Forums
vacation/PTO
Benefits & Compensation
vacation/PTO
Exchange ideas about health plans, retirement, work/life benefits, and employee assistance.
We are located in CA.
Last year we changed our vacation policy to allow it to be used for sick days. (We do not have a sick leave policy-yep the company is cheap.) However, by doing so, our lawyer sa
0
Cat:Topic ForumsForum:ForumId52
Cat:Topic ForumsForum:ForumId52Discussion:DiscussionId36487
Forums » Topic Forums » Benefits & Compensation » vacation/PTO
|
vacation/PTO
posted at 4/16/2010 1:14 PM EDT
|
Posts: 94
First: 2/7/2008 Last: 3/21/2011 |
We are located in CA.
Last year we changed our vacation policy to allow it to be used for sick days. (We do not have a sick leave policy-yep the company is cheap.) However, by doing so, our lawyer said we tied our hands a bit once we told employees they could use vacation days as sick days because it in effect became PTO days. He felt we would have some difficulty disciplining employees for taking off unscheduled time, unless we had spelled out some parameters on such use in our policy which we didn't really do unless it was for vacation time. We want to cut down on unscheduled absences so have a no-fault point system in place for unscheduled time off, but he didn't feel we could implement it. Moreover, the designation of them as being available for sick pay could require us to make those days available as leave for family members pursuant to Labor Code Section 233 making half of the employee's permitted leave time available for care for family members. Most employers that provide sick leave, typically don't have more than 6 years per year of such leave and thus the most that can be used for Kin Care leave is three days. But now an employee who might get two or more weeks of vacation per year can now allot half of that time for this leave. Looking forward, he thought we would be better situated if we went back to our prior way of doing things if since do not want these unscheduled absences and want to be able to discipline for them. Therefore this year we changed back to a strict vacation policy. Now employees are complaining that they can't be paid for sick days. Can anyone offer suggestions on the conditions we can place on this time off? We would like to allow only 6 days to be used for sick leave (3 for kincare) and still require 2 weeks notice for all other time off although requests of 2 days or less may be approved with 48 hours notice at the discretion of the manager. |
|
|
vacation/PTO
posted at 4/18/2010 7:16 AM EDT
|
|
Posts: 1047
First: 4/11/2002 Last: 9/14/2011 |
How many vacation days per year are your providing your employees? Is it a sliding scale based on years of service?
I would agree that employees aren't going to be happy if you don't pay them for sick days. Most companies are either going to have a sick/incidental absence day allotment or have a PTO poilcy, which you just did away with. The easy suggestion would be to create a sick day policy in which you pay your employees a certain number of days when calling in sick. According to the benchmarking surveys I have, it looks like the average company provides 9 sick/incidental absence days while the average used is 6. This is going to vary based on region, industry and size of your company. So not to incur a ton of additional cost, perhaps you can start off low and offer 3 or 4 sick days per year and monitor those results? There's really dozens of ways you can look at this. Providing sick days can benefit your company when it comes to attractiing and retaining workers. Do you really want really sick employees showing up to work and spreading their germs to other employees, which is likely to happen if you are docking employees pay for calling in sick. Etc, etc, etc. |
|
|
vacation/PTO
posted at 4/18/2010 2:09 PM EDT
|
|
Posts: 2146
First: 2/15/2006 Last: 9/14/2011 |
5-6 days is the norm for exempt employees because of the DOL's "unofficial" definition of a "bonafide sick plan". That is one of the few deductions allowed -- that is if the exempt employee had used all their PTO/sick under the bonafide plan, you could then deduct wages for further absences due to sickness.
So if you decide to go less than that, then under federal wage law, you will owe pay to exempts who take any sick days off, unless they miss a whole week. (Of course this is predicated with the fact that if the illness is covered under FMLA, that is one of the few other reasons you could pay an exempt only for hours worked and deduct the difference). |
|
|
vacation/PTO
posted at 4/19/2010 11:34 AM EDT
|
|
Posts: 94
First: 2/7/2008 Last: 3/21/2011 |
It is a sliding scale based upon years of service- 1 year to start, then 2 and 3 weeks.
Most likely we will not be adding sick days at this time due to the economic situation so if we do allow EEs to take vacation days for sick days in essence changing this back to PTO, can anyone tell me what conditions we can place PTO? Can we only allow a certain amount of days to be used for sickness/emergency and still require 2 weeks notice for all other time off requests? |
|
|
vacation/PTO
posted at 4/20/2010 12:42 PM EDT
|
|
Posts: 217
First: 3/22/2005 Last: 8/29/2011 |
I don't believe so, especially in CA. You probably should have consulted a good benefits/legal specialist before you made the change. After all my years there, PTO was just that. Paid Time Off. Absent a CBO, which it sounds like you don't have, if you have no sick leave and the employee is sick, that's all they have to use! And once is't accrued it can't be taken away and must be paid on termination which sick leave doesn't. I'd consult your DOL website |
Forums » Topic Forums » Benefits & Compensation » vacation/PTO
