There is no legal right to be paid extra for overtime in the UK. Time and a half and double time are contractual benefits, not entitlements.
Your employer must pay you for the hours you work. Whether they pay more per hour for hours beyond your normal week is entirely a matter for your contract.
What the law does guarantee
Your average pay must not fall below the minimum wage. This is the real protection, and it is calculated across the whole pay reference period rather than hour by hour.
From 1 April 2026 the rates are:
| Age | Hourly rate |
|---|---|
| 21 and over (National Living Wage) | £12.71 |
| 18 to 20 | £10.85 |
| 16 to 17, and apprentices | £8.00 |
If someone paid £12.71 works 10 unpaid extra hours in a week, their average for that week falls below the minimum and the employer is in breach — even though the contracted rate is legal.
The 48-hour week. Under the Working Time Regulations your average working week, including overtime, must not exceed 48 hours averaged over 17 weeks. You can opt out in writing, and the opt-out must be voluntary and can be withdrawn with notice.
Rest breaks. A 20-minute break when working more than 6 hours, 11 hours between shifts, and a day off each week. Overtime does not remove these.
Compulsory, voluntary and guaranteed overtime
Three types, and the distinction matters for holiday pay:
Guaranteed overtime — your employer must offer it and you must work it.
Compulsory (non-guaranteed) overtime — no obligation to offer it, but you must work it when offered.
Voluntary overtime — you can decline.
Your employer can require overtime only if your contract says so. If it does not, you can refuse — though in practice refusing where it is customary can create difficulties, and consistent refusal could theoretically be treated as a conduct issue if the contract implies flexibility.
Overtime and holiday pay
This is where overtime becomes a legal question rather than a contractual one.
Holiday pay must reflect your normal pay. If you regularly work overtime, that overtime should be included in your holiday pay — otherwise taking leave costs you money, which undermines the purpose of paid leave.
Regular voluntary overtime counts too, provided it is sufficiently regular to be part of your normal remuneration. There is no bright-line test for “regular”, which is unsatisfying but honest — it depends on the pattern.
The calculation uses a 52-week reference period, averaging your pay over the 52 weeks before the leave. Weeks with no pay are skipped and earlier weeks used instead, going back up to 104 weeks.
If your holiday pay is noticeably lower than a normal working week and you regularly work overtime, that is worth querying.
TOIL
Time off in lieu means taking time off instead of being paid. It is entirely contractual — there is no statutory right to it and no statutory rate.
Points worth checking: whether TOIL accrues hour for hour or at an enhanced rate, whether it expires if unused, and whether it is paid out when you leave. Unused TOIL is often lost on termination unless the contract says otherwise.
Part-time workers
Part-time staff must not be treated less favourably than comparable full-time colleagues.
In practice this usually means a part-time worker doing extra hours up to full-time hours is paid at their normal rate, not an overtime rate, because a full-time colleague would not receive an enhancement for those hours either. Enhanced rates typically only begin once they exceed normal full-time hours.
Salaried staff
If you are salaried with no overtime provision, extra hours are generally unpaid. The protections that remain are the minimum wage floor and the 48-hour limit.
The minimum wage point catches people out. A salary of £26,000 for a 37.5-hour week is about £13.33 an hour — above the minimum. Work 50 hours a week consistently and it falls to £10.00, which is below it. The employer is in breach regardless of what the contract says about salaried hours.
Total your hours and check your effective rate
What to check
- Does your contract mention overtime, and at what rate?
- Is it guaranteed, compulsory or voluntary?
- Does your holiday pay include regular overtime?
- Have you signed a 48-hour opt-out, and do you still want to be opted out?
- Does your average hourly rate across all hours worked stay above the minimum wage?
If you think you are being underpaid the minimum wage, HMRC enforces it and you can report it confidentially. Employers found in breach face penalties and are publicly named.
Sources
- Overtime: your rights — GOV.UK
- National Minimum Wage rates — GOV.UK
- Overtime — Acas
Checked against source on 30 August 2026. This is general guidance, not legal advice.
Written by Nathan Cole
I built the calculators on HoursHQ and check every statutory figure against GOV.UK, Acas and the legislation itself before it goes live. Where the law is genuinely unclear, I say so rather than guessing.