Holiday Pay on an Hourly Wage in Switzerland (2026): the 8.33% Rule for Household Help

If you pay a cleaner CHF 30 an hour, you are not paying CHF 30 an hour. Somewhere in that arrangement sits a holiday entitlement, and if nobody has written down how it is handled, it is usually the household that ends up paying for it twice. This guide sets out the official percentages for 2026 and where they come from. It also covers the detail on the payslip that decides whether the money you have already paid counts for anything.

It is written for households employing help at home in Switzerland, whatever the work is called: cleaning, childcare, a hand with an older parent. If you are the one doing the work, the same numbers tell you what your payslip should show.

The short answer

On top of the base hourly wage you owe two separate supplements:

What	Days per year	Supplement on the base wage
Holiday, 4 weeks (legal minimum)	20	8.33%
Holiday, 5 weeks	25	10.64%
Holiday, 6 weeks	30	13.04%
Each paid public holiday	1	0.39%

A base wage of CHF 30 an hour with four weeks of holiday and one paid public holiday becomes CHF 32.62 an hour. On a three hour clean once a week that is about CHF 34 a month, and close to CHF 400 over a year. Most households never budget for it.

The two supplements are worked out separately on the base wage, not stacked on top of each other. The official table for domestic work does it the same way.

Why the hourly wage on its own is never the full wage

Swiss law gives every employee at least four weeks of paid holiday per year of service, and five weeks until the end of the year in which they turn 20 (Art. 329a of the Code of Obligations). There is no lower limit for small jobs: three hours a week counts. The law also says the employee must not be worse off financially during holiday than if they had worked (Art. 329d), which is the reason the supplement exists at all.

For someone on a monthly salary this is invisible: the salary keeps arriving while they are away. For someone paid only for the hours they actually work, no hours means no money, so the holiday entitlement has to be converted into a percentage that rides on every hour worked, or set aside and paid out when the holiday is actually taken.

Public holidays follow their own logic. The 1 August is the only public holiday guaranteed across the country, and cantons may designate up to eight further days. Whether those days are paid for hourly staff depends on your cantonal standard contract and on what you agreed, so the public holiday share gets counted in days rather than taken for granted.

Where the percentages come from

The percentages are not a rule of thumb. They come from the number of holiday days divided by the working days that remain: 20 days of holiday out of 240 remaining working days gives 8.33 per cent, 25 days gives 10.64 per cent, and a single day gives 0.39 per cent.

For work in private households, the federal standard employment contract publishes the full table. The SECO information sheet on the NAV Hauswirtschaft states plainly that the minimum wages for hourly staff are understood without holiday and public holiday supplements, and that the two supplements are each calculated on the base hourly wage rather than added together first. Its own worked example, using the 2026 minimum for unskilled domestic work, looks like this:

• Base hourly wage: CHF 20.35
• Public holiday supplement, 0.39 per cent: CHF 0.10
• Holiday supplement, 8.33 per cent: CHF 1.70
• Hourly wage including supplements: CHF 22.15

Two limits to keep in mind. The federal minimum wages apply from an average of five hours a week with the same employer, and they do not apply in Geneva, which has its own standard contract for domestic work with its own minimum wage and its own calculation example. People whose main task is childcare, such as babysitters and childminders, sit outside the federal minimum wage rules too, although their holiday entitlement under the Code of Obligations is unaffected.

Calculate your supplement

Set the hourly wage, the holiday weeks and the hours per week, and switch between the two points of view depending on whether you pay the wage or receive it. The calculator covers the holiday supplement, which is the big one; the public holiday share is the separate 0.39 per cent per paid day from the table above. The percentages are the ones Helpore uses in its own payroll.

Whichever number you land on, write down which one it is. These things get agreed at a kitchen table, and almost nobody says out loud whether CHF 30 is with or without holiday pay. On a three hour weekly clean the two readings sit about CHF 400 apart over a year. Settle it before the first shift, not after.

The mistake that makes employers pay twice

Paying the holiday share with every wage instead of when the holiday is actually taken is convenient, and it is also where households most often come unstuck.

Swiss case law allows it only in narrow circumstances, essentially work that is genuinely irregular and part time, and only if two things are true at once:

1. The holiday share is stated in the written employment contract, as a franc amount or a percentage.
2. The holiday share appears separately on every single payslip, again as an amount or a percentage.

A contract that says holiday pay is included, with no figure, fails the test. So does a payslip that shows only a total. When the conditions are not met, the employee can claim the holiday wage again, and the claim reaches back up to five years. The money you already paid does not count, because there is no proof of what it was for.

Where hours are regular week after week, the safer route is the ordinary one: grant the holiday, keep the supplement as a reserve, and pay it out when the person is actually away. Either way, write it down.

What it means for the household budget

The supplement is wage, so everything else is calculated on the higher figure. AHV, unemployment insurance, family allowances and accident insurance all apply to the gross wage including the holiday and public holiday share, which adds roughly 9 to 11 per cent depending on your canton.

Count the holiday, the public holidays and the employer contributions, and a base wage of CHF 30 an hour costs a household closer to CHF 36. That is the honest number to plan with, and it is why our price guide for cleaning help and the senior care cost planner both start from the all in figure rather than the headline rate. If you are still setting up the employment itself, the legal checklist for hiring household help covers registration, insurance and contracts.

In an undeclared arrangement none of this is written down anywhere, and that is the problem. An unpaid holiday entitlement does not disappear. It waits. Our guide on cash in hand versus declared work sets out what that tends to cost when it surfaces.

If you are the one doing the work

Three things belong in your paperwork, and it is worth checking all three:

1. A figure in the contract. A percentage or an amount in francs. The words "holiday included" on their own are worth nothing.
2. Its own line on the payslip, month after month, rather than folded into a single total.
3. Calculated on the base wage. 8.33 per cent of CHF 30 is CHF 2.50 an hour. If the base rate quietly shrinks first, the supplement shrinks with it.

If you are working out what to charge in the first place, our guide on setting your rate and the take home pay estimator show how the base wage, the supplements and the employee contributions fit together.

How Helpore handles it

On Helpore, helpers decide their own rate, the work they take on, the area they cover and the hours they are free. A household picks one of those free slots and the booking goes through on its own. The rate on the profile already has the holiday and public holiday supplement inside it, worked out with the percentages above and raised where a canton asks for more. Contract and payslip carry the vacation share on its own line, which is the paperwork the courts look for.

The helper keeps the whole gross wage. You stay the legal employer and pay the Helpore fee on top, while the contract, the AHV registration, the insurance and the monthly payslips run in the background under a power of attorney. Helpers join for free, and anyone who brings a friend along gets CHF 35 once that friend has worked 30 booked hours.

Find a declared helper near you and see the real hourly rate, supplements included, before you book anything. If you would rather set things up properly first, create your free household account and the contract, the supplements and the payslips are handled from the first hour.

Questions people ask

Do I have to pay holiday pay to a cleaner who works a few hours a week?

Yes. Paid holiday is a legal entitlement in Switzerland from the first hour of work, with no minimum number of hours. For staff paid by the hour it is normally settled as a supplement on top of the base wage: 8.33 per cent for four weeks of holiday, 10.64 per cent for five weeks. The federal minimum wages for domestic work are explicitly understood without this supplement.

How much is holiday pay on an hourly wage in Switzerland?

Four weeks of holiday means 8.33 per cent, five weeks 10.64 per cent and six weeks 13.04 per cent of the base hourly wage. The percentage comes from the number of holiday days divided by the remaining working days, which is why 20 days gives 8.33 per cent. On a base wage of CHF 30 an hour, four weeks of holiday adds CHF 2.50 an hour.

What is the public holiday supplement, and how much is it?

Public holidays are counted separately from holiday. The official table used for domestic work puts one paid public holiday at 0.39 per cent of the base hourly wage, so each further paid public holiday adds another 0.39 per cent. The federal reference is the 1 August. How many public holidays are paid depends on your canton and on what you agreed in the contract.

Can holiday pay simply be included in the hourly rate?

Only under strict conditions. Swiss case law accepts settling holiday pay with the running wage for genuinely irregular part time work, and only if the share is stated as an amount or a percentage in the written contract and shown separately on every payslip. A note saying holiday pay is included is not enough. If the conditions are not met, an employer can be required to pay the holiday wage again for up to five years.

Does the supplement change what the household pays in social contributions?

Yes, because the supplement is wage. AHV, unemployment insurance, family allowances and accident insurance are calculated on the gross wage including the holiday and public holiday share, so the employer contributions of roughly 9 to 11 per cent apply to the higher figure.

How does Helpore handle holiday pay?

The rate you see on a helper profile already contains the holiday and public holiday supplement, calculated with the same percentages shown in this guide and adjusted for the cantons whose own rules require more. The payslip shows the vacation share as its own line, the helper keeps the full gross wage, and the household pays the Helpore fee separately.

Official sources

• SECO, information on the NAV Hauswirtschaft, valid from 1 January 2026: minimum wages by category and the full holiday and public holiday supplement table.
• Swiss Code of Obligations, Art. 329a and Art. 329d: holiday entitlement and holiday wage.
• AHV information sheet 2.06 on domestic work: contributions on wages paid in a private household.

This guide is general information for 2026 and not legal advice. For a binding answer on your own arrangement, ask your cantonal labour office or a lawyer.