Guide
UK Overtime Pay Rules: What Employers Must Pay
In the UK there is no legal right to a higher rate for overtime. Your employer doesn't have to pay time and a half, or even pay for extra hours at all, as long as your average pay for all the hours you work stays at or above the National Minimum Wage. What you actually get for overtime is set by your contract. Two other rules still protect you: the 48-hour average working week and, for regular overtime, holiday pay.
Overtime pay is a contract term
GOV.UK puts it plainly: employers do not have to pay workers for overtime, but average pay for the total hours worked must not fall below the minimum wage. In practice, contracts handle overtime in one of these ways:
- A premium rate, such as time and a quarter, time and a half, or double time on Sundays and bank holidays. Common, but only if the contract or a collective agreement says so.
- Plain time: extra hours paid at the normal hourly rate.
- Time off in lieu (TOIL): time off instead of pay, on terms you agree with your employer.
- Unpaid: common in salaried roles with a clause such as "you may be required to work additional hours without extra pay".
You only have to work overtime if your contract says so. If it does, you can't usually be required to work more than an average of 48 hours a week (see below).
Part-time workers
Part-time workers usually only get an overtime rate once they work more than the normal hours of a comparable full-time worker. If full-time staff work 37.5 hours and get time and a half after that, a part-timer contracted for 20 hours who works 25 is normally paid plain time for the extra 5 hours. Check your contract, which can be more generous.
The minimum wage check
Unpaid or plain-time overtime is legal only while your pay, averaged over all the hours you work, stays at or above the minimum wage for your age. From April 2026 the rates are:
| Age | Hourly minimum |
|---|---|
| 21 and over (National Living Wage) | £12.71 |
| 18 to 20 | £10.85 |
| Under 18, and apprentices | £8.00 |
Example. A salaried worker aged 25 earns £25,000 a year for a 37.5-hour week. That is £480.77 a week, or £12.82 an hour, which is just above the National Living Wage. If they routinely work 45 hours a week with no extra pay, their pay falls to £480.77 ÷ 45 = £10.68 an hour, which is below £12.71. The unpaid overtime has taken them under the minimum wage, and the employer owes the difference.
This is a simplified check. HMRC works out minimum wage compliance over each "pay reference period" (usually the pay period) and has specific rules for salaried hours, so treat this as a warning sign rather than a final figure.
The 48-hour week
The Working Time Regulations limit you to 48 hours a week on average, normally averaged over 17 weeks. Some points about it:
- It is an average, so individual weeks can be longer.
- You can choose to opt out in writing. Your employer can't make you, or treat you badly for refusing.
- Under-18s can't opt out and can't work more than 8 hours a day or 40 hours a week.
- Some jobs are excluded, such as the armed forces and emergency services in some situations, jobs that need 24-hour staffing, and managing executives who control their own working time.
- It is a health-and-safety limit, not a pay rule. Working 50 hours doesn't by itself entitle you to a premium.
The same regulations give most adult workers a 20-minute rest break when working more than 6 hours a day, 11 hours' rest between working days, and a weekly rest period. See are breaks paid?
Overtime and holiday pay
This is the part most people miss. If you work overtime regularly, it can increase your holiday pay. For workers with regular hours, the first 4 weeks of the 5.6-week statutory holiday must be paid at your "normal" rate, which GOV.UK says includes regular overtime payments, commission, and payments for length of service or professional qualifications (bonuses usually don't count). The remaining 1.6 weeks can be paid at your basic rate.
For workers with irregular hours, holiday pay is based on average pay over the previous 52 weeks in which they were paid, going back up to 104 weeks if necessary, so regular overtime is reflected that way.
Working out your overtime pay
- Find the hours your contract treats as "normal" (for example 37.5 a week).
- Subtract them from the hours you actually worked to get overtime hours.
- Multiply the overtime hours by your hourly rate and the contract multiplier (1.0 for plain time, 1.5 for time and a half).
- Check the minimum wage: total pay ÷ total hours must be at least the rate for your age.
Example. £14.00 an hour, 37.5 normal hours, time and a half after that, 42 hours worked: 37.5 × £14.00 = £525.00, plus 4.5 × £21.00 = £94.50, for £619.50.
The Overtime Calculator has a UK option, which uses a common contractual default (1.5× after 40 hours). Because UK overtime is set by your contract, the custom rule is usually the better fit: set the threshold to your normal hours and the multiplier to your contract rate. The Hourly Pay Calculator turns the result into weekly, monthly and yearly figures.