A day-one right to reasonable time off when something happens to someone who depends on you. Check what is covered — and whether a paid right covers the same days.
There is no statutory limit, but the time has to be reasonable — enough to handle the emergency and put arrangements in place. One or two days covers most situations.
| If you take | Lost pay | After tax and NI |
|---|
Every employee has the right to a reasonable amount of unpaid time off to deal with an unexpected emergency involving a dependant. It comes from section 57A of the Employment Rights Act 1996, it is a day-one right, there is no limit on how often you can use it, and your employer cannot refuse a reasonable request or penalise you for making one.
There is no set number of days, because the law will not pretend that every emergency is the same size. In practice one or two days is what “reasonable” means: enough to deal with the immediate problem and put arrangements in place. It is unpaid unless your employer chooses otherwise, though a good many do pay it and rarely say so unprompted.
The right is narrower than its reputation suggests. It applies where you need time to assist a dependant who falls ill, gives birth, or is injured or assaulted; to arrange care for one who is ill or injured; to deal with the death of a dependant; to cope when arrangements for their care are unexpectedly disrupted; or to handle an unexpected incident involving your child during school hours.
A dependant is wider than you might expect — a spouse, civil partner, child or parent, anyone living in your household other than a tenant or lodger, and anyone who reasonably relies on you for help or for arranging care. An elderly neighbour counts. They do not have to be family and they do not have to live with you.
Two things fall outside it. Anything you knew about in advance — GOV.UK’s own example of what does not qualify is a booked hospital appointment. And providing ongoing care yourself: the right covers dealing with the emergency and arranging care, not becoming the carer for the following fortnight.
This is the reason the tool above asks what happened rather than just how many days you need. Several situations that plainly qualify as emergencies are also covered by an entitlement that actually pays, and employers process what you ask for — so a day logged as “emergency leave” is treated as unpaid, even where a paid right covered it.
If your partner has gone into labour, paternity leave gives two paid weeks. If your baby is in neonatal care, neonatal care leave gives up to twelve paid weeks on top of everything else. If your child under 18 has died, or you have had a stillbirth from 24 weeks, parental bereavement leave gives two paid weeks and stays open for 56 weeks afterwards. And if the person who is ill is you, this right does not apply at all — that is Statutory Sick Pay, payable from the first day off since the April 2026 reforms.
Name the right you mean, in writing, and ask for it to be recorded that way. Reclassifying leave after the fact is much harder than getting it right at the time.
Repeated use of this right is a signal worth reading. There is no statutory limit, but if the same situation keeps recurring it has probably stopped being unexpected — and continuing to rely on emergency leave leaves you on weaker ground than the entitlements designed for it.
Carer’s leave gives a week a year, in half days if you want, for someone with a long-term care need. Unpaid parental leave gives 18 weeks per child up to their eighteenth birthday, and became a day-one right in April 2026. Both need notice, which is precisely why they cannot serve as emergency cover — and precisely why they are worth setting up before the next crisis rather than during it. Acas advises free of charge if a request is refused.
A reasonable amount — there is no set number of days and no limit on how often you can use it. The law deliberately avoids a figure, because a burst pipe at your mother’s house and a child being taken to hospital are not the same problem.
In practice one or two days is what “reasonable” usually means. The test is whether the time was enough to deal with the immediate emergency and put any longer-term arrangements in place — not whether it was enough to provide the care yourself.
No. Time off for dependants is unpaid unless your contract says otherwise or your employer chooses to pay it. A good many employers do pay it, and it is rarely advertised, so it is worth checking the staff handbook before assuming you will lose the money.
The real cost is lower than the headline: pay you do not receive is pay you are not taxed on, so a day off a £30,000 salary costs about 72% of a day’s gross once income tax and National Insurance are accounted for.
No. It is a day-one right for employees — there has never been a qualifying period. It is worth adding that this right was not among those changed by the Employment Rights Act 2025 in April 2026, because it did not need to be.
It is an employee right, though. Agency workers, contractors and the self-employed are outside it, as they are for most statutory leave.
Five specific grounds, set out in section 57A of the Employment Rights Act 1996. You can take time off:
Two things, and between them they account for most refusals:
Anything you knew about in advance. The right is for the unexpected. GOV.UK uses a booked hospital appointment as its example of something that does not qualify, however important it is. A nursery’s planned closure, a parents’ evening, a scheduled operation — all foreseeable, all outside this right.
Providing ongoing care yourself. The entitlement covers dealing with the emergency and arranging care. It does not stretch to becoming the carer for the following fortnight. That is what carer’s leave and unpaid parental leave exist for.
This is the question worth getting right, because using unpaid dependants’ leave when a paid entitlement covers the same situation is a common and expensive mistake. A quick map:
| Situation | The right that fits | Paid? |
|---|---|---|
| Sudden illness, injury, care breaking down, an incident at school | Time off for dependants | Unpaid |
| Ongoing care for a long-term condition or disability | Carer’s leave — a week a year | Unpaid |
| Planned or foreseeable time with your child | Unpaid parental leave — 18 weeks per child | Unpaid |
| Your partner giving birth or adopting | Paternity leave — 2 weeks | Paid |
| Your baby in neonatal care for 7 days or more | Neonatal care leave — up to 12 weeks | Paid |
| The death of your child under 18, or a stillbirth from 24 weeks | Parental bereavement leave — 2 weeks | Paid |
| You are ill yourself | Statutory Sick Pay — from day one since April 2026 | Paid |
You can use several of these for the same episode. Time off for dependants handles the first day; the others take over from there.
Wider than most people assume:
That last category is what brings in an elderly neighbour, a friend, or a relative who lives elsewhere but depends on you. They do not have to be family and they do not have to live with you.
Tell your employer as soon as is reasonably practicable, say what has happened and roughly how long you expect to be away. Because these situations are by definition unexpected, notice after the event is acceptable where it was not possible beforehand — you are not required to ring in before an ambulance arrives.
No proof can be demanded. There is no requirement for a doctor’s note or any other evidence, and an employer who insists on one is going beyond the law.
No to both. An employer cannot refuse a reasonable request, and cannot subject you to any detriment for taking the leave or asking for it — no disciplinary action, no effect on promotion or training, and it should not be counted against you in an absence procedure.
Dismissal for exercising this right is automatically unfair, with no qualifying service needed to bring a claim. The tribunal time limit is three months less one day from the act complained of, which is short, so take advice quickly if it happens.
No statutory limit. Each occasion is judged on its own facts — whether that particular absence was reasonable in those circumstances.
In practice an employer may raise it if the pattern is affecting your work, and repeated use can start to suggest that the underlying situation is not really an emergency any more but an ongoing caring responsibility. If that is what has happened, the honest answer is usually to move to carer’s leave, unpaid parental leave or a flexible working request — all of which are designed for the long term, and all of which are stronger ground to stand on.
Raise it in writing first, naming the right: say that you are exercising your statutory right to time off for dependants under section 57A of the Employment Rights Act 1996, and set out the emergency briefly. A surprising number of refusals come from managers who have simply never heard of it.
If that does not resolve it, use the grievance procedure and take free advice from Acas, who also run the early conciliation service you must go through before a tribunal claim. Keep the three-month time limit in mind throughout.
All free and independent:
If the emergencies keep recurring, the right built for it gives you a week a year and cannot be refused either.
