Keeping records

Last updated: April 1, 2021

Employers must keep a record of the hours worked by each employee each day and provide a pay statement every payday.

On this page

• Wage statements
• Employers must keep records
• What you can do

Wage statements

Employers need to give each of their employees a written or electronic wage statement (pay stub) on every payday.

A wage statement needs to be separate from a pay cheque, so that the employee can keep it. It needs to include:

• The employer's name and address
• The hours worked by the employee
• The employee's wage rate (for example, an hourly wage, salary, flat or piece rate, commission, or other incentive basis)
• The hours worked by the employee at the overtime wage rate(s)
• Any money, allowance or other payment the employee is entitled to (for example, vacation or statutory holiday pay)
• The amount and purpose of each deduction from the employee's wages
• How the employee's wages were calculated (if they were paid anything other than an hourly wage or salary)
• The employee's gross and net wages
• Any amounts withdrawn from the employee's time bank and the remaining balance

If all the information on a wage statement is the same as the last pay period, then employers don’t need to provide a new one until that information changes.

Employers can provide electronic wage statements to their employees. If they do, they need to provide their employees with a way to confidentially access and make a paper copy of each wage statement through the workplace.

Employers must keep records

Employers need to keep the following records for each employee:

• The employee’s name, date of birth, job title, phone number and residential address
• The date the employment began
• The employee’s wage rate
• The hours worked each day, regardless of the employee’s wage rate
• The benefits paid to the employee
• The employee’s gross and net wages for each pay period
• The amount and reason for each deduction from the employee’s wages
• The dates of the statutory holidays taken by the employee and the amounts paid
• The dates of the annual vacation taken, the amounts paid, and the days and amounts owing
• The amounts paid from the employee’s time bank, dates taken and remaining balance

Employers need to keep these records in English at their principal place of business in B.C. for 4 years after each record was created.

Employers also need to keep:

• Agreements and records about reimbursing employees for cleaning and maintaining special clothing for 4 years
• Agreements about substituting another day for a statutory holiday for 4 years
• Averaging agreements for 4 years after the latest expiry date in the agreement

Specific employers

Farm labour contractors, employment agencies and talent agencies need to keep other records in addition to the records listed above.

What you can do

If you're having issues at work, find out what you can do:

• Use Solution Explorer
• Contact Employment Standards
• Submit a complaint 

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