Have to work during my agreed AL

No, TOIL is supposed to be a planned workload that is applied for and accounted for over and above the working hours. Not for not taking the leave you that you have planned and applied for. This is more blurring of lines.

The OP really needs to get a handle on workng hours, planning time and sticking to it.

If they’re going to mandate set leave in December then they need to be completely closed down for that period and all clients informed.

You have some responsibility here because your out of office should have been on and work systems not being looked at. If you’ve had to work 5 days of your paid leave then you need to claim that back.

Claim TOIL. Next time set an "out of office reply". There are no blurred lines in WFH unless you choose to blur them. I have my out of office set up for next week already and I will not be opening my laptop or switching on my work phone until I am "back in the office".

So you were booked to be off for some days in december. These days clashed with the 2 weeks they were making you take anyway so you rebooked it and then worked those days? And you randomly work when at home and on leave as well?

My suggestion is to take those other days not in december as you are already off for a fortnight, or move the work to days you are working and to stop working when you are on leave. Give notice to your clients that you will be off X dates and if there is anything then need doing before then, best get that in early and make some arrangements for when you are not there to cover their short term needs with someone else.

Your job sounds like mine - but if I have leave someone else picks up the queries while I’m not around. The service may not be as good as if I was around as I may have more background (but we keep files up to date so the business could run if I died tomorrow) but clients understand we’re humans who are entitled to leave.

An important lesson I’ve learnt in my career is that I’m not as important or crucial as I think I am. If I died or left, the business wouldn’t crumble without me, so it can definitely cope with two weeks of me not checking my email when I’ve left a clear contact on my out of office message.

I wfh and my lines are not blurred. When I am on annual leave that laptop stays shut.

Our business is client led too, we can’t easily predict when we’ll be busy, not often around Christmas but if we are, we ask for volunteers, people are thankfully pretty good at stepping up.

Out of office messages and direct people to someone who is available. Be prompt in responding once you are back at work.

I’m not sure I understand your post. It seems to suggest that, regardless of whether you’re on leave or not, you still have to work if clients ask you to, but that can’t be right, so I must have misunderstood something 😅 If you’re on leave, why are you still doing work? Don’t you have an ‘out of office’ email notification or something?

So they mandated two weeks off at Christmas without considering how the workload falls? That was very silly of them. Speak to your line manager.