Public holidays: NSW and Victoria compared

If you live on the Murray you already know the feeling. The shops are shut on one side of the river and open on the other, and nobody warned you. Public holidays are declared by each state, so New South Wales and Victoria do not keep the same calendar.

This matters for two reasons. It changes when you can get a trade, a delivery or a council office, and it changes what an emergency callout costs.

All dates are set annually by each state government and some are moved or substituted from year to year. Check the official New South Wales Government public holidays page and the Business Victoria public holidays page for the current year before you plan anything around them.

The days both states share

New Year's Day, Australia Day, Good Friday, Easter Saturday, Easter Sunday, Easter Monday, Anzac Day, the June holiday for the monarch's birthday, Christmas Day and Boxing Day are gazetted in both states. When Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Year's Day or Australia Day falls on a weekend, an additional day is usually declared, and the substitution rules are not identical between the states.

The days that differ

Labour Day

Victoria takes Labour Day in March. New South Wales takes it in October. Same holiday, different season, seven months apart. This is the difference that surprises people most, because it hits two long weekends a year and neither one lines up.

Melbourne Cup Day

The first Tuesday in November is a public holiday in Victoria. It is an ordinary working Tuesday in New South Wales. In parts of regional Victoria, councils can arrange for an alternative local day to be gazetted instead, often tied to a local show or festival, so the Cup Day holiday is not universal across the state. Check with the council in your shire.

The Friday before the AFL Grand Final

Victoria gazettes a public holiday on the Friday before the AFL Grand Final. The date moves with the football calendar and is declared each year. New South Wales has nothing equivalent. For border towns this is the biggest practical difference in the year, because Wodonga trades are on holiday rates while Albury trades are working a normal Friday.

The August bank holiday

New South Wales has a bank holiday on the first Monday in August. It is not a general public holiday. It applies to banks and some financial institutions, so most workplaces, shops and trades operate normally. Victoria has no equivalent day.

Local show days and regional variations

Both states allow local public holidays or part day holidays to be declared for particular districts, usually for a show or a race meeting. These are gazetted and they are genuinely local. If a job is booked in a smaller town, it is worth asking whether the local show day is coming up.

What the difference costs you

Most trade businesses price a public holiday callout at roughly double the weekday rate, often with a minimum of two to four hours and a higher callout fee. That is not regulated, it is commercial practice, and the numbers are indicative rather than fixed.

The cross border consequence is direct. On Melbourne Cup Day, a Wodonga plumber is on holiday rates while an Albury plumber is on a normal Tuesday. On the New South Wales October long weekend, the reverse is true. If your job is not urgent and you can choose which side of the river to call, you can genuinely save money by knowing which state is on holiday.

The base rates that the loading applies to are set out in what plumbers charge in regional NSW and what electricians charge in regional Victoria.

Beyond callout rates

Several other things follow the state calendar.

• Council offices and inspections. A permit or an inspection booked with Albury City is not affected by a Victorian holiday, and a Wodonga inspection is not affected by a New South Wales one. Long weekends that differ by state routinely add a week to approvals.
• Deliveries and trade suppliers. A Victorian supplier is shut on Grand Final Friday. If your job depends on parts arriving that day, it does not matter that your side of the river is working.
• Retail and pub trading. Trading restrictions on days such as Anzac Day morning and Good Friday are set by each state and differ in detail.
• Penalty rates for staff. Employers with workers on both sides of the border deal with two calendars in one payroll. There is more on cross border operating in starting a business in regional NSW or VIC.

Planning around it

Book non urgent work away from either state's long weekends. The fortnight around a shared holiday period is when every trade is booked and every response time blows out.

If the work is urgent, ask for the holiday rate in writing before the tradie is dispatched. A genuine emergency, meaning a burst pipe, no power, a gas leak or a security issue, is worth the loading. A dripping tap on Melbourne Cup Day is not.

If you are travelling, check accommodation early. Grand Final Friday and the Cup weekend fill motels across north east Victoria and the border towns, and cancellation terms tighten on those dates. That is covered in what to ask before you book a motel.

To find someone working today, the listings for plumbers in Albury and electricians in Wodonga show trading hours with each state's holiday calendar applied.