Took you 4 years to decide to fucking read your contract?
In Brazil you have a month of paid vacation for each worked year and you can’t work for more that 2 years without using your vacation time. HR would force you to take your vacation time even if you don’t want.
Know your contract. So many people get burned by what they thought they could do, or what they thought their employer couldn’t do, because they don’t know the rules of their employment. General rule of thumb: if it’s not spelled out in the contract that an employee can do a thing, the employee can’t do it. If it’s not spelled out somewhere that an employer can’t do it, you bet your ass they’re gonna try to do it.
as a heads up, if you can save enough money to take a sabbatical, you should. It was the greatest time of my fuckin’ life.
I’d love to but all the logistics are overwhelming for me. What made your sabbatical so good? Was it easy to finance?
Was it easy to finance?
I mean… yes and no? I earned about £35k+ per annum between between 2013 ish and 2017 ish, and didn’t spend much money on hobbies and such and being frugal. So I was saving money without trying that hard, and figured that about £16k was enough to take a year out to try to learn spanish and slightly change careers, if I spent about £1k a month.
What made your sabbatical so good?
The complete freedom, living on my own, being able to work on daily and long term goals. I lived in a town that was near london, so it was (kinda) cheaper, walkable, 1 h away from london so I could visit from time to time, and had a climbing center nearby.
I took the time to get regular exercise, work on my mental health, learn spanish and just live at my own pace. I even travelled a little (I had a holiday I booked in 2017 for 2018 that I was going on anyway to visit LATAM, and Behold The Arctopus was playing live gigs again for the first time in 5 years, and obviously they were not coming to europe, so I went to NY for like 5ish days (3 days + 1 night + 1 morning).
I’d love to but all the logistics are overwhelming for me.
What logicistics are causing you issues? I stayed in the same place I was in while I was working, and all I had to do was quit my job. There’s not much to do… oh. You must be from the US? Healthcare? Good luck with that shit.
Why would one need to save up vacation days to take a “full paycheck” off? That is one month, so 20 working days? 20 working days should be very common mount of available vacation days per year (at least in EU)?
20 working days should be very common mount of available vacation days per year (at least in EU)
Americans:
Oh I was assuming a 2 week pay period so 10 days and still not all that surprised that someone would get that. Someone working part time more than likely won’t get get any vacation nor sick time at all in America.
I’m on a three week break and that’s like normal summer holiday for most of us in France. I’d even say on the small side because we can’t really be away that much from our respective jobs. The main difference is what one can afford to do during those three weeks, for sure, but otherwise we are paid the same.
The European mind cannot comprehend this.
…stateside standard for private-sector salaried positions is ten working days per year (combined illness/vacation) which begin accruing after a six-month probationary period; some employers increase that to fifteen or twenty days for long-tenured staff after several / many years of continuous employment, but it varies…
…for hourly positions, you’re paid only for actual hours worked…
…government positions tend to be much more generous with holidays, vacation, and sick leave, although compensation is typically lower than the private sector; large corporations often fall somewhere between those two extremes…
That’s pretty shitty PTO policy you’ve worked under.
Flexing on us with that parenthetical statement
A full paycheck for an extended period contains many paychecks.
That would have been the first thing I’d check … seems standard practice.
Depends on the country you’re from, not an issue in Australia for example
IKR!
seems standard practice
I was like where?? America?
Every time I come on here I just fuckin love Australia more and more
Same in NZ. That would be illegal here. They can force you to take leave, or they can pay you out, but it can’t just poof
Isn’t “go poof” the means by which to force taking leave?
I mean, they can tell YOU to poof, but they can’t make your LEAVE go poof like in the op
Yeah. I mean… I kinda sympathize, but yeah. Vacation days disappearing if they go unused for a year is pretty common.
Does Anon think they were the first person to come up with the extended vacation plan? If no, then wouldn’t it make sense to find out why it wasn’t more widespread?
Standard is for your workplace to force you to take a vacation if you build up to much. It should be illegal to remove your vacation.
I was shocked the first time I had vacation days expire without any kind of notification that I had miscalculated, and there was no payout or anything for the lost hours. I mean, the vacation days are part of the negotiated reimbursement for work. The deal is I give my time doing whatever I’m asked, and in return they give me money and time off. They shouldn’t be able to not give it to me because my napkin math was wrong.
To me it is no different than if you were paid by physical check, and if you didn’t pick up your check fast enough they threw it away and didn’t pay you. If I hadn’t already been radicalized, this would have put me over the edge.
They can also pay it out as wage instead at the end of the year. It’s the standard practice around here if you accumulate above a certain threshold. Nothing gets lost, except that you pay taxes on wages but not on vacation.
Telling you to use it or lose it is essentially forcing you.
Yeah but theres a huge difference between being forced to use it (and still getting paid vacation) and losing it(no vacation and no pay).
Maybe unpopular but I’m not of the opinion that a business should babysit a grown adult and monitor their PTO and make them take it.
How do you even imagine it? Can you force someone to take their PTO at any time? Or only when they will absolutely lose it? (End of year)
So a company will lose how many days at the end of each year trying to force their staff to take days off?
I kinda agree. I think my old company did a reasonable job. We calculated vacation days via accrual, and I think you could have, like, 6 weeks accrued at any given time. At the end of every month, HR would send out emails to everyone who was near their limit and tell them to use it or lose it. This usually resulted in me saying “oh, okay”, and then scheduling one or two vacation days per month just randomly.
As long as the employer has any say in, when the PTO is taken, they have a responsibility Period
How do you even imagine it? Can you force someone to take their PTO at any time? Or only when they will absolutely lose it? (End of year)
In my country you have to inform your employee, when their vacation days are about to expire and make measurable efforts to find a vaccination schedule that works for both of you. Or else they don’t expire.
So a company will lose how many days at the end of each year trying to force their staff to take days off?
Or you know, you could talk to your employees and work out a schedule over the year, that works for both of you. If you, as a business, are unable to do basic management tasks, then yes you run into the situation, where you are functionally unable to do business at the end of the year.
They have a responsibility to let you know, yes. And they have to actually let you take it. Beyond that should be personal responsibility.
Here are my expectations and how I normally experience pto policy at work.
- HR has in writing company PTO policy. When and how to apply, how many per year, rollover policy.
- HR provides friendly reminders in email to use it or lose it and the deadline is coming up.
- HR provides a decent software system that tracks your PTO balance and history and is easy enough to use to request time off
- HR reminds managers to approve PTO unless there is some issue in which case HR should help handle
If a company does the above then the employee has no one to blame if their days are lost.
Not sure where you’re from, but it’s pretty common here in Australia. I think there are a few things to addresses.
There are two mechanisms a company might make you take leave.
-
A company shut down period. Eg company is closed over Christmas to new years and requires employees to take a week of leave then.
-
Over a threshold of leave. Leave won’t evaporate at the end of a calendar year, it builds each day and can only be used or paid out. Companies will often have a threshold, for example 8 weeks of leave before they may require you to create a plan to use it, or pay it out. The reason an employer does this is staff leave is a liability on the books. Eg If you make $100k, 8 weeks leave is approprimately a $16k liability for the employer.
8 weeks. Haha man that’s like a pipe dream.
I think PTO works kind of the same in most places? My point is you can’t really force an employee to take PTO and if they ignore their PTO policy that should be on them.
If a business closes down for Xmas new years, then you’re but really taking PTO right? Workplace is closed. If you force PTO to be taken and most of your staff dragged their feet or didn’t read their email, then essentially you’re unable to operate for the last month of every year
-
I had to take three separate 4 week vacations one year since my company was switching to a max accrual so I had to get below the mx by years end.
Vacation days disappearing if they go unused for a year is pretty common.
What?? Where?
Only ten days transfer to the next year in Spain. But even that seems like more than US gives in a year, so not too bad
I can use them only through march of the following year in Germany
But your employer is forced to proactively nudge you into taking your days off. If they request you to take your vacation and you still don’t do it, they might even be required to suspend you from coming to work. A least for the minimum of vacation days per year that are required by law.
They can’t just say nothing, wait until April and say: Haha, now your PTO is expired.
wow that sucks :O
Yeah, America. And you should love Australia. It’s getting increasingly fucked up here.
They didn’t notice getting paid out for all of their vacation days?
I’m guessing it was USA and they were just lost.
Yup. The only thing you can count on from your employer is what they have already given you. I don’t believe any promises.
If I got paid out for my vacations, I would not take my vacations ever. Probably a good thing they don’t pay them out.
They just get lost in the UK too, most places seem pretty good about making sure you take them though.
At the first full time job I had in Oz there were a bunch of old dudes who had each accrued over a year in untaken annual leave. The company had to crack down on it and make them start taking it because it was a huge liability, both financially and as a risk to actually getting work done. They had to develop plans for them to take it a couple months at a time.
Yeah this happened to me as a Kiwi living in the UK. First job over there. My boss just let me take them, even though they had all expired.
What a champ!
Gosh, I’m quite shocked at the UK. They are not ally pretty good for workers rights.
The worker in Australia may have accrued long service leave. It’s a seperate entitlement that means younger 3 months leave at once,.on top of holiday entitlement, after working somewhere for 10 years.
Older contracts and union deals can be quite good in the UK. I would bet if this company doesn’t have a union that newer employees would be limited in the number of days they can transfer to the next year, likely less than a week.
Yeah the company I worked for let you shift 5 but you had to take them within the first 3 months
No no, this was multiple old guys and in addition to long service leave, they just never took leave.
For the UK I think the policy is in support of worker rights, in a round about kind of way. If you let people pay it out then they might never take leave and won’t get the benefits of actually having had a break from work.
Many places don’t pay them out - use or lose.
That’s fucked up
'Murica
Not fuck life. Fuck your boss
Not my preferred way of getting promotion
But a time-honored one
Both. Both is good.
deleted by creator
That’s something that isn’t even guaranteed by law in Germany. But it’s part of the contract very often (with restrictions like the company can make you take your vacation days and such). So yes, check first before you start „saving“.
Even if it is part of your contract, I’d still suggest you talk with your boss about your plans beforehand. Just so both sides are in the same boat and your employer can also plan ahead, knowing that you’ll be gone for two months next year. Otherwise they might not even allow you to take all your time at once.
Afaik by law vacation days never expire in Germany, except if the employer explicitly tells you they do. So yeah, check your contract. But if the contract doesn’t mention it, and you did not get a written warning, your unused vacation days are usable forever.
My contract explicitly states that they don’t expire. So I never had to check the law and just assumed it’s the other way round. 🙂
Dumb bass
