Ho ho ho: Holiday rules in Canada

With the Christmas season around the corner, many are looking forward to statutory holidays. To give a quick breakdown, Christmas Day (Dec. 25) and New Year’s Day (Jan. 1) are statutory holidays across all provinces in Canada. However, Boxing Day (Dec. 26) is only listed as a statutory holiday in Ontario and for federally regulated employees.

When these statutory holidays arrive, some businesses will close up shop, while others will remain open. For those that do carry on business, employees will be required to work. What are employees entitled to if they must work on these dates? This article summarizes employee holiday eligibility and entitlements for a selection of Canadian jurisdictions.

British Columbia

Eligibility. Eligible employees are those that have been employed for 30 calendar days and have worked on at least 15 of the 30 calendar days preceding the holiday. Employees who work under an averaging agreement, which permits hours of work to be averaged over a period of up to four weeks, do not have to meet the 15-day minimum requirement.

Holiday scenarios. If employees do not work on a holiday they are entitled to holiday pay. If employees work on a holiday, they must be paid holiday pay plus 1.5 times their regular wage for time worked on the holiday up to 12 hours and double time for any hours thereafter.

Holiday pay. Holiday pay is an “average day’s pay.” That amount is determined by dividing the amount that was paid or payable to an employee during the 30 days preceding the holiday (including vacation pay but less overtime pay) by the number of days the employee worked within that same 30-day period.

Alberta

Eligibility. Eligible employees are those that have worked at least 30 days in the 12 months before the holiday. Employees are not eligible for statutory holiday pay if they do not work on the holiday when required or scheduled to do so, or they are absent from employment without the consent of the employer on their last regular workday preceding, or their first regular workday following, a holiday. 

Holiday scenarios. If the holiday falls on a day employees are normally scheduled to work and they do not work, they are entitled to holiday pay. If employees work on the holiday they are entitled to receive either holiday pay plus time-and-a-half for hours worked, or regular wages for hours worked plus another paid day off on another date.

If the holiday falls on a day employees are not normally scheduled to work and they do not work, employees have no entitlements. If employees work on the holiday they are entitled only to time-and-a-half for hours worked. If employees work an irregular schedule and there is doubt about whether a holiday is on a day that would normally have been a workday for the employee, the doubt is resolved as follows: if in at least five of the nine weeks preceding the work week in which the holiday occurs the employee worked on the same day of the week as the day on which the holiday falls, the holiday is treated as occurring on regular scheduled working day.

Holiday pay. Statutory holiday pay is the average daily wages of the employee. The employer may determine this amount by averaging total wages for days worked by the employee in either:

• The 4-week period immediately preceding the holiday.
• The 4-week period ending on the last day of the pay period immediately preceding the holiday.

Saskatchewan

Eligibility. There are no work attendance or service requirements for holiday eligibility in Saskatchewan.

Holiday scenarios. Employees who work on a holiday receive time-and-a-half in addition to their holiday pay. Employees who operate well-drilling rigs receive their holiday pay on top of their regular pay only. An employer can also request a permit to observe a statutory holiday on an alternative day.

Holiday pay. The pay for a statutory holiday is 5% of an employee’s wages earned in the four weeks before the holiday. Holiday pay for hourly paid construction workers is 4% of their annual wages (overtime not included). 

Manitoba

Eligibility. In Manitoba, all employees are eligible for holiday pay unless employees are scheduled to work on a general holiday, but are absent without the employer’s permission, or employees are absent without the employer’s permission from their last scheduled workday before the holiday, of their first scheduled workday after the holiday. 

Holiday scenarios. If the statutory holiday falls on a day when employees are normally scheduled to work and the employees do not work, employees are entitled to holiday pay. If the holiday falls on a non-working day, and employees do not work, employees are entitled to a substitute holiday with pay on another date.

Employees who work on the statutory holiday are entitled to statutory holiday pay plus pay at a rate of time-and-a-half for hours worked. However, as an alternative, certain defined “continuously operating businesses” can elect to pay employees who work on a holiday their regular wages for time worked and provide a paid day off on a regularly scheduled workday within the next 30 days or a later date if agreed to by the employee.

Holiday pay. Statutory holiday pay for employees who work consistent hours is a regular day’s pay. Those who have varying hours receive 5% of their wages over the course of the four weeks prior to the holiday. Those in the construction industry receive 4% of their gross earnings for the year instead of statutory holiday pay for individual holidays.

Ontario

Eligibility. In Ontario there is no service requirement for holiday eligibility. Employees will not be eligible for holiday pay if they either: (i) failed without reasonable cause to work their last regularly scheduled shift before and first regularly scheduled shift after the public holiday; or (ii) agreed to or were required to work on the public holiday, but failed without reasonable cause to work their entire shift on that day.

Holiday scenarios. If the holiday falls on a day when the employee would normally be scheduled to work and the employee does not work, the employee is entitled to receive holiday pay. If the holiday falls on a day when the employee would not normally be scheduled to work the employee is entitled to receive a substitute holiday with holiday pay at a later date, no longer than 12 months later (the employee may agree in writing to waive the substitute holiday and receive only a day’s holiday pay).

Employees who agree to work or are required to work on a public holiday are entitled to their regular rate of pay for all hours worked on the holiday, and to a substitute holiday with holiday pay. Alternatively, if the employee and the employer agree in writing, the employee may receive holiday pay plus pay at a rate of time-and-a-half for hours worked.

Holiday pay. Holiday pay is equal to the total amount of regular wages earned and vacation pay payable to the employee in the four work weeks before the work week in which the public holiday occurs, divided by 20. 

Quebec

Eligibility. In Quebec there is no service requirement for holiday eligibility. Employees will not be eligible for holiday pay if they are absent from work without employer authorization or valid cause on the working day before and the working day after the statutory holiday.

Holiday scenarios. If the holiday falls on a day when the employee would normally be scheduled to work and the employee does not work, the employee is entitled to receive holiday pay. If the holiday falls on a day when the employee would not normally be scheduled to work the employer may either pay the employee holiday pay or grant the employee a substitute holiday with pay on an agreed date.

Employees who work on holidays are entitled to their regular rate of pay for hours worked plus holiday pay, or regular pay for hours worked plus a substitute holiday with pay within three weeks before or after the holiday.

Holiday pay. Holiday pay is equal to 1/20 of the salary earned during the previous four full weeks of pay.

Federal

Eligibility. For most federally regulated employees there are no work attendance or service requirements for holiday eligibility. Employees who work in a “continuous operation” are not entitled to holiday pay if they do not report to work on a holiday when called into work on that day, or if they make themselves unavailable for work where their conditions of employment require them to be available or allow them to make themselves unavailable.

Holiday scenarios. If the holiday falls on a day when employees would normally be scheduled to work and they do not work, they are entitled to holiday pay. If the holiday falls on a day when employees would not normally be scheduled to work and they do not work, they are entitled to a substitute holiday with pay. When a holiday falls on a Saturday or Sunday that is a non-working day the substitute holiday must be on the working day immediately before or after the holiday.

If employees work on a holiday they are entitled to holiday pay plus time-and-a-half for hours worked. If employees are employed in a “continuous operation” and are required to work on a holiday they are entitled to either holiday plus time-and-a-half for hours worked or regular wages for hours worked plus a substitute holiday with pay. Managers, superintendents and designated professional employees who work on a holiday must be granted a substitute holiday with pay on another date.

Holiday pay. Holiday pay is calculated by adding all of the wages, excluding overtime, earned by the employee in the four weeks before the work week of the holiday and dividing by 20.