How to Fill Out Hawaii Form UC-B6: Deadlines, Filing, and Rates

Hawaii employers file Form UC-B6 with the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations (DLIR) each quarter to report wages paid to every employee and remit unemployment insurance contributions along with the Employment and Training (E&T) assessment. For 2026, the taxable wage base is $64,500 per employee, the state is operating under Contribution Rate Schedule C, and the new-employer rate is 2.4%.¹ The wages you report determine both your contribution owed and the benefit amount your employees would receive if they later file a claim.

What to Have Ready Before You File

Pull these together before opening the form:

Your Hawaii UI account number, assigned when you registered with the DLIR.
Your assigned contribution rate from the annual rate notice the department mails you. If you never received it or lost it, contact the Unemployment Insurance Division before filing. Employers who don’t file required reports can be assigned the maximum rate.²
Your E&T assessment rate, which is 0.1% of taxable wages for most employers in 2026.³
Each employee’s Social Security number and full name.
Gross wages paid to each employee during the quarter, including commissions, bonuses, tips the employee reported, and the cash value of non-cash pay like meals or lodging.
Year-to-date wages per employee, so you can calculate how much of each worker’s pay exceeds the $64,500 taxable wage base.⁴

Errors on the form can trigger a notice from the department requiring a corrected report within 15 days, so clean payroll records throughout the quarter save trouble at the deadline.

Filling Out the Form

UC-B6 has two parts: a wage-detail section listing individual employees, and a summary section that calculates your total contribution.⁵

Employee Wage Detail

For each employee who received any pay during the quarter, enter the Social Security number in column 1, the name in column 2, and total gross wages for the quarter in column 3. Use a decimal point and don’t leave the cents field blank. If you have more employees than the main form holds, continue on Form UC-B6a and carry that subtotal forward.

Summary Section

The numbered items walk through the math:

Item 4, total wages paid: add up all amounts in column 3.
Item 5, continuation sheet total: enter the subtotal from Form UC-B6a if you used one.
Item 6, grand total wages: items 4 plus 5. Don’t include adjustments from prior quarters.
Item 7, excess wages: for each employee whose year-to-date wages exceed $64,500, enter the amount over that threshold paid this quarter. If you acquired another business during the year, you can count wages the predecessor paid to those same employees when applying the cap.
Item 8, net taxable wages: item 6 minus item 7.
Item 9, contributions due: item 8 multiplied by your assigned contribution rate.
Item 10, E&T assessment: item 8 multiplied by your E&T rate (0.1% for most employers in 2026).
Item 11, amount due: items 9 plus 10.
Item 12, credits: enter any amount from a Notification of Credit the department sent you.
Item 13, adjusted contributions due: item 11 minus item 12.

Item 17 asks for the count of full-time and part-time employees who worked during the payroll period that includes the 12th of the month. If nobody worked during that period, enter zero.⁵

Zero-Wage Quarters

Even if you had no employees and paid no wages during a quarter, you still have to file. The DLIR requires every liable employer to submit a report every quarter, whether or not there were paid employees and whether or not contributions are owed.⁶ File with zeros across the board. A missing report can bring penalties and may lead the department to assign you the maximum contribution rate.

Quarterly Deadlines

Reports and payments are due by the end of the month following each calendar quarter:⁷

Q1 (January through March): due April 30
Q2 (April through June): due July 31
Q3 (July through September): due October 31
Q4 (October through December): due January 31

When a deadline falls on a weekend or state holiday, it shifts to the next business day.

How to Submit

Filing Online

The DLIR’s HUI Express system is the primary electronic filing method. Create an account, then download the free QWRS (Quarterly Wage Reporting System) program, which calculates total and taxable wages and the contributions due.⁷ Upload the file QWRS produces, confirm totals on screen, and pay electronically. The department also directs employers to its interactive Employer Website at uiclaims.hawaii.gov for filing and other account management.⁸

Filing by Mail

Send the completed UC-B6 and payment to the Hawaii Unemployment Insurance Division at 830 Punchbowl Street, Honolulu. Mail early enough that the envelope is postmarked before the deadline. Keep a copy of everything you send, and file any confirmation or receipt with your payroll records.

Late Filing and Late Payment

The consequences for filing late and paying late are separate, and they stack.

An employer who fails to file the quarterly wage report on time owes a flat $30 penalty.⁹ If you also pay contributions late, the form instructions impose a penalty of 10% of the adjusted contributions due, with a $10 minimum. Any contributions and penalties still unpaid 15 days after the delinquency date accrue interest at two-thirds of one percent per month until paid.⁵ The director has discretion to waive the filing penalty for excusable delay, but that’s not something to plan around.

How Your Contribution Rate Is Set

Your rate is not the same as every other Hawaii employer’s. The department assigns rates based on each employer’s experience, essentially the benefit charges against your account relative to what you’ve paid in.² Employers with frequent layoffs and high benefit charges pay higher rates; stable employers with few claims pay lower ones.

The statewide rate schedule shifts each year with the health of the trust fund. For 2026, Hawaii is on Schedule C, with rates topping out at the statutory maximum of 5.4%. New employers are assigned 2.4% until their account has been chargeable with benefits for at least 12 consecutive months ending the previous December 31.³ Use the exact rate printed on your annual rate notice when computing item 9.

If You Acquired Another Business

When one business acquires another, or takes over substantially all of its assets and employees, the buyer can inherit the seller’s unemployment insurance experience rating. That may be better or worse than the new-employer rate you would otherwise get.

To transfer the rating, both the predecessor and the successor must sign and file Form UC-86, “Waiver of Employer’s Experience Record,” available at uiclaims.hawaii.gov.⁶ Timing controls the outcome:

Filed within 60 days of the transfer, with the predecessor’s outstanding reports filed and contributions paid: the successor gets the predecessor’s current rate immediately.
Filed after 60 days but before March 1 of the following year: the successor pays the new-employer rate for the rest of the current year, and the two reserve balances merge for future rate computations.
Filed after March 1 but by December 31 of the year after the transfer: same outcome, new-employer rate now, combined reserves for future rates.
Filed after December 31 of the year following the transfer: the application is returned unprocessed.

If the predecessor’s reserve balance is negative (more benefits charged than contributions paid), the successor may be better off not filing UC-86 at all. The DLIR uses the postmark date for mailed applications and the received date for hand-delivered or faxed ones, so don’t cut the deadline close.⁶

1
Department of Labor and Industrial Relations. Tax Rate Schedule and Weekly Benefit Amount
2
Justia Law. Hawaii Code 383-66 – Contribution Rates, How Determined
3
Department of Labor and Industrial Relations. Contribution Rates Explained
4
Department of Labor and Industrial Relations. Tax Rate Schedule and Weekly Beneficiary Amount
5
eformrs.com. Form UC-B6 Instructions
6
Department of Labor and Industrial Relations. Employer Frequently Asked Questions
7
Department of Labor and Industrial Relations. Unemployment Insurance Employer Registration
8
Department of Labor and Industrial Relations. Forms – Unemployment Insurance
9
Justia Law. Hawaii Code 383-94 – Records and Reports, Penalties