Christmas & New Year's 2025/2026 – Payroll Processing & Public Holidays
What dates are the public holidays over Christmas
and New Year Holiday Period?
There are four Public Holidays over this period.
- 25 December 2025 (Christmas Day)
- 26 December 2025 (Boxing Day)
- 1 January 2026 (New Year’s Day)
- 2 January 2026 (Day after New Year’s Day)
As
these dates fall on Thursday and Friday, there is no Mondayisation required for this holiday period.
Leave Requests and Leave Calendar
By now, your Employees are hopefully entering their Leave Requests in the iPayroll Employee Kiosk.
Our Leave Approver Guide provides helpful information to support you through this process.
Once the Leave Requests are approved, you may find the Leave Calendar in iPayroll helpful for viewing upcoming leave. This report is found under Reports > Leave > Leave Calendar.
Christmas and Holiday Processing Dates
Over the Christmas and New Year Holiday period, your payroll confirmation dates may change. As payrolls are not processed on Public Holidays, you may need to confirm some payrolls earlier than usual.
To help with planning, you can use the future payroll date planner on the iPayroll Dashboard under Future Payrolls.
Close your payrolls in advance and enter future dated Payrolls
If your organisation is shutting down or your Paymaster will be away over the holiday period, you can prepare your payrolls in advance and have them ready to go out automatically on the scheduled date, by using the Close in Advance Functionality.
If you need help with closing your payrolls in advance, please contact our Helpdesk Team.
How to pay your staff on a public holiday?
Employees working on a public holiday:
- If the public holiday falls on the employee’s normal working day, they must be paid time and a half for the hours worked, and they are also entitled to an alternative holiday.
- If the public holiday is not one of their normal working days, the employee is entitled to be paid time and a half for the hours worked, but no alternative holiday is granted.
Employees not working on a public holiday:
- If the public holiday is their normal working day, the employee should be paid a statutory holiday taken.
- If an employee is on leave when there’s a public holiday and they normally would have worked on that day, then they are entitled to be paid for the public holiday and not use their leave balance.
- If it is not the employee’s normal working day, they are not entitled to public holiday pay.
The Employment New Zealand website has more detailed information and guidance on paying your Employees for both working and not working on a Public Holiday.
Public Holiday – Automatic Processing
Did you know that you can now choose to automatically add PHNW - Public Holiday (Not Worked) in iPayroll for a pay period that includes a public holiday for people that have Work Patterns? The automatic entry is based on a Person's Work Pattern hours for that day. More information on this, can be found here.
Need any further Help
If you have any further questions, our Helpdesk Team will be available over the Holiday Period, all days except the Public Holidays.
Feel free to contact us. Our support hours are 8am to 5pm weekdays.
09 - 377 1517
04 - 472 2997
03 - 372 9468
Or email – help@ipayroll.co.nz
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