Time Off: Vacation, Holidays, and Leave

The Manitoba Employment Standards Code guarantees a baseline of paid and unpaid time off. The most commonly broken rules in this area aren’t about entitlement, they’re about employers expecting workers to be available or actually working during that time off.

Annual Vacation

Every employee in Manitoba is entitled to:

2 weeks of vacation after each of the first 4 years of employment, with vacation pay of 4% of gross wages.
3 weeks of vacation after 5 years of employment, with vacation pay of 6% of gross wages.

A few important points:

Vacation pay is earned as wages are earned. Even if you leave before taking your vacation, the unpaid vacation pay must be paid out at termination.
An employer can schedule when you take your vacation, but they can’t simply refuse to give you any.
“Use it or lose it” policies are limited by the code. Earned vacation pay doesn’t simply evaporate because of an internal HR policy.

Working Through Vacation

If you are on approved vacation, you are off work. Doing work during vacation , answering emails, attending meetings, “just one quick call”, undermines the whole point of the entitlement. If your employer requires you to work during vacation, that may itself be a violation of the code, and the time worked may be owed back to you as wages.

General (Statutory) Holidays

Manitoba recognizes a set of general holidays during which most employees are entitled to either the day off with general holiday pay, or to work the day at premium rates plus general holiday pay.

The general holidays in Manitoba are:

New Year’s Day
Good Friday
Victoria Day
Canada Day
Labour Day
Thanksgiving Day
Christmas Day

(Louis Riel Day in February is a holiday for many Manitobans but is governed differently, confirm whether it applies to your employer.)

To qualify for general holiday pay you generally must have been employed for a minimum period and have worked your scheduled shifts before and after the holiday. Specific qualifying rules, and the formula for calculating general holiday pay and premium pay if you work the day, are set out in the code.

Common Violations

Being told to work a stat holiday “as a regular day” with no premium pay or substitute day.
Being denied general holiday pay because you’re salaried, on probation, or part-time. Most of these denials are wrong, entitlement isn’t determined by those labels alone.
Being scheduled off the day before or after the holiday specifically to disqualify you from holiday pay. The code anticipates this and protects against some of it.

Other Leaves

The code provides for a number of other leaves, generally unpaid, with the right to return to your job afterward. These include:

Maternity and parental leave
Bereavement leave
Compassionate care / family caregiver leave
Sick leave / personal illness or injury leave
Family responsibility leave
Domestic violence leave
Long-term leave for serious illness
Reservist leave

Eligibility (length of service required), duration, and whether any portion is paid varies by leave type. The Employment Standards Branch publishes current details for each.

The key principle: taking a protected leave cannot be a reason for termination, demotion, or any disciplinary action. If you were let go shortly after requesting or taking a protected leave, that timing matters and is worth raising.

Termination, what happens when “we’re letting you go” comes after a leave request.
Constructive dismissal, when working conditions change so badly during or after a leave that you effectively have no job to come back to.