Annual Leave
Joel Scancarello
Annual leave is a period of paid time off work granted by employers to employees to be used for whatever the employee wishes. Depending on the employer's policies, differing number of days may be offered, and the employee may be required to give a certain amount of advance notice, may have to coordinate with the employer to be sure that staffing is available during the employee's absence, and other requirements may have to be met.[1] The vast majority of countries today mandate a minimum amount of paid annual leave by law.[2]
Among the larger countries, China requires at least five days' paid annual leave and India requires two days of paid leave for every month worked. The United States mandates no minimum paid leave, treating it as a perk rather than a right.[3]
In the European Union the countries can set freely the minimum, but it has to be at least equivalent to 4 working weeks.[14] In the Netherlands this is achieved by mandating at minimum 4 times the number of contracted hours in a person's working week; e.g. if someone works 4 days of 7 hours a week, the annual leave hours a year is 112 at minimum.
In New Zealand, 20 days' paid leave is also the normal minimum in addition to the 11 paid statutory holidays (e.g. Christmas, New Year's Day).[16] However, many employers offer 5 or more weeks, especially in the public sector.
UK employers offer 28 days per annum of annual leave with a further 8 public holidays,[10] these are referred to as Bank Holidays. Some employers may include the 8 bank holidays within their annual leave decreasing it to 20 days.
US federal law does not require employers to grant any vacation or holidays, though, as of 2007, only about 25 percent of all employees receive no paid vacation time or paid holidays.[18] Due to the lack of federal legislative requirements, paid leave in the US is mainly a matter of employment contracts and labor union agreements.[19][20] Some jurisdictions within the US, including the states of Maine and Nevada, require paid time-off days.[21]
In New Zealand, consecutive paid holidays occur for Christmas/Boxing Day, New Year's Eve/New Year's Day, and Good Friday/Easter Monday, the last of which straddle a weekend. However, these are among 11 'statutory paid holidays' that are additional to 'paid annual leave'.
An employee may use annual leave for vacations, rest and relaxation, and personal business or emergencies. An employee has a right to take annual leave, subject to the right of the supervisor to schedule the time at which annual leave may be taken. An employee will receive a lump-sum payment for accumulated and accrued annual leave when he or she separates from Federal service or enters on active duty in the Armed Forces and elects to receive a lump-sum payment.
Note 1: A temporary employee with an appointment of less than 90 days is entitled to accrue annual leave only after being currently employed for a continuous period of 90 days under successive appointments without a break in service. (This restriction only applies to the accrual of annual leave. If an employee on such an appointment already has annual leave to his or her credit from a previous appointment, he or she is allowed to use this annual leave during the temporary appointment.) After completing the 90-day period of continuous employment, the employee is entitled to be credited with the leave that would have accrued to him or her during that period.
Employees and their supervisors are mutually responsible for planning and scheduling the use of employees' annual leave throughout the leave year. Employees should request annual leave in a timely manner, and supervisors should provide timely responses to employees' requests.
Ultimately, supervisors are responsible for the overall planning, coordination, and approving of their employees' annual leave throughout the leave year so that the agency's mission and employees' needs are met, and so that employees do not approach the end of the leave year with a significant amount of annual leave that must be used or forfeited. While the final date to schedule leave applies only to situations involving the possible forfeiture and restoration of annual leave, employees should be sure to schedule and use annual leave throughout the leave year and not wait until the end of the leave year to schedule annual leave. When an employee makes a timely request for leave, the supervisor must either approve the request and schedule the leave at the time requested by the employee or, if that is not possible because of project related deadlines or the agency's workload, must schedule it at some other time. If the employee forfeits annual leave because the supervisor did not schedule the leave or request a determination that a public exigency exists that would prevent the employee from using the leave, the supervisor's negligence constitutes administrative error and the employee's leave must be restored.
Since supervisors must balance the work of the agency against the interest of the employee in using annual leave, supervisors may find it necessary from time to time ask employees how they will use the requested annual leave so that the supervisors may make informed decisions about scheduling the leave. In such cases, employees are not required to provide the supervisor with this information, but should understand that in the absence of such information, their request for annual leave may be denied based on project related deadlines or the workload of the agency. However, supervisors should not make it a standard practice to require that employees inform them how the annual leave will be used.
"Use or lose" annual leave is the amount of annual leave that is in excess of the employee's applicable annual leave ceiling. Any accrued annual leave in excess of the ceiling will be forfeited if not used by the final day of the leave year. Forfeited annual leave may be restored under 5 U.S.C. 6304(d). (See Restoration of Annual Leave fact sheet.)
A leave year begins on the first day of the first full biweekly pay period in a calendar year and ends on the day immediately before the first day of the first full biweekly pay period in the following calendar year. (See Leave Year Beginning and Ending Dates for more information.)
The maximum amount of annual leave that employees may carry over to the next leave year is shown in the annual leave ceiling table above. An agency may restore annual leave that was forfeited due to an exigency of the public business or sickness of the employee only if the annual leave was scheduled in writing before the start of the third biweekly pay period prior to the end of the leave year. (See fact sheet on Leave Year Beginning and Ending Dates for dates for scheduling "use or lose" leave.) Any annual leave scheduled after that date will be forfeited if not used by the final day of the leave year. Annual leave that was not scheduled in advance may be restored only under very limited conditions such as employees affected by the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Act (5 U.S.C. 6304(d)(3)), administrative error, or prolonged sickness of the employee.
Dismissal or closure due to weather conditions or other emergencies, end-of-year holidays granted by Executive order, and other unexpected paid time off without charge to leave may disrupt plans to use scheduled annual leave. Workdays on which a Federal activity is closed are nonworkdays for leave purposes, and employees will not be charged annual leave on such nonworkdays. If such circumstances result in an employee being unable to reschedule and use "use or lose" leave before the end of the leave year, the leave will be forfeited. When "use or lose" leave is forfeited under such conditions, it cannot be restored.
Employees may request annual leave instead of using sick leave (see Sick Leave (General Information) fact sheet). Although an employee may request annual leave for sick leave purposes, annual leave is subject to supervisory approval and may be denied. If an employee chooses to use annual leave for sick leave purposes, he or she may want to share the reason for the request with the supervisor so that the request receives proper consideration.
An agency cannot require an employee to use annual leave when the agency has placed the employee on extended excused absence (e.g., in cases where adverse actions are being pursued by the agency). However, being placed on extended excused absence does not relieve an employee of the responsibility to schedule annual leave that would otherwise be forfeited. If the employee fails to schedule (i.e., request in writing) the use of annual leave that would otherwise be forfeited, the agency cannot restore it to the employee. If an employee schedules (i.e., makes a writen request to use) annual leave, and the agency denies the request, the agency is required to restore the annual leave.
All civilian service (including previous civilian service of a reemployed annuitant) that is potentially creditable for Civil Service Retirement Service (CSRS) purposes, including service covered by the Federal Employee Retirement Service (FERS) is creditable for purposes of annual leave accrual. Potentially creditable service includes service that could be credited if the employee made deposits to the retirement fund. Such deposits are not required before the employee receives credit for annual leave accrual purposes. (See OPM's Guide to Processing Personnel Actions, Chapter 6 - Creditable Service for Leave Accrual.)
A newly-appointed or reappointed employee may receive service credit for prior non-Federal service or active duty uniformed service that otherwise would not be creditable for the purpose of determining his or her annual leave accrual under the conditions prescribed in 5 CFR 630.205. See Creditable Service for Annual Leave Accrual for Non-Federal Work Experience and Experience in the Uniformed Service.
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