Quebec severance and termination pay (2026): what you're owed when your job ends

Quebec has no separate statutory severance pay, and the severance pay hub shows which two jurisdictions do. What the Act respecting labour standards gives you is written notice of termination, from 1 week to 8 weeks on a four-rung ladder, or a compensatory indemnity equal to your regular wage for the notice weeks you didn't get. On top of that you're owed the annual leave indemnity you earned but were never paid, at 4% or 6% of your gross wages, plus any holiday indemnity still owing. Quebec sets no statutory deadline for the whole final pay: the indemnity is due when the employment ends, and the rest follows the ordinary pay interval. Its collective dismissal rules start at 10 employees, the lowest threshold in Canada.

Updated September 6, 2026 · Figures verified against the statutes of each jurisdiction · see all figures and their sources

Who the Act covers, and who is federally regulated instead

The Act reaches every employee working in Quebec, employees who work partly outside Quebec for an employer based here, and Quebec residents working outside the province for such an employer. It binds the government itself (LSA s. 2).

Section 3 takes people out, and one carve-out is wider than the manager exclusions elsewhere. Senior managerial personnel are outside most of the Act, including the notice of termination in s. 82; they keep a short list of standards, mainly the leave and psychological-harassment provisions (LSA s. 3). Also out: construction workers governed by the construction industry Act, some live-in carers working occasionally, and students on an approved school work-induction placement.

The Act says nothing at all about federal jurisdiction, because that boundary is constitutional rather than statutory. It still decides which page you should be reading. If your employer is a bank, an airline, a railway, a telecom or broadcaster, an interprovincial trucking company or a Crown corporation, the Canada Labour Code applies and the Quebec Act does not, wherever in the province you work. Those figures are on the federally regulated page.

Notice of termination and the indemnity that replaces it

Quebec's ladder has four rungs, not eight, so it climbs in bigger steps and reaches its ceiling later than the Ontario and British Columbia schedules do. The Act puts a floor under it at 3 months of uninterrupted service (LSA s. 82.1).

Source: Act respecting labour standards (QC), s. 82 — Notice of termination of employment or layoff. Reviewed on September 6, 2026. Notice is owed once you have 3 months of continuous service.

The same notice is owed before a layoff expected to last six months or more, and s. 82 doesn't take away anything another statute gives you. If your employer gives no notice, or too little, it owes a compensatory indemnity instead:

"An employer who does not give the notice prescribed by section 82 … must pay the employee a compensatory indemnity equal to the employee's regular wage excluding overtime for a period equal to the period or remaining period of notice to which the employee was entitled." (LSA s. 83)

The indemnity falls due at the moment the employment ends, when a layoff expected to run past six months begins, or six months into an open-ended layoff. If you're paid wholly or partly by commission, the weekly figure is the average of your weekly wage over the complete pay periods in the three months before the end. Where a collective agreement gives recall rights for more than six months, the indemnity is postponed to the earlier of the end of those rights and one year after the layoff.

During the notice period, and notice that is void

Quebec has no equivalent of Ontario's section spelling out what must be maintained during notice. What it has instead is the contract: if your employer gives working notice, the employment contract simply continues and your wages and conditions run on as before. If it pays the indemnity, s. 83 fixes the amount at your regular wage without overtime for the missing weeks.

One trap is worth knowing. A notice of termination handed to you while you are already laid off is absolutely null, unless the job is a seasonal one that normally lasts six months or less each year (LSA s. 82). An employer cannot run your notice out while you sit at home on a layoff.

Who gets nothing

Section 82 does not apply to an employee with less than 3 months of uninterrupted service, to a fixed-term contract or a contract for a specific undertaking that simply runs out, to an employee who has committed a serious fault, or where the end of the job or the layoff is the result of superior force (LSA s. 82.1).

"Serious fault" is a higher bar than an employer saying it had cause, and the courts read it narrowly. It is the Quebec equivalent of the just-cause and wilful-misconduct tests elsewhere, and the employer has to prove it.

Temporary layoff

Quebec sets no fixed number of weeks after which a layoff becomes a termination, which is unusual. What the Act does is treat a layoff of six months or more like a termination for notice purposes: your employer owes the s. 82 notice, and the indemnity falls due either when a layoff expected to run past six months starts, or six months into an open-ended one.

Worked example: Chantal's indemnity

Chantal started at a Laval distributor on September 4, 2013 and her last day was May 15, 2026: twelve completed years of uninterrupted service. Her regular wage, overtime excluded, was $1,100 a week. Twelve years puts her on the top rung, 8 weeks. She was told to leave the same afternoon with no written notice, so the whole entitlement becomes an indemnity payable at the moment the employment ends: 8 weeks × $1,100 = $8,800.00. Three weeks' proper written notice, worked normally, would have reduced the indemnity to $5,500.00.

Severance pay in Quebec

There is no separate severance pay in Quebec: what people call severance here is the indemnity in lieu of notice, the s. 83 amount above. Read Division VI and the collective-dismissal division end to end and you won't find a second entitlement of the Ontario or federal kind (LSA s. 83).

Two other routes can be worth much more than the statutory minimum, and neither is calculated on this site. The first is the Civil Code duty to give notice in reasonable time, which is Quebec's answer to common law reasonable notice. The second is the s. 124 complaint against a dismissal not made for good and sufficient cause, which is set out further down. If you were let go without cause, a lawyer may be able to recover more than the figure on this page.

Collective dismissal: the lowest threshold in Canada

Quebec's group rule starts at 10 employees of the same establishment in the course of 2 months, including layoffs of six months or more. It's the lowest collective-dismissal threshold in the country, and far below what Ontario, British Columbia and federally regulated workplaces use (LSA s. 84.0.1).

Source: Act respecting labour standards (QC), s. 84.0.4 — Notice of collective dismissal to the Minister. Reviewed on September 6, 2026. Before a collective dismissal for technological or economic reasons the employer must notify the Minister, copy the notice to any certified union, and post it where the employees can read it. Giving that notice does not excuse the employer from the individual notice in section 82. If the Minister’s notice is missing or short, each dismissed employee is owed an indemnity equal to their regular wages, overtime excluded, for the missing weeks. You cannot stack that indemnity on top of the section 83 indemnity: you get the greater of the two.

Read that table for what it is: the notice the employer owes the Minister of Employment and Social Solidarity before a collective dismissal for technological or economic reasons, not a second notice to you. The employer also has to copy the notice to any certified union and post it where employees can read it, and giving it doesn't excuse the employer from the individual notice in s. 82 (LSA s. 84.0.4).

Where the Minister's notice is missing or short, each dismissed employee is owed an indemnity equal to their regular wages, overtime excluded, for the missing weeks. Then comes the rule that sets Quebec apart:

"No employee may cumulate the indemnities provided for in sections 83 and 84.0.13. However, an employee shall receive the greater of the indemnities to which the employee is entitled." (LSA s. 84.0.13)

In Ontario, British Columbia and federally regulated workplaces the group entitlement sits on top of the individual one. In Quebec it doesn't: you get the greater of the two, never both. Any calculator that adds them together is wrong for Quebec.

Employees with less than 3 months of uninterrupted service, expiring fixed-term contracts and employees who committed a serious fault aren't counted as affected, and the division doesn't apply to open-ended layoffs that in fact last under six months, to seasonal or intermittent establishments, or to an establishment hit by a strike or lockout.

Notice you owe when you quit

The Act sets none. The Civil Code does, and it sets no number:

"Either party to a contract for an indeterminate term may terminate it by giving notice of termination to the other party. The notice of termination shall be given in reasonable time, taking into account, in particular, the nature of the employment…" (CCQ art. 2091)

Reasonable time is judged on the nature of the job, the circumstances and how long the work has lasted, so there is no fixed number of weeks to quote and this page doesn't invent one. The duty runs both ways, which is why art. 2091 is also the source of a Quebec employee's claim against an employer beyond the statutory minimum. You can't give up the right to an indemnity for insufficient notice or for an abusive dismissal.

The annual leave indemnity on your final pay

Quebec measures vacation over a reference year that runs from May 1 to April 30 unless an agreement fixes another start date, and it calls the money an indemnity rather than vacation pay. Under one year of uninterrupted service you earn one working day of leave per month of service, capped at two weeks, with the same 4% indemnity (LSA s. 67).

Source: Act respecting labour standards (QC), s. 69 — Three weeks of annual leave. Reviewed on September 6, 2026. If the job ends before you have taken all the leave you earned, the employer owes the indemnity for the leave you did not take, plus a further 4 or 6 per cent, whichever rate applies to you, of the gross wages you earned in the current reference year.

The third week arrives earlier here than in Ontario or British Columbia: Quebec grants it at three years of uninterrupted service (LSA s. 69). The indemnity is 4% of your gross wages during the reference year, or 6% once you're credited with the service in the table above (LSA s. 74). Your employer can't buy the leave out with money instead of time off, except that the third week may be paid at your request if the workplace closes for two weeks.

When the job ends before you've taken the leave you earned, s. 76 gives you two amounts: the indemnity for the leave you never took, plus a further 4% or 6% of the gross wages you earned in the current reference year. Chantal had $19,000 of gross wages since May 1, and at twelve years her rate is 6%, so that second amount is $1,140.00 on top of whatever her untaken leave is worth.

Statutory general holidays in your last weeks

The Act calls them statutory general holidays and there are 8: seven listed in s. 60, plus the National Holiday on June 24, which comes from its own statute (National Holiday Act s. 2). Quebec has no Family Day, no Remembrance Day and no National Day for Truth and Reconciliation among them.

The counting rule catches people by surprise. Section 60 gives Good Friday or Easter Monday, at the employer's option: that's one holiday with a choice of date, not two (LSA s. 60). Two other days are known by names the Act never uses. Section 60 says only "the Monday preceding 25 May", and "1 July, or 2 July where the 1st falls on a Sunday". The familiar names for those dates are ordinary usage, not statutory language.

Source: Act respecting labour standards (QC), s. 60 — Statutory general holidays. Reviewed on September 6, 2026. The statute names 8 holidays.

For each holiday your employer has to pay an indemnity of one twentieth of the wages you earned in the four complete pay weeks before the week of the holiday, overtime excluded. If you're paid wholly or partly on commission, it's one sixtieth of the wages earned in the twelve complete pay weeks before, and the National Holiday uses the same two formulas (LSA s. 62). If you have to work the holiday, your employer owes the day's wages plus either the indemnity or a compensatory day off taken within three weeks either side.

There is no minimum length of service:

"To benefit from a statutory general holiday, an employee must not have been absent from work without the employer's authorization or without valid cause on the working day preceding or on the working day following the holiday." (LSA s. 65)

When the final pay must arrive

Quebec's Act sets no deadline for the whole final pay. Read Division I of Chapter IV and Division VI in full and you'll find no equivalent of Ontario's s. 11(5) or British Columbia's s. 18.

Two rules cover it instead. The indemnity in lieu of notice is payable at the time the employment is terminated, or when a layoff expected to run past six months begins, or six months into an open-ended layoff (LSA s. 83). Everything else follows the ordinary pay rule: wages have to be paid at regular intervals no longer than sixteen days, or one month for managerial staff, so your last wages and your annual leave indemnity land on the next regular pay day (LSA s. 43).

One protection is worth knowing before you sign anything the employer puts in front of you: a settlement in which you accept less than the amount claimed is absolutely null under the Act.

Severance and Employment Insurance

Money paid because the job ended, whether it's the indemnity in lieu of notice, an employer's severance offer or an annual leave payout, normally counts as earnings for Employment Insurance. It's allocated to the weeks after your last day at the rate of a normal working week, so benefits don't start until it runs out. Allocation delays the payments; it doesn't cut the total weeks you can draw.

Apply as soon as the job ends rather than waiting for the money to settle, because a late application can cost you weeks. The Quebec EI page has the province's economic regions, the hours you need and an estimator, and severance pay and EI works through the allocation rule. Employment Insurance is federal and applies in Quebec like everywhere else; only the premium rate is different, because Quebec runs its own parental insurance plan.

What the statutory minimum doesn't include

Everything above is the floor. Three things can sit above it, and none is calculated here.

• The Civil Code duty to give notice in reasonable time. Article 2091 binds the employer as well as you, and reasonable time is decided on the facts of the job, not on the s. 82 ladder. It's Quebec's route to more than the minimum, and it produces no number a calculator can print.
• Your written contract. A contract can promise more than the Act. A term promising less isn't enforceable, and you can't give up the indemnity for insufficient notice or for an abusive dismissal.
• A collective agreement. If you're unionized, your agreement may set out its own indemnity, recall rights and grievance timetable, and your union comes first.

Quebec also has a recourse most employment standards statutes do not offer. With two years of uninterrupted service in the same enterprise, an employee who believes they were dismissed without good and sufficient cause can complain under s. 124, and the Administrative Labour Tribunal can order reinstatement, an indemnity up to the wages you'd have earned, or any other decision it thinks fair (LSA s. 124). The deadline is short: 45 days from the dismissal. The recourse is closed where another remedial procedure, other than damages, is open to you under an Act or an agreement.

How to file a complaint

You file a written complaint with the CNESST, which can claim unpaid wages and other money benefits from your employer on your behalf. The prescription for a civil action under the Act is 1 year from each due date (LSA s. 115), so an older unpaid amount can expire while a recent one is still claimable. Don't read that as the deadline for a dismissal complaint: the s. 124 route has its own 45-day clock. Both start at the CNESST's page on filing a complaint.