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Manitoba is the most recent Canadian province to enact a prompt-payment regime. Bill 38, the Builders’ Liens Amendment Act, amended The Builders’ Liens Act (CCSM c.B91) and came into force on April 1, 2024. It follows the same structural model as Ontario (2019), Alberta (2022), and Saskatchewan (2022), but with several Manitoba-specific differences that contractors need to know.
The three most important: the statutory holdback is 7.5%, lower than the 10% used in Ontario, BC, and Alberta. The lien preservation window was extended from 40 days to 60 days on the same date. And Manitoba charges both GST and its own provincial Retail Sales Tax (RST), not a harmonized HST.
This guide explains the rules in plain language. Every reference is to The Builders’ Liens Act, CCSM c.B91 as amended by Bill 38, currently in force.
When a contractor delivers a proper invoice to the owner, the owner must pay within 28 calendar days. The clock starts on delivery. The owner has 14 days to issue a notice of non-payment if disputing or withholding any amount. Once the contractor receives payment, it must flow downstream to subcontractors within 7 days. The same 7-day passthrough applies at every tier in the contracting chain. All days are calendar days, not business days.
The notice of non-payment must specify the amount being withheld and the reason. A payer who neither pays nor issues a timely notice of non-payment is exposed to adjudication and loses the ability to raise defences that should have been flagged at the 14-day mark.
The 28-day clock only starts when you deliver a proper invoice. An invoice that does not meet the requirements can be disputed and the clock does not run. The required elements under the amended Act are:
Most generic invoicing tools omit the period of work, the authorized payment recipient, and the itemized breakdown by service type. Any of those omissions gives the payer grounds to dispute the invoice’s status as “proper,” restarting the clock only after the corrected invoice is delivered.
Markup formats every invoice to include all required fields. Start a free trial to see the template.
Under section 43 of The Builders’ Liens Act, CCSM c.B91, a lien claimant has 60 days to register a lien. This replaced the prior 40-day window on the same date the prompt-payment rules came into force: April 1, 2024.
The 60-day clock begins from the earlier of:
After preservation (registration of the lien), court action must be commenced within 2 years of registration. Missing the 60-day preservation window permanently extinguishes lien rights, there is no equitable extension.
The practical effect of the extended window is meaningful. Under the old 40-day rule, a contractor who invoiced late in a project could find themselves racing against the lien deadline while still waiting to see whether the owner would pay. At 60 days there is more breathing room, but the hard deadline is still real. Track it from day one.
Markup’s lien-deadline tracker handles the Manitoba 60-day clock automatically. Try the free calculator. See also: lien deadlines by province across Canada.
Manitoba’s statutory holdback is 7.5% of each progress payment. This is lower than the 10% holdback required in Ontario, BC, and Alberta. Every owner must withhold 7.5% from each progress payment and hold it until the lien preservation period expires or all liens are discharged.
The holdback fund is not the owner’s money to spend while the project runs. It is a statutory trust for the benefit of lien claimants further down the chain. Releasing holdback early , even with the best intentions, can expose an owner or GC to personal liability for subcontractor claims.
Subcontractors holding a lien have a right against the holdback fund specifically. This means a sub can pursue the holdback regardless of the payment status between the owner and the general contractor, an important protection when the GC is the one who is not paying.
Markup tracks holdback amounts separately from the invoice total on every Manitoba project, so the retained amount is always visible and accounted for.
Manitoba did not harmonize its provincial sales tax with the federal GST. Construction invoices in Manitoba are subject to two separate taxes:
Combined rate: 12%.
RST applies to most construction services and materials supplied in Manitoba. Because the two taxes are administered separately, you will have separate registration, filing, and remittance obligations with CRA (for GST) and with Manitoba Finance (for RST). Do not confuse them. A single invoice should show both line items distinctly.
Markup applies the correct 5% GST and 7% RST split automatically when you set a project province to Manitoba.
Bill 38 introduced a statutory adjudication mechanism into The Builders’ Liens Act alongside the prompt-payment rules. Either party to a construction contract can refer a payment dispute to an adjudicator nominated by the designated nominating authority under Bill 38.
Adjudication is a fast, binding-on-an-interim-basis dispute resolution process:
If you are facing non-payment on a Manitoba construction project and a notice of non-payment has been issued, adjudication is the fastest route to a binding order. Consult a Manitoba construction lawyer before initiating to confirm the dispute is within scope and the proper steps have been followed.
Manitoba’s framework is modelled on Ontario’s Construction Act but has several meaningful differences. If you work in both provinces, these are the ones that matter most.
See also: Alberta PPCLA and BC Construction Prompt Payment Act for Western Canada comparisons, or Ontario’s Construction Act for the original model Manitoba followed.