Vacation Refused

Has anyone run into this before? Our policy on vacation states that we max out at 200 hours. Staff see their accrued vacation hours on their paystubs and most are very good at taking their vacation and not maxing out. A few times staff have maxed out and stopped accruing vacation hours just because they didn't want the time off. However, now we have a staff person who reached his max, requested time off and his supervisor denied the vacation request because we were short staffed (this was back in October). The supervisor states that since October she has not been able to spare this staff person. Now the supervisor wants to pay him out the vacation time he would have accrued (about 50 hours). I'd like to know how other businesses might have handled this type of situation. Thanks for any input!

Comments

  • 7 Comments sorted by Votes Date Added
  • The employee has requested vacation time, but due to the company's staffing issues has been unable to use the time. I would pay-out the vacation. You're going to create a morale problem if you do not allow employees to use their vacation and then penalize them for not using it.

    I don't believe the problem is going to go away by paying him out the 50 hours that he should have accrued since October. Until you allow him to use some of his vacation time or go over the 200 hour max, you're going to continue to have this problem month after month.
  • You may also want to revise your policy to allow for some additional carry-over and develop a methodology for monetary compensation that would treat all employees equally and eliminate subjective treatment by either supervisors or HR.

  • We also have a max and the employee stands to loose any vacation accrual over the max if not used by their employment anniversary date each year. A few times we had employees not plan ahead and ended the year with loosing vacation days because of the workload. A couple of times, they were given an extension, however, to tighten the ship, we now notify them quarterly (in writing) of their vacation balance and if they do not plan accordingly and take it they loose it.

    So in your case, I would say it depends on if you have your policy in writing and have distributed it to the employees, if they have been notified of their vacation balances periodically during the year...if so, they should have planned ahead because as in all business, the workload is the priority. However, if they have had notification of some sort during the year, you can be hardnosed or allow it to be extended one time only and the time be scheduled for use at the supervisor and the employee's discretion.

    I think that it is always best to warn employees what to expect and then hold them accountable whether it be in a policy or a memo but definitely in writing.
  • I've checked out your state laws, so you are not required to pay vacation if the ee term's unless it's in your policies to do so. Here's the link:

    [url]http://www.hr.state.ks.us/home/html/ffaq.htm[/url]

    That being said, does your company have a policy for cashing out vacation? Either expressly allowing it or expressly disallowing it? Go to your policies first. If you have nothing addressing this issue, I would put something together right away. In our company, we only allow folks with 3 weeks of vacation to cash out a portion of their time (up to one week of vacation - they have to use the rest). Everyone else is subject to use it or lose it - we don't even roll it over. Our philosophy (and it really depends on each individual company) is that we want people to take time away from work - it refreshes them & makes them more productive overall. It also makes the administration of the vacation time extremely easy & it's easy to work into our budget the estimated indirect wages for the year. There is a flip side to this policy of use it or lose it in that it does mean our folks are away from work and we consequently temporarily lose their productivity during their vacation time - but that argument isn't strong enough for us to change our company philosophy. I hope that makes sense. Good luck.

  • I'm going to base my reply based on certain assumptions. First, the supervisor has refused this ee a vacation since last October. Second, the ee has asked to take a vacation.
    For morale purposes, it is unfair to max a vacation for an ees and then refused to allow them to use the benefit. I would pay him the 50 hours. Then, I would try to pin the supervisor down to a period of time when the ee could take a vacation (Sarcastically, I have the feeling the supervisor does not want to be pinned down). At this company, we have learned from experience that everyone should have a vacation (for their sake and for the good of the company). Finally, you have to rethink your vacation policy and possibly change it or tweak it a little bit.
  • It seems to me that you have a hard-working, dedicated employee x0:) and a callous supervisor who is using and abusing him and mismanaging her department. xx(

    Nobody is so indispensible that he can't take off a week in a five-month period. What if he got hit by a bus and missed two weeks of work? What if he quit tomorrow? (And who would blame him?) Would the department fall to pieces? If the supervisor hasn't trained anyone as his backup, she should have to cover for him.

    Not that I have a strong opinion about this...

    James Sokolowski
    HRhero.com
  • Thanks for all your input. This is the first time I've run into this problem and I agree that the supervisor who denied the vacation needs to be talked to. I hate to penalize the employee by losing vacation when he did ask for it off (even though he waited until he was ready to max out before he asked for it off evidently). I'll see how we can make it clearer in our policy and educate existing supervisors on how important it is to work with their employees in getting the vacation taken before staff max out. This time we'll probably pay it out at 100% or give him those extra vacation days. Again, thanks!
Sign In or Register to comment.