It is a leave that is granted to all employees in all various institutions and establishments, and it is also applied to all public and private sectors, so that the employee who fulfills all the conditions has the right to submit an application to the facility in which he works in accordance with what is stipulated in the Saudi labor system.

However, in order for the employee to obtain this right, he must enjoy a set of conditions stipulated in the provisions regarding the leave system, in addition to adhering to the period stipulated in the law so that the employee is not exposed to legal accountability or any deductions from his salary.

 

The duration of Hajj and Umrah leave in the Saudi labor system

The Saudi Labor Law specifies the minimum and maximum period of Hajj and Umrah leave in the Kingdom, which any employee, whether in the public or private sector, can obtain to perform this duty, and we can summarize it in the following points:

 

• The minimum duration of leave must be at least 10 days.
• The duration of the leave must not exceed 15 days, including the holiday for Eid Al-Adha.

 

This leave shall be paid in accordance with what is stipulated in the law. The employer is not entitled to deduct the period of absence from the employee’s monthly salary. However, there are some cases in which employers have the right to deduct the period of absence of the employee from the monthly salary.

 

Conditions for obtaining a permit for Umrah and Hajj in the Kingdom

 

The Saudi Labor Law has set a set of conditions that must be met by an employee who wishes to perform Hajj or Umrah, in order to be able to obtain leave. These conditions can be summarized in the following points:

 

• The employee must work in the organization for two consecutive years in order to benefit from this right.
• Employees or workers are required to take the leave within the year of its entitlement, and they may not waive it or even replace it with a cash allowance.
• If the boss agrees to grant the employee his leave, he must notify him of the date of his leave by a period of not less than thirty days.
• Employees are entitled to this leave once during their years of service in the workplace.

 

If these conditions are met, the employee has the right to submit the request and wait for a response from his boss, which may come with acceptance, postponement, or rejection.

 

Does the employer have the right to refuse an employee’s leave?

 

According to what is stipulated in the provisions related to Hajj and Umrah leave in the Saudi labor system, the employer has the right to approve, reject, or even postpone the leave to another time, in accordance with what is required by the nature of the work and the interest of the company, and the employee may not force the employer to do so. Leave as long as work conditions require this postponement.

However, the postponement must be for a period of 90 days after the expiry of the year of entitlement to that leave, and the postponement period must not exceed the end of the following year. The law requires the employer to obtain written approval from the worker to prevent any future disputes from occurring.

The law also gives employers the right every year to determine the number of employees who can benefit from this leave, according to what the business interest requires in order to ensure the maintenance of work progress within the institution.

 

How can employees obtain Hajj and Umrah leave in the Saudi labor system?

 

In order for the employee to be able to obtain leave to perform Umrah or Hajj, he must fulfill all the conditions that qualify him to benefit from that leave, and then he can notify the establishment or company in which he works, by writing an official request explaining his desire to obtain leave and submitting it to the employee. responsible and waiting for a response, either by approval, rejection, or postponement, depending on the work conditions. The employee must respond to the boss’s decision as long as it is consistent with what is stipulated in the law.

In the event of any arbitrariness on the part of the employer, the employee has the right in that case to claim his right to obtain leave, by submitting a complaint to the competent authority and submitting all evidence of the employer’s arbitrariness to take all measures against him and resolve this dispute between the employer and the employee.

 

Cases of deducting the performance of Umrah and Hajj from the salary

 

The principle of Hajj and Umrah leave in the Saudi labor system is that it is a paid leave, so that any employee, whenever he meets the conditions, has the right to obtain it without prejudice to his monthly salary. However, there are some cases in which the law gives the employer the right to deduct the leave period from the employee’s salary, and we can Summarized as follows:

First: It is known that the provisions pertaining to the Hajj or Umrah instrument leave in the Kingdom’s work system give the employee the right to obtain it only once throughout his professional life in the facility in which he works, and he must be committed to the stipulated period of absence, but in the event that the employee’s absence period increases As stipulated in the Kingdom’s labor system, the employer has the right to deduct the period of absence from his salary.

Second: If the worker wishes to perform the Umrah or Hajj rituals again during his period of work in the organization, he can request leave without pay to complete that religious duty. In that case, the employer has the right to approve, reject, or postpone the request according to the need and circumstances of the work, and the law also allows him a deduction. The duration of an employee’s absence from his basic salary.

 

Permission to perform Hajj and Umrah in the private sector

 

The law gave private sector employees the same rights as employees working in the public sector, and therefore all provisions related to Hajj and Umrah leave in the Saudi labor system apply to all workers in the private sectors, whether in institutions, establishments, or factories, as well as companies.

The Kingdom’s labor law also gives workers and employees the right to file a complaint with the competent authorities if the employer refuses to give employees this type of vacation without any clear justification that requires this prohibition.

If it is proven that the employer is abusive, the concerned authorities can impose penalties on him, such as imposing financial fines as a punishment for his abuse towards his workers, in addition to obliging him to give workers the rights stipulated in the law.

In the end, we can say that the Kingdom continuously seeks to protect employees and guarantee them all their rights according to a text of the law, the most prominent of which is the Hajj and Umrah leave in the Saudi labor system, in order to prevent any abuse from the employer or the emergence of any disputes between them, and it also guarantees the interests of the work. And protecting the right of business owners in various sectors to ensure regular workflow and achieve community development.