Take a break when you can! Henan is pilot testing a model of half a day off on Friday, combined with weekends and annual leave.

Leading cadres should take the lead in taking vacations, promoting full compliance with vacation policies, ensuring employees take their full entitled leave. For those unable to take vacations, compensation will be paid at 300% of their daily salary. A short-term vacation model of Friday half-day + weekend + annual leave will be piloted. Recently, the Organization Department of the Henan Provincial Party Committee, the Provincial Department of Human Resources and Social Security, and six other departments jointly issued a notice titled "Notice on Further Promoting the Implementation of Paid Deferred Leave for Employees," which details comprehensive measures to ensure paid leave while balancing employees' need for rest with market consumption vitality. The notice specifies that employees who have worked continuously for over 12 months, regardless of their employment typebe it full-time, contract, labor dispatch, or temporary employmentwill equally enjoy paid annual leave. Notably, the notice establishes a "green channel" for special groups: employees who are pregnant, nursing, caring for disabled or seriously ill elderly individuals, or minors, as well as those working in different locations, will receive priority in securing vacation time. In order to allow employees to easily plan short and long trips, the new policy offers flexible leave arrangements. The notice encourages employees to combine their paid annual leave with weekends, statutory long weekends, winter and summer vacations, and spring and autumn breaks in primary and secondary schools to create flexible vacations lasting from 3 to 7 days. Units with the ability to do so may adjust their summer work hours and trial flexible departures on Friday afternoons, establishing the Friday half-day + weekend + annual leave short-term vacation model.