Comments on: Paying to Go Unpaid

By: wadE

wadE — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 17:41:35 +0000

“spread out financial impact”… nice… here there is rumors that we may severely limit the number of PTO days you can roll over year to year b/c those unused days hit the budget at the end of each year… I hate accountants…

By: monkey

monkey — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 22:12:21 +0000

I get *real* tired of corporate-ish verbiage that trumpets “BAD FOR EMPLOYEE” as “OUTSTANDING NEW PROGRAM”. Just be honest. Let people make up their own minds whether or not to participate. Don’t snowball or whitewash. Like you note, it’s insulting. But then again, they just tipped their hand as to what they think of your intelligence…

By: alex

alex — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 16:46:11 +0000

I did come across some verbiage while looking up an unrelated benefit, that pitched these days as a way to spread out the financial impact. And THAT, I agree with. Seems like they could have found a way to mention that while trying to sell me on this ‘outstanding benefit’. I still wouldn’t agree, but I might have been slightly less insulted.

By: monkey

monkey — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 05:41:42 +0000

I’ve got an arrangement like wadE used to have. Not much vacation but unlimited sick (unless it’s more than 40hrs consecutive — then it’s short-term disability). And I’ve never been hassled about the sick usage.

Alex, are you guys (or any of the hourly workers) unionized?

By: Bounce

Bounce — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 21:10:05 +0000

I remember the PTO days. It always lead to Shaun @ FanBuzz getting deathly sick and using all his time on sick days b/c everyone else would come in sick and eventually the strain would get stronger and stronger until it knocked out the resident germaphobe (aka Shaun). Good times!

By: alex

alex — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 20:10:17 +0000

I’m quite sure it’s accurate – the program description is very detailed, and I don’t see any other way to read something like: “The cost of your paid time off will be based on your hourly pay rate in effect on January 1, 2010…”

By: wadE

wadE — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 19:37:40 +0000

I’ve been dealing with this since I left the consulting world. At my employer it’s called “PTO” (Paid Time Off). It’s a catch all bucket that includes sick time. At previous places you had Vacation Days, Holidays, and Personal Days. Sick time was on your honor. We were all professionals and we were generally so busy that you didn’t have the luxury of taking a lot of sick time unless you were actually sick. Regardless, it sucks.
Anyway, are they really asking you to buy days off that are unpaid? At most places when you run out of vacation days you just take days unpaid. Are you sure your description is accurate?