Holidays in 2017: What Finance needs to know

Holidays can make a number of finance-related tasks — such as processing payroll — more difficult. So make sure your payroll team has a plan for tackling these dates.

Here are the legal holidays (L) from the IRS as well as the banking holidays (B) from the Federal Reserve:

• Mon., Jan. 2: New Year’s Day (L and B)
• Mon., Jan. 16: Martin Luther King Jr. Day (L and B)
• Mon., Feb. 20: Presidents’ Day (L and B)
• Mon. April 17: Emancipation Day (L)
• Mon., May 29: Memorial Day (L and B)
• Tues., July 4: Independence Day (L and B)
• Mon., Sept. 4: Labor Day (L and B)
• Mon., Oct. 9: Columbus Day (L and B)
• Fri., Nov. 10: Veterans’ Day (L)
• Thurs., Nov. 23: Thanksgiving (L and B), and
• Mon., Dec. 25: Christmas (L and B).

3 Payroll responsibilities

When it comes to holiday payroll, there are three things Payroll needs to look at:

1. which holidays your company won’t observe
2. whether Payroll will need to process payroll early to get direct deposits through, and
3. whether any tax deposit and reporting deadlines will be changed.

For private employers, almost all (90% ) companies observe the standard six U.S. holidays, which include New Years Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day — according to BLR Research.

In addition, 64% of companies oberserve the Friday after Thanksgiving, 30% observe Washington’s Birthday/President’s Day and 26% observe Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.

And the holidays least-likely to be observed by employers:

• Yom Kippur (1%)
• Rosh Hashanah (1%)
• Election Day (1%), and
• Lincoln’s Birthday (2%).