The second son of an English father, John Payne and Anglo-Canadian mother Harriet Maud de Burgh Moffett. His father was listed as working in on the railway and he passed away when Vivian was only 13. The President of the Grand Trunk Railway, Charles Melville Hays took on a surrogate father role to the boy and Vivian became his private secretary after completing his schooling.

He was described as a likable and charismatic young man who was part of the Hays party that travelled to Europe in early 1912, his first trip abroad. He wrote to his mother commenting on how green the English countryside was in March. 

Payne boarded Titanic with his employer's party which included Mr Hays wife Clara, their daughter Orian and her husband Thornton and the family maid Mary Anne Perrault.  Vivian drowned in the disaster and if recovered, his body was never identified. 

Upon news of the sinking, his mother held vigil outside the Montréal White Star Line Offices, pleading for news.  "Can't you find out something about my boy?" she is quoted in the Toronto Globe, "He was my baby and he is only 22. Do you not think that  Mr Hays would see that he was saved?"