Holiday Pay: Meaning Under the Labor Code

The Labor Code provision on holiday pay, as quoted by the Supreme Court in Atienza v. Saluta (2019), has two main rules:

1. Every worker "shall be paid his regular daily wage during regular holidays, except in retail and service establishments regularly employing less than ten (10) workers".
2. The employer may require an employee to work on any holiday, but the employee "shall be paid a compensation equivalent to twice his regular rate".

In Nippon Paint Philippines v. Nippon Paint Philippines Employees Association (2021), the Court described holiday pay as "a legislated benefit enacted as part of the constitutional imperative that the State shall afford protection to labor."

The list printed in the Labor Code text is old and is no longer the list in use. Regular holidays and nationwide special days are now listed in Section 26 of Executive Order No. 292, as amended by Republic Act No. 9492. That section applies "unless otherwise modified by law, and or proclamation", so the days of each year also depend on later laws and proclamations. For the current days, see the 2026 holidays and the 2027 holidays.

Special non-working days are not covered by the holiday pay rule above. Their pay rules come from other rules and from yearly DOLE issuances: see the holiday pay rules guide.

Besides small retail and service establishments, the 1989 implementing rules (Book III, Rule IV, Section 1) exclude government employees, domestic helpers and persons in the personal service of another, managerial employees, and field personnel and other employees whose time and performance are unsupervised by the employer. In Atienza (2019), the Court held that a family driver was not entitled to holiday pay because he was in the personal service of another.

The 1989 implementing rules (Rule IV, Section 4) say that work on a regular holiday, up to eight hours, is paid at least 200% of the regular daily wage. If that holiday work falls on the employee's scheduled rest day, the employee gets an additional premium of at least 30% of the 200% rate. Overtime on a regular holiday is paid the holiday rate plus at least 30% of it (Section 5). See Working on your rest day.

Not always. In Nippon Paint (2021), the employer had paid additional holiday pay for Eidul Adha for two years. The Court held that this had ripened into a company practice that the employer could not withdraw. See Can an employer remove benefits?

Made-up illustration: Jessa works in a Cebu City supermarket with 60 employees. On a regular holiday, she stays home and still receives her regular daily wage. Her co-worker Mark is required to work eight hours that day, so he receives twice his regular daily rate. Holiday pay does not count toward the basic salary used for 13th month pay.

To compute an amount, use the holiday pay calculator.