MITRAB – September 2020 Holidays

The Ministry of Labor, or MITRAB for its acronym in Spanish, just this week notified the general public as to its recent resolution in relation to the national holidays that are observed during the month of September of each year.

This is due to the fact that as per article 66 of the Labor Code the 14^th and the 15 of September of every year are national holidays.

Therefore, being national holidays, these are days that, with a few exceptions, all working people have the right to rest.

Nonetheless, MITRAB also has the legal faculty to declare additional days of rest and in use of those powers has declared that for the public sector in addition to the national holidays as established by law, government or state employees will also receive the 16^th, 17^th and 18^th off. This means that all non-essential government offices will be closed from Monday the 14^th of September until Monday the 21^st of September.

The decree of the additional days corresponding to the 16^th through the 18^th are not generally applicable to private businesses, but again there are a very few exceptions, such as those businesses that by custom provide such days off or have other agreements with employees that requires the employer to maintain government office hours.

With that in mind, please remember to take into consideration the closure of many government offices for the duration of next week especially with regards to any government services that will be suspended.