Time Off Requests Get Ignored or Punished
Employees consistently experience unpredictable and often punitive responses when requesting time off, whether for vacation, bereavement, or sick leave. This stems from a lack of transparency, arbitrary approval processes, and a feeling of powerlessness against employer decisions, leading to stress and fear of job security. The complaints highlight a disconnect between policy and practice.
SOURCES (60)
“Someone under me quit last week. HR canceled what my team and I were working on for the week. The meetings with my boss last week and today were cancelled. HR had a meeting with the person who quit today and the other people on…”
“I plan to take one week off August 1st. I am the only one working in my office, so if I take the day off there isn’t anyone to cover me as I’m the only one hired. I get 2% vacation pay each month. Is telling my boss tomorrow enough notice for the vacation? Will he even let me go on vacation as I don’t even have a week saved up yet. I only have 2 days I can take off. submitted by /u/One_Sell_2501 [link] [comments]”
“Not necessarily, as I also need that year to sort out the logistics of moving. It’s not purely to give them time to prepare.”
“Morning, Bit of a life update. Returning from parental leave this week to a job I’ve wanted to leave for year(s), but have felt trapped due to earning potential (commission). My wife & I have been flirting with the idea of me taking at least 6-12 months off to spend time with our newborn and mentally detach from my job. Not planning to retire forever, but leverage out portfolio to take a brief hiatus from corporate. An overview of our portfolio: Ages 36 & 35 My 401k $672,000 Wife’s 401k”
“It's hard to say. It depends on the hospitals absentee policy. My current hospital you don't get a verbal warning until the 7th absences and fired at the 10th within a rolling 12 month period. Another, you get disciplinary action at your 4th absence within 6 months. Just a few examples. Others may be have lenient overall policy, but have a stricter policy while on orientation. So you need to look up your hospital specific policies. I'm sorry that you're going through this and may”
“First, I know I just typed a novel so don't read if you don't want to, this is just more about venting for me as no one in real life I know does this or cares. Sorry if I'm too verbose it's just how I write. #4 is the important one that I'm most frustrated with if you just want to read about the bs Contract Violation. ------------------- So I've been doing this part time for about 10 months now. I have 1000 deliveries and have maintained 5.0 and 100% on time, completion r”
“I’m in a super annoying place where I’ve been trying to get pregnant for a year now and ended up unexpectedly so after starting a new job. I know I won’t have fmla, I’ve looked into other maternity leave options, I’m crossing my fingers and praying the very large non-profit I work for will have a heart and give me some leave instead of firing me. But I don’t have a lot of hope since I was written up for missing work when my grandma died. My newest issue is, I don’t know when to tell them. I was”
“I've never ever had a block on my calendar made by someone else that I didn't accept like a meeting invite.”
Your terminated. Like they are going to tell you before they are ready.
“Ah the classic "have you tried turning it off and on again" approach to a pink slip. She's stalling big time.”
“An employee could come back and say they were not paid correctly if the pay dates are not correct. It sounds like they arent paying attention or that the payroll was not set up correctly in the system. These pay dates should automatically populate.”
“So as the title says, I LAST month brought up the possibility of me leaving for 5 days so I can visit my best friend because shes turning 18 and ive know her since she was 11, she means so much to me I love her 💕 my boss kinda snapped at me.. She goes " Your a manager you cant just do that! You cant just be gone for that long, because what im i going to do?! You cant just do that, you need to figure it out" mind you, she was just out for a week and some change because she hurt her arm”
“Thanks, I'll look into it. I only have proof of the approved vacation hours. The rest of the proof is in their computers. The scans and 5% cuts are "standard company policy" according to the manager, but over the years that's thousands of dollars.”
“Yeah - 4 12s is horrible. The 6 in a week is hard, but I get that one (stay in bed the whole time) day after 3. Plus since I never use my PTO if I do have a horrible week I can easily call out for mental health days when needed without stressing over PTO hours.”
“They won't pay you for the extra hours. Sorry budget issues or something. Also we are cutting your position while you're in the beds cause you brought light to the obvious holes in the net. Thanks for your diligence.”
“In my state there’s a generous paid family leave program for 12 weeks. My boss was very hostile about me taking for 2 weeks after the birth of my child. After realizing how demanding a newborn is, I want to extend my leave, but I fear retaliation. submitted by /u/Known_Smile_3858 [link] [comments]”
“got pip’ed and told to bring my hours up. idc about the job so planning to coast until they fire me. I was given a timeline and want to go take two weeks right before the timeline is up. is there any reasons to not do this? submitted by /u/hopeful202020 [link] [comments]”
“I’m bipolar type 1. I work full time and was promoted to a senior level role. I have ADA accommodations that allow me to take time off for my health. It’s 100% possible to hold a job.”
“Holidays and weekends only. Pick up on a random Tuesday? Get the fuckkk out of here!”
“Im currently an apprentice for an electrical company and this is my 3rd month working for them. These past few paychecks my boss has been shortening my hours, for example I worked 48 hours this week and he only payed me 38 and when I asked why he said because he didn’t allow those hours but he has me working those hours so I think it’s just an excuse. Luckily I have a second job that pays me more than he does so I can quit and work full time for them till I can find another electrical company or”
“I have 3 weeks of vacation, 7 personal days. I work for Professional PT. I am a PTA. submitted by /u/Agreeable_Usual7558 [link] [comments]”
“As the title says, I need to cut hours back at my job and wrote out an email to inform my manager and the business owner. It’s a bit of a unique situation because my manager doesn’t make the schedule the owner does. So going straight to my manager is just going to result in needing to talk to the owner and go into the owner will just blindside my manager. So that’s how I landed on email. Plus the owner LOVES emails. I know this availability might not work for them, but I would rather ask and the”
“For what, exactly? Even if I could find a legitimate reason, the cost of a lawyer would be too high and I'd most certainly lose my job anyway.”
“That would be nice but knowing my manager, I would have to request it off, and my it wouldn’t be approved 🤦🏽♀️”
“I took the full 8 weeks the company gave me off. It was indeed a mess when I got back but I honestly couldn’t care less and would do it again. They could have hired a temp when I was gone (I submitted all my leave paperwork through an insurance company so I assume the company was getting some reimbursement from them) but they chose not to. No time off for the dad and having to take PTO is brutal. Hope you have family nearby.”
“TLDR: Just got a vacation approved but because of a toxic workplace now I want to give my two weeks before then, would this be wrong/burn bridges or am I overthinking it? This is my first job as an adult at an animal hospital, I have been there for a couple years and unfortunately it’s become a bit toxic, we are understaffed (with no plans to rehire what we’ve lost) and despite my low pay an incredible amount of responsibility was shifted to me, was denied a fair raise and told I wouldn’t get a”
“I’m 23 weeks and about to go over my maternity leave with my boss within the next week or so. I’ll likely get 4 weeks paid and the rest is up to me. In the meantime, last week leadership said we’re only 30% funded for next year so things are not looking great. A lot of our work is based off of government funded projects - which have been defunded over the past 2 years. Anyhow, for the first 16 weeks I was full of anxiety about finding affordable childcare. Eventually, I found two options that ar”
“I posted the other day about my program breaking the time off rule (6-8 weeks straight with only 1-2 scheduled days off). Well, I got behind on my notes and now they’re threatening to make me take PTO to catch up on my notes. Is this kosher? it doesn’t feel like it. Anyone been through something similar? submitted by /u/Generic4295 [link] [comments]”
“Update on this post: https://www.reddit.com/r/daddit/s/FuLAkGxFSa TLDR HR and payroll decided after I had been on parental leave for a week of my two weeks they approved that I didn't qualify, and took the hours away without telling me. So I spent the last week arguing with HR over this. I emailed everyone I could, my boss, their boss, the assistant superintendent, our union even though I wasn't a member ( I should get on that) and the DoL. Yesterday the assistant superintendent at my wo”
“Curious if any other parents here are in NJ and are waiting for their bonding to be approved. It’s been 7 weeks for me and it’s still pending 🙄🙄🙄. It’ll be approved by the time I go back to work in 5 weeks. submitted by /u/NaturalAd760 [link] [comments]”
“I'm trying to decide between two temporary work arrangements and can't figure out which would be better for my 12-month-old. Option 1: Work 2 days per week. 5 days a week I am off. On this work days I will be away from home roughly 6:00 a.m. to 7:30 p.m (3h commute one way). Will be home just before bed time. Full salary. Option 2: Work 4 days per week (Monday to Thursday) Away from about 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m (5 mins commute) half of the salary. If this were your 1-year-old, which optio”
“Are there any exemptions for the 70 hour rule? Can you use unforeseen conditions if you would go over 70 hours? submitted by /u/DriberGlenn [link] [comments]”
“So I started my new job yesterday and I thought my shift was going to be 8:00am-12pm and then when I was clocking out the manager tells me. That I have to come back at 2:30 then I’m off at 6. And I do that Monday-Saturday. I was confused. The manager said during the interview that they asked my availability. Yes I’m available but I didn’t know it was be a 2.5 hour gap. I don’t have a car either. I’ve been waiting in the shopping center for 2.5 hours. I’m a college student and my parents don’t re”
“I was recently injured and was ordered by my doctor to take 4 days off from work. I was scheduled to work 3 of those days, and used PTO. I came back to a write up for excessive absenteeism from my direct manager. A few key details: it is illegal in my state to discipline employees for using their accrued sick time. The company uses a general PTO pool that satisfies the sick time law, so it counts as protected time. It is also company policy that disciplining an employee for calling in sick when”
“I recently got a full-time position that requires me to stay at the office until 5:30. I am also considering getting a part-time job a couple days on the weekends and maybe evenings after work for some extra cash as I want to maximize some loan repayments. I'm told there may be possibility that I'll have to stay in the office past 5:30 some days when things pick up, but it'll be pretty unpredictable. For those of you that had 9-5s along with a second job in the evenings, I'm curi”
“I got denied unpaid time off to go on a vacation from my grocery store, like that’s a reward anyway to begin with 🙄 and no call no showed to my 4pm shift on Saturday and got denied that callout, she never called me back since my calling out at 10am. Never called me at 4pm on Saturday, never called me since then. I was supposed to pick up my paycheck for the previous pay cycle on Friday but I was already away. Now I have two paychecks that I need. When would they be mailed to me? New York State”
“Hey so ive been working a full time job sun-thurs and a part time fri-sat (ik im dumb for doing that). Anyway, how frowned upon is it to give a notice and only work 3 more shift at the part time job ? They're sweet and have been great, but i just really need the time off to do my own things. submitted by /u/SnooSuggestions3608 [link] [comments]”
“yeah mental bandwidth more than literally cutting your W2 hours. if the rentals keep throwing little problems at you even with a PM, NNN probably feels appealing because fewer small fires are waiting after work.”
“I generally keep an eye on stuff because if I don’t the stress of returning to work will far outweigh the benefits of the vacation. But I turn off all notifications so I only have to check stuff on my own terms.”
“I'm due mid-December, currently 18 weeks, with a high-risk pregnancy. This is my first pregnancy and first time requesting any kind of leave. I work in a pretty volatile industry where companies lay off whole teams amounting to thousands of people whether or not things go well. We traditionally have Christmas Eve to New Years off because my office closes during that time and people still get paid. My manager and I discussed an intermittent leave so that I would still receive pay and could ge”
“2 weeks is more then enough. But personally I'd have something else lined up already. They might just tell you to leave after giving your notice”
“If you care,2 weeks. Remember this. I've been doing this 40 years and I've seen a lot of guys get fired. You know how much notice they get when fired? Zero. This occured to me at a young age. I'm not a bridge burner but its business, everyone looks out for themselves first. Especially owners. 2 weeks and not a day longer. My first dealership job was a place called Morris Ford Mercury in burnt hills ny. I worked there 15 years. The place was dead at the end. I asked to take 2 weeks va”
“I’ve just discovered this may be a thing I am able to do and I’m wondering if it is unreasonable for me to ask my employer for. I will be using PFL after baby is born to help my wife. I have accrued about 80 hours of sick time as i very seldom call out for any reason. Curious what others thoughts are on this and have you done it personally? submitted by /u/JMRTOL85 [link] [comments]”
“Your employer should be withholding for both states and paying into whichever family leave/disability program they're required to pay into. It might be both, but it depends on the two states' laws and whether they've established any reciprocity for this kind of thing. I would think the most likely case is you pay into MA's system and would claim maternity benefits there, just as you would file an unemployment claim in MA if you needed to. But really you have to ask your company&#”
“When I'm on leave, I'm on LEAVE. Zero service, no phonecalls. I turn off notifications for Teams and Outlook (if it doesn't ping I don't think about it). I just did my first 9 day vacation where I didn't look at how work was going once and it's the first time I've felt refreshed from a vacation in years. I also treat leave requests as a notice and not an option--I will be going on leave, or my team will be going on leave, and the company can work around it. I usually”
“At my previous job (banking), most employees were required to take 2 continuous weeks off at any point during the year on top of the 20 days PTO we were given and the worked holidays we were reimbursed. I worked in accounting so we usually worked the standard banking holidays. Amounted to be about 8 weeks of PTO each year.”
“It became customary to have summer vacations because it is the end of school, and if you have to pay to have your kids camp somewhere might as well go with them too. In some countries they have specific months/weeks where basically the whole country is off.”
“US public accountant here, I get 27 days maximum PTO (17 accrued, 10 can be banked from overtime between 1/15-4/15 when there's 6 day workweeks) and 9 holidays. Our office is unfortunately open through the end of the year where some close for a couple weeks in December. However, most people are just burning excess PTO by then because only 40 hours can roll over into the next year. For sick time I think we get a few hours each biweekly pay period and it can accrue up to like 536 hours or some”