The Philippines has two kinds of public holiday and they pay differently. Clients who plan around a single number get the coverage wrong twice a year.
The two kinds
Regular holidays. An employee who does not work is paid for the day. An employee who does work receives a substantially higher rate, commonly described as double.
Special non-working days. The default is no work, no pay, unless a favourable company policy or agreement provides otherwise. An employee who works receives a premium, lower than the regular holiday rate.
The distinction is statutory and the rates are set out in labour department advisories issued for each holiday. It is the single most misunderstood thing about scheduling here.
How many there are
More than most Western countries, and the exact list is set annually by presidential proclamation. There is a core of regular holidays that recurs, a set of special days that varies, and occasional additions declared at short notice for elections, national events or local observances.
That last category is the one that catches clients: a day can be declared a holiday with limited notice, and it applies whether or not anybody planned for it.
Local holidays
Cities and provinces have their own charter days and fiestas, which may be declared special non-working days locally. A team in Cebu and a team in Dumaguete therefore do not have identical calendars, which matters if you are relying on one to cover the other.
What to do about it
Ask the provider for the current year's list at the start of the engagement and for the next year's when it is published, usually some months ahead. Put it in whatever calendar your business plans against.
Then decide, in advance, which holidays your team works and which it does not. Deciding in the week creates a premium cost nobody budgeted and a conversation about fairness nobody wanted.
The coverage question
If your business runs on a day that is a holiday here, you have three options and they should be chosen rather than defaulted into.
Accept the gap, and tell your own customers. Pay the premium and staff the day, which is legitimate and costs what it costs. Or arrange cover from elsewhere, which for a single person is usually not possible.
For a team of any size the practical arrangement is a rota with the premium budgeted, and staff generally volunteer for holiday shifts because the rate is good.
The reverse case
Your own public holidays are ordinary working days here. A team briefed by somebody who is off for a long weekend has nobody to ask, and the honest options are the same in reverse: give them work that does not require you, or accept that the week is short.
Businesses frequently notice the Philippine calendar and never think about their own, and the second gap is the one that produces idle time.
Leave, on top
Statutory leave is a floor and most providers offer more. Ask what the actual entitlement is for your roles, how it is scheduled, and whether December is heavily booked, because it invariably is.
Planning it properly
Take the year's holiday list, your own, and the team's leave entitlement, and mark the weeks where coverage will be thin. There will be four or five and they are predictable in January.
Almost nobody does this and it converts a recurring surprise into a scheduling decision, which is a fair description of most of the advice in this journal.
Holiday classifications and pay rates are set by Philippine statute and by advisories issued for each holiday, and the annual list is set by proclamation. Rates and coverage contain conditions this summary does not reproduce. Nothing here is legal advice and the current advisories should be consulted rather than this page.