Including bank/public holidays the legal minimum for a full-time employee in the UK is 5.6 weeks, or 28 days. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7740249.stm)

I have 29.5 days in total, with some of those being compulsory because the office is closed. Some are confusingly called 'compulsory discretionary' holidays due to the hilarious management I have.

My employer adds an extra half a day each year you stay with the company, plus another half a day if you meet sickness attendance targets.

Don't know about UK, but in Iceland it's generally 22.5 days as well as a minimum, but with each year you work for an employer it increases.

But it also depends on which union you're a part of etc.

Yeah, I think I get an extra half day a year. I forget, though, because I haven't been here a year, and we just got bought out and had all this stuff reshuffled.

There's no legal requirement for your holiday entitlement to increase each year - it just needs to be at least the minimum number of days.

In my experience, different companies handle it in different ways - one company I was with increased it by five days, but on your fifth anniversary with the company. I've also heard of companies giving one-off extra holidays for long service or other achievements.

If you're employed directly by a large company, your holiday situation is usually pretty good in the UK. If you're employed through an agency or you're a temporary worker, then it's usually pretty dire (compared to the UK norm - probably still quite good compared to the US).