Rest breaks on a UK shift
The break in the middle of a shift and the gap before the next shift are different rights. Teams mix them up because both get called a break. The rota has to survive both.
One break, not one every six hours
An adult who works more than six hours in a day gets one uninterrupted 20-minute rest break. Six hours exactly is not over the line. A 12-hour close is still one break under that basic rule, not two. A contract can give more. The break does not have to be paid unless the contract says so. It is taken in one go during the day, not tagged on as a late start or an early finish, and the person can spend it away from where they work. If you call them back early, it has not counted.
A young worker, above school-leaving age and under 18, gets 30 minutes if they work more than 4.5 hours, preferably in one go. Add the hours from every employer before you decide the day was short. The usual limit on their working time is 8 hours a day and 40 hours a week, and they cannot opt out. This is not the rule for a child who is still of compulsory school age.
The rest break calculator shows the usual figure for one day’s length. It does not apply the exceptions. Some shift work can owe compensatory rest instead of the break at the normal time. If you are relying on that, read the GOV.UK page rather than dropping the break because the service was busy.
Eleven hours, and the week
Daily rest for an adult is 11 hours between working days. Finish at 11pm and the next start is not 7am. A young worker’s daily rest is 12 hours. Weekly rest for an adult is an uninterrupted 24 hours each week, or an uninterrupted 48 hours each fortnight. A young worker’s weekly rest is 48 hours. A split shift’s afternoon gap is not that weekly rest, and it is not the 11 hours. It is a gap inside one day. Record the two halves as two shifts.
Saving a week in Shiftbrook can warn when the 11 hours, the weekly rest or the 48-hour average is missed. The warning does not refuse the save, and it does not insert a 20-minute break you did not type. The break field on a shift is the unpaid minutes you expect. The work hours calculator subtracts those minutes. It does not look up the statute.
The working time guide is the longer page. This one is the mistake we see most: treating a long shift as if the law handed out a fresh 20 minutes every six hours.