Good Friday and Easter Sunday at work

It is DTRH’s official reading of how work performed on Good Friday and Easter Sunday is paid in the businesses that must remain closed on those days. It is signed by the Office of the Labor Prosecutor and rests on two texts: Article 3.17a of Act 4-2017, the "Labor Transformation and Flexibility Act", and Article 4(c) of Act No. 379 of 15 May 1948.

It reaches the employees of those businesses to which the total closing required by Article 3 of the repealed Act No. 1 of 1 December 1989 applied, or would have applied. That Act defined "commercial establishment" as any premises, store or analogous place where any kind of commercial operation or acts of commerce of retail sale or transfer of goods are carried out, or which belongs to one and the same corporation or natural or legal person.

• That it be a business to which the total closing required by Article 3 of the repealed Act No. 1 of 1989 applied, or would have applied.Verified against the official source
• That the day worked be Good Friday or Easter Sunday, the two days Article 3.17a of Act 4-2017 kept closed.Verified against the official source

Information pending verification.

1. 1

   Step 1: The two days that survived the Closing Act

   Act No. 1 of 1 December 1989, known as the Closing Act, was repealed when Act 4-2017 was approved. But Article 3.17a of that same reform preserved one duty: those commercial establishments which, before it came into force, were obliged to remain closed on Good Friday and Easter Sunday shall remain obliged to stay closed. The Office confirms it: businesses to which the total closing of Article 3 of the repealed Act No. 1 applied, or would have applied, must remain closed on those two days.

2. 2

   Step 2: If the business opens anyway

   The consequence is about pay, not only about fines. The Office says it plainly: if a business that must stay closed operates during these days, it must pay its employees the extraordinary compensation applicable to them for each hour worked. And the opinion’s conclusion repeats it: establishments that must remain closed on Good Friday and Easter Sunday must pay their employees the extraordinary compensation due to them, according to their hire date, for each hour worked on those days.

3. 3

   Step 3: Where the extraordinary pay comes from

   From paragraph (c) of Article 4 of Act No. 379, which defines as overtime "the hours an employee works for their employer during the days or hours in which an establishment must remain closed to the public by legal provision". That is the hook: the day is closed by legal provision, so the hour worked is overtime.

4. 4

   Step 4: And why being a Sunday is not enough

   That same paragraph (c) adds that hours worked on Sundays, when by legal provision the establishment must remain closed to the public, shall not be treated as overtime by the mere reason of being worked during that period. The Office explains: it is the legislator’s clarification. The extraordinary compensation on Easter is owed solely because the business must remain closed that day under Article 3.17a, and not because it is a Sunday. With Act No. 1 repealed, the restrictions on Sunday opening of commercial establishments and the minimum compensation of eleven dollars fifty cents ($11.50) for each hour worked on Sundays in those businesses were eliminated.

5. 5

   Step 5: Religious accommodation

   The opinion closes by recalling it: nothing stops an employee or prospective employee from requesting a religious accommodation under Article 2.19 of Act 4-2017 and DTRH Regulation No. 8947, the regulation implementing the reasonable-accommodation scheme for religious practices in employment. We did not read that regulation and do not describe its procedure here.

6. 6

   Step 6: What the opinion does not settle

   Two things, and we say them because they matter. First: the opinion does not publish the amount of the extraordinary compensation; it says only that it is the one due "according to their hire date". The rate comes from the overtime rules of Act 379-1948, which we cover in another guide. Second: the Office itself warns that nothing in the opinion should be used to question the jurisdiction or competence of any other government agency to regulate or supervise commercial opening hours, or which goods or services may be sold at a given time.

A claim for unpaid extraordinary compensation is a wage claim: it goes to DTRH’s Bureau of Labor Standards or to court. Written guidance on the reading of these laws is issued by the Office of the Labor Prosecutor.

• Believing the Easter Sunday premium is because it is a Sunday: it is because the business must be closed that day by law.
• Still expecting the $11.50 minimum per hour on Sundays, which vanished when Act 1-1989 was repealed.
• Assuming every business must close: only those covered by the total closing of Article 3 of Act 1-1989.
• Assuming the opinion fixes the amount of the compensation: it says only that it is the one due according to the hire date.
• Forgetting the reasonable accommodation for religious practices under Article 2.19 of Act 4-2017.
• Using this opinion to argue opening hours with another agency: the Office expressly warns it is not for that.

These are the government pages this guide is based on.

• Departamento del Trabajo y Recursos Humanos (DTRH)

  Departamento del Trabajo

  www.trabajo.pr.gov

• DTRH — Secretary’s Opinion No. 2020-04 (repeats Article 3.17a and the definition of commercial establishment)

  dtrh

  www.trabajo.pr.gov