I asked my Filipino VA Jomvie to put together a list of official holidays in the Philippines for your quick reference. If you choose not to give them paid time off, consider at least to let them pause their work during that time if you pay by the hour.
Just think about going to work on Christmas or on Sylvester – you wouldn’t like that very much, right? 🙂
Over to my VA…
| “We may be different in size, color and shape, but there’s something we all love — Holidays!
In the Philippines, we have an average of ten regular holidays in a year. So, in a year, we are given a 10-day break away from work. And what’s so good about it? It’s (normally) paid. We have two types of holidays in the Philippines
Often, other people from outside the Philippines do not understand that Regular and Special Holidays are two different types of holidays. What is a Regular Holiday?Regular Holidays are paid holidays that are celebrated nationwide. Actually, apart from these regular holidays, we have local holidays (that fall on special non-working holidays). One of them is celebrating the years of our city through colorful feasts that is locally known to us as “Fiesta”. Regular Holidays are holidays where “no work, no pay” does not apply. In other words, if the employee does not work during this day, he/she is still paid 100 percent of his/her daily rate. And, if that day the employee is asked to work, he/she will be paid 200 percent for the first eight hours. List of Regular (paid) Holidays in the PhilippinesHoliday Name Date
These are the most celebrated holidays in the Philippines. Since we have a large amount of the population of our fellow Muslim brothers and sisters here in the Philippines, the observance of Eid’l Fitr (July 29) and Eidul Adha (October 4) is yet to be proclaimed. Saturday and Sunday ExemptionsOn regular holidays, there are exemptions if they fall on a weekend day.
An example for this year (2014): We celebrated our “National Heroes Day” and since it fell on Sunday, it was celebrated on Monday (August 26).  Francis
How lucky! I wish we had this exemption rule here in Germany. I have never heard from such a rule. For us, it’s a matter of luck with “good” or “bad” years, depending on how many holidays fall on a weekend. On that day, ceremonial rites were given to all our heroes who fought for our freedom and bondage during the perilous times.
What is a Special Non-Working Holiday?Special Non-Working Holidays are non-paid holidays that are celebrated locally or nationwide. They are holidays where if an employee will not work, he/she will not get his/her salary for that day. But, let’s not tackle deeply into technical terms. This is just a brief explanation for you to know the difference between Regular and Special Holidays in the Philippines.” |
In addition to the Holidays and special holidays, employers should also take into account paid vacation days. What would be a reasonable number of paid vacation days to give to your VA worker (Philippine-based VA)?
Good point, thanks for the comment, Xavier!
I would say it depends on the level of skill the VA brings to the table. If he works on a task effectively from the first week, he brings back results to the employer quickly. Personally, I have often worked with VAs from the Philippines that needed more training at the beginning. So from my perspective, that training period was an investment into the VA with the hope of later results.
This out of the way, I would say it’s a good idea to define paid vacation days when the VA has proved to provide results for the business. I have read at least one source that defined 5 paid vacation days a year, growing over time. Now, I don’t want to define a certain value, and I am sure many readers may react negative to this example of 5 paid vacation days. It’s something to negotiate between the VA and the employer.
Working as a VA is different than working for a “normal job” where such things are tightly defined. For example, for my projects I try to find a VA for whom the tasks ideally don’t feel so much as work, as well as being generous with regards to flexible schedule in case he needs to take care of something.
And finally, if you work based on an online virtual assistant marketplace like upwork, there are neither paid holidays nor paid vacation. On Upwork, you get paid for the time you work and that is pretty much it.
So from the spectrum I showed for upwork to a classical job with holidays, vacation, insurance etc, there is a big range of differences.