Canada
United States
Bahamas
Jamaica
Trinidad & Tobago
Antigua & Barbuda
Barbados
AnguillaCanada
Statutory Holiday Pay, in plain English.
Book a Workzoom walkthrough → 25+ years of HR and payroll production. Live in Canada, the US, and the Bahamas.
Statutory holiday pay is the wage an employee receives for a public holiday they do not work, set by provincial employment standards legislation.
Read the full answer
Most provinces calculate it from average earnings over a defined period before the holiday rather than from a standard day's pay. Employees who work the holiday are generally owed premium pay plus the holiday entitlement. Workzoom calculates the averaging window from actual pay history on the employee record.
How Statutory Holiday Pay works.
The calculation is an average, not a fixed day. Provinces define a lookback window of earnings and divide by a set number of days, which means the same employee can be owed different amounts for two holidays in the same year depending on the hours they worked before each one. Eligibility rules add another layer: several jurisdictions require the employee to have worked their scheduled shifts immediately before and after the holiday. Which holidays are statutory also varies by province, so a national employer runs different calendars simultaneously.
Where Statutory Holiday Pay goes wrong.
- Paying a flat eight hours is the default error, and it under- or overpays depending on the employee's recent hours.
- For part-time and variable-hours staff the gap is largest.
- The second trap is the holiday calendar itself: assuming a federal list applies everywhere leads to missed entitlements in provinces that recognize holidays others do not.
- 2000 Running payroll since Workzoom has run Canadian payroll for 25+ years.
- Canadian data residency AWS Canada (ca-central-1). Canadian customer data stays in Canada.
- SOC 2-aligned controls Encrypted at rest, role-based access, immutable audit logs.
- Trusted in production County of Renfrew, Silvera for Seniors, and Cable Bahamas. Built for 50 to 5,000 employees.
In the product
How Statutory Holiday Pay runs on Workzoom.
Statutory Holiday Pay is part of the Workzoom Payroll Suite. Workzoom runs HR, workforce, and talent on a single employee record across ten countries: Canada, the United States, the Bahamas, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados, Antigua and Barbuda, Anguilla, the Cayman Islands, and the United Kingdom. Full gross-to-net payroll runs live in Canada, the United States, and the Bahamas. Pricing starts at $4 per employee per suite per month.
Questions about Statutory Holiday Pay
More on Statutory Holiday Pay
Playbooks and teardowns from teams putting it into production.
Best Canadian Payroll Software 2026: 12 Options Compared
Find the best Canadian payroll software for your team: compare 12 options, pricing models, Quebec reporting, migration checks and Workzoom...
Read article →
Jamaica NIS Employer Registration: No Number, No Withholding
TAJ handles Jamaica NIS employer registration, not the NIS office. The portal differs from the individual card login, and NHT filing follows...
Read article →
Best HR Software for Barbados Employers (2026 Guide)
The best HR software for Barbados compliance: Employment Rights Act, NIS, BRA payroll. See how Workzoom handles the Caribbean workforce.
Read article →
Bahamas Employment Act: The Housekeeper's 46-Week Bill
A Nassau resort paid two weeks' severance for a ten-year employee. The Bahamas Employment Act and the Industrial Tribunal turned it into 46...
Read article →Run HR, payroll, workforce, and talent on one platform.
$4 per employee per suite. 50 to 5,000 employees. Sprint-based, client-paced go-live.