Running payroll for the first time in Hong Kong means juggling three separate clocks at once: the salaries tax cycle administered by the Inland Revenue Department (IRD), the BIR56A employer return issued every April, and the MPF remittance cycle run by the trustees. Miss any one of them and the consequences are different but compounding — an extra tax bill, a late-return surcharge, or a trustee surcharge on contributions.
This page brings the three cycles onto a single April-to-March timeline so a new employer can see, at a glance, what is due when.
The IRD side: April, BIR56A, and the IR56B year-end
Every employer in Hong Kong who pays salaries, wages, director's fees or other remuneration is required to lodge an annual Employer’s Return (BIR56A). The IRD issues the return in the first week of April each year, covering the period from 1 April of the previous year to 31 March of the current year.
From the issue date, the employer has a one-month deadline to complete the return, even if no tax is owed. The BIR56A contains the IR56B sheets — one per employee — that summarise the remuneration paid during the year. In practice, three things have to be ready by the May deadline:
- The employer's portion of the form (Part A: company particulars and declarations).
- The IR56B sheets, one for each employee on payroll during the year.
- The IR56E / IR56G / IR56F supplementary sheets for employees who started, left, or were away from Hong Kong during the year [VERIFY exact supplementary-form triggers].
The IRD's published IR56B distribution window runs through April and early May: most employers aim to have the employee IR56B slips distributed within the same period so that staff can file their own Tax Return – Individuals (BIR60) by the standard deadline.
The MPF side: 60-day enrolment and monthly remittance
On the Mandatory Provident Fund side, an employer has two distinct obligations:
- Enrolment. Every employee aged 18 to 64 who has been employed for at least 60 days must be enrolled in an MPF scheme. The statutory window is 60 days from the start of employment for regular staff, and 10 days for casual employees (defined as those employed under a contract of not less than 60 days, where they work fewer than 18 hours a week, or such other definition as set out in the MPF legislation].
- Remittance. Employer and employee contributions must be remitted to the MPF trustee on or before the last day of the month following the month in which the relevant wages were paid. This is the date most newcomers get wrong: it is not "the 10th of the next month" or "the 15th", it is the calendar end of the following month. Pay day on the 28th of June, for example, gives a remittance deadline of 31 July.
Late remittance triggers a trustee surcharge equal to 5% of the overdue contributions, or HK$1,500, whichever is lower [VERIFY current threshold], plus interest.
How the three cycles interlock across an April-to-March year
The cleanest way to read the calendar is to anchor everything to 1 April and walk forward.
| Window | IRD action | MPF action |
|---|---|---|
| Early April | BIR56A issued by IRD; IR56B sheets drafted | Run prior-March payroll and remit contributions by last day of April |
| April–May | Lodge BIR56A within the one-month window; distribute IR56B slips to staff | Continue monthly remittance for current month's payroll |
| June–March | Standby for IRD queries; employees file BIR60 [VERIFY standard BIR60 filing deadline] | Repeat monthly remittance discipline; enrol new hires within 60 (or 10) days of their start date |
| Year-end (Feb–Mar) | Finalise IR56B figures for the closing year; reconcile against payroll register | Final remittance for March wages falls on 30 April of the new tax year |
The cycles do not run in parallel — they cascade. The MPF remittance for March wages is due on 30 April, the same month the BIR56A lands. If a new employer has not closed the March payroll cleanly by mid-April, the IR56B figures are produced from incomplete data and the BIR56A is at risk.
A few pitfalls that catch first-year employers
- Treating the BIR56A as optional. Even a company that paid no salaries because it was dormant for the year must file a "NIL" return within the one-month window.
- Pay-day drift. Moving pay day from 31 March to 1 April shifts that month's wages into a different MPF remittance month and a different tax year. The IRD looks at the date of payment, not the work period [VERIFY current IRD position on accrual vs cash basis for salaries tax].
- Bonus payments in March. A discretionary bonus paid on 31 March is in the closing tax year; one paid on 1 April is in the new year. Plan bonuses before the cut-over.
- Forgetting the 60-day vs 10-day split. Casual employees, including part-time and short-term hires, have a much tighter enrolment window.
Where CompanyForge bookkeep fits
CompanyForge bookkeep is an invite-only beta for new Hong Kong employers who would rather track all three clocks on one page than rebuild the calendar by hand. Access is through a waitlist, with concierge onboarding for each accepted company — a guided setup of the payroll register, the BIR56A filing workflow, and the MPF contribution schedule against the actual issue, deadline and remittance dates in force for the current year.
Beta participants work directly with the CompanyForge team to validate the calendar mapping against their real payroll run, and to confirm the IRD and trustee dates before any submission is made. There are no self-serve sign-ups; every account is provisioned by hand once the waitlist application is reviewed.
Closing the loop
The Hong Kong new-employer payroll year is dense but predictable: April brings the BIR56A and its one-month filing window, the IR56B distribution runs alongside it, and the month-end MPF remittance discipline threads through every other week of the year. Once the three cycles are mapped onto one April-to-March page, the rest of the year is repetition.
To request a slot on the CompanyForge bookkeep waitlist and the concierge onboarding that comes with it, visit https://companyforge.ai/bookkeep/.
Put this guide into practice
Bookkeep is currently invite-only beta with concierge onboarding. Join the waitlist and we will map your entity structure before setup begins.
Never miss another statutory deadline
ForgeOps tracks NAR1, Business Registration renewal, and every other recurring HK filing across every entity you control — with holiday-roll-aware alerts sent before the window closes, not after.