Colombia Public Holidays: 2026 Dates, Pay Rules, and HR Tips

If you run payroll or manage schedules in Colombia, public holidays are an important part of that. They affect pay, staffing, approvals, and compliance. Once you know which holidays move, which stay fixed, and what happens when someone works on the day, the rules get much easier to manage.

The basics

Colombia has 18 national public holidays each year. Several move to the following Monday under Ley 51 de 1983, which is why your payroll calendar and shift plan should follow the observed date, not just the original calendar date.

2026 public holidays in Colombia

Confirm the published observed dates each year before you lock payroll and shift schedules, because some holidays move.

Employee pay for public holidays

In Colombia, a statutory public holiday is generally a paid day of rest for employees on local employment contracts. That means you don’t dock pay just because the employee doesn’t work on a public holiday.

For monthly-salaried employees, the holiday is usually already built into the monthly salary. You normally do not add a separate holiday-rest payment when they take the day off. You just pay the salary as usual.

For hourly employees, a statutory holiday should not be treated like an unpaid missed shift. Your payroll setup should reflect the employee’s right to paid holiday rest.

Part-time employees are not outside the rules just because they work fewer hours. What matters is whether they are employees under a local contract and whether the holiday falls on a day they were scheduled to work. If it does, the paid-holiday framework still matters. If it falls on a non-working day in their normal schedule, review the contract terms and payroll method before assuming an extra paid day applies.

How holiday work pay works in Colombia

Under Colombia’s labor reform, work performed on a mandatory rest day or public holiday carries a premium above the ordinary wage. The current statutory surcharge is 80% through June 30, 2026, increasing to 90% on July 1, 2026, with the law moving to 100% on July 1, 2027 unless an employer adopts the higher rate earlier.

Compensatory rest matters too. If holiday work is occasional, meaning up to two mandatory rest days worked in a calendar month, the employee has the right to a paid compensatory rest day or cash retribution under the statutory rule. If holiday work is habitual, meaning three or more mandatory rest days worked in the month, the employee is entitled to paid compensatory rest and the cash retribution.

Night work, overtime, and holiday work can overlap. When those hours also qualify as night hours or overtime hours, payroll should apply the relevant additional premium instead of stopping at the holiday rate alone. That is where mistakes usually start for shift teams, support functions, and businesses that stay open through weekends and holidays.

• Hourly worker. An employee works eight daytime hours on a public holiday in April 2026. If payroll treats the shift as cash-retributed holiday work, those 8 hours are paid at 1.8 times the ordinary hourly rate.
• Monthly-salaried employee. An employee on a salary works six holiday hours, and your payroll system records their ordinary hourly equivalent at COP 18,000 (US$5). In April 2026, the holiday-work amount for those 6 hours would be COP 194,400 (US$54) if paid as cash retribution. The employee’s base salary still stays in place. The holiday-work calculation is the additional payroll item your team needs to code correctly.

Substitute-day rules and Monday holiday shifts in Colombia

This part causes many avoidable errors.

Some Colombian public holidays move to Monday because of Ley Emiliani. The law shifts the paid day of rest for specific civic and religious holidays when they do not fall on a Monday. That is why Epiphany, Saint Joseph’s Day, Ascension Day, Corpus Christi, Sacred Heart, and several others often appear as Monday holidays in payroll calendars.

For payroll purposes, you apply the rule based on the observed day of rest. That is the date that drives paid time off, holiday-work premiums, and scheduling decisions.

The most common mistake is treating the original calendar date as the statutory paid holiday when the law has moved observance to Monday. That can create the wrong premium payment, the wrong attendance exception, or both.

Who is covered by public holiday rules in Colombia

Employees hired under Colombian employment contracts are the main group covered by statutory public-holiday rules. That includes full-time and part-time employees.

Shift workers and essential roles are not exempt from the rules just because the business stays open. They can be scheduled when operations require it, but holiday pay and rest day rules still need to be applied correctly.

Contractors are different. A true independent contractor is not covered by employee holiday-pay protections in the same way because they are not on local payroll as an employee. That said, this is exactly where global employers need to be careful. Calling someone a contractor does not fix a classification problem.

Regional closure days, collective vacation days, and extra employer-granted days off can all be useful. They are just not the same thing as a statutory national public holiday. Your policy should clearly separate what the law requires from what the company offers on top.

Employer compliance checklist for Colombia public holidays

Clean payroll starts with a clean setup.

• Update your holiday calendar. Load the full year into HRIS, payroll, and workforce-planning tools.
• Confirm movable dates. Double-check Monday-shift holidays and Easter-based holidays before the year starts.
• Communicate early. Tell shift teams and managers which holidays affect staffing and approvals.
• Configure payroll codes. Separate holiday rest, holiday work, overtime, and compensatory rest tracking.
• Keep clean records. Hold onto time entries, manager approvals, and any compensatory-rest elections.
• Apply rules consistently. Similar roles should be handled the same way across teams.

Tips for success

Lock holiday dates into your payroll calendar early. For U.S.-based teams coordinating with Colombia, it can help to compare local deadlines with a broader payroll calendar so approvals do not get stuck around month-end or long weekends.

Review June, November, and December carefully because Colombia’s holiday pattern can bunch up around payroll deadlines, staffing gaps, and higher support demand.

Build a simple pre-holiday approval flow for managers. Decide who can approve work on the holiday, who checks premium-pay coding, and who confirms whether a compensatory rest day is owed before the shift happens.

How an Employer of Record (EOR) can help

An employer of record is a third party that legally employs your team member in Colombia on your behalf. This allows you to hire without establishing a local entity, avoiding the hidden costs of entity establishment.

The EOR handles salary offers, employment contracts, payroll, tax withholding, statutory benefits, and all ongoing compliance. You manage the day-to-day work normally while the EOR takes care of just about everything else.

For employers testing the market or those who need to scale quickly, an EOR is usually the right choice. You get to reduce risk, move faster, and know all local laws and regulations will be followed.

Pebl helps you handle Colombia holiday pay

If you’ve made it this far, you’ve got your sights set on Colombia. Maybe you’ve even found the perfect talent. There’s a lot that needs to be taken care of before you can start hiring—researching taxes, finding experts in local labor law, finding a payroll processor, and more. It takes a lot of time and a lot of money. Wouldn’t it be great if there were an easier way?

With Pebl, there is.

When you hire in Colombia through our EOR platform, you get a country-ready holiday calendar, the right payroll setup for holiday work, and local guidance when rules change, so you can keep pay accurate and stay compliant without having to become a Colombia labor-law expert.

Our EOR platform allows you to hire, pay, and manage employees in 185+ countries around the world without setting up your own local entity. That means your new talent starts in days, not months. We handle it all: onboarding, benefits, salary benchmarking, payroll, and compliance with all local regulations. For every public holiday, overtime, or double-time pay the law requires, we make sure it happens. All you have to do is stay focused on leading your team.

When you’re ready to do things the easy way, let us know.

This information does not, and is not intended to, constitute legal or tax advice and is for general informational purposes only. The intent of this document is solely to provide general and preliminary information for private use. Do not rely on it as an alternative to legal, financial, taxation, or accountancy advice from an appropriately qualified professional. The content in this guide is provided “as is,” and no representations are made that the content is error-free.

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