Why Americans take only half their vacation time

[ZLoth]

From CBS News/Marketwatch:

Why Americans take only half their vacation time

Americans are lousy about taking vacations, and it's not only because the U.S. is the sole industrialized country that doesn't guarantee paid days off.

"Fear is still motivating people to not be away from the workplace," even though concerns about layoffs have mitigated since the recession, said Rusty Rueff, a career and workplace expert at employment site Glassdoor.

American workers only used half of their eligible vacation time during the past 12 months, a Glassdoor survey found. The top reason for not taking vacation time was the concern that no other employee could do the job, followed by a fear of getting behind. Seventeen percent of respondents said they were afraid of losing their job.

FULL ARTICLE HERE

[Duke87]

While it may seem as if Americans are more dedicated workers -- that old Protestant work ethic kicking in -- the reality may be more stark. Thanks to technology, which makes it almost impossible to claim you didn't read an email or aren't available via phone, there's a growing sense of fear about taking a genuine, disconnected vacation.

I wouldn't call it "fear", but this is definitely true. In my job, my coworkers know when I am on vacation and know not to call me when I am. But the clients I work with usually do not know when I am on vacation and even if they did, many of them do not have a point of contact other than me and thus would have to call me anyway. This means that if I am taking a week off, I am not at liberty to completely pretend my job does not exist for that time as much as I'd like to, since ignoring a client for a week without even responding to say "on vacation, will deal with this when I get back" is totally unprofessional. Like it or not, we live in a world where taking more than 48 hours to respond to someone is rude, regardless of where you are or what you're doing. Completely unplugging is not socially acceptable.

As for people not going on vacation at all, well...
1) Just because someone has vacation time does not mean they can afford to take a trip somewhere. Some people will take vacation days and not travel, but others will not see a point in doing that.
2) Likewise, there are (shockingly) people who have little interest in traveling even if they could afford to. These people may similarly see little use for vacation days.
3) Some people are just compulsive workaholics and shudder at the thought of missing a day of work for any reason. I work with at least one of those.


Also, the actual availability of vacation time depends on more than just the number of days offered. I have it easy: if I want to take vacation time, all I have to do is inform my manager and that's it, it's done. But most companies require that employees put in a formal request for time off on specific days, and that request may be approved or denied. I'm sure you also have people who would like to take vacation time, but keep having their requests denied because "we're gonna be busy that week, I need you in the office" or whatever. And then you have the banking industry, where demanding that employees cancel their vacation plans at the last minute because something suddenly came up that they need to work on NOW is normal and expected.

[corco]

Also, the actual availability of vacation time depends on more than just the number of days offered. I have it easy: if I want to take vacation time, all I have to do is inform my manager and that's it, it's done. But most companies require that employees put in a formal request for time off on specific days, and that request may be approved or denied. I'm sure you also have people who would like to take vacation time, but keep having their requests denied because "we're gonna be busy that week, I need you in the office" or whatever. And then you have the banking industry, where demanding that employees cancel their vacation plans at the last minute because something suddenly came up that they need to work on NOW is normal and expected.

I think that's a big problem. When I was in grad school, I worked overnights at a hotel. For me to get a night off was nearly impossible- I had to request it like a month in advance, I usually had to train somebody to work overnights in the meantime, and it was often denied anyway. The only way I was able to take time off was when I had maxed out my vacation time, and if I didn't use it I'd lose it, so at that point they basically had to let me take it and they would.

My shift was R/F/S/S overnight, working 4/10s. In the two years I worked there, I was off two Saturday nights and three Friday nights.

Overnights are worst case, but getting time off in the service industry can be quite difficult.

[oscar]

In my job, my coworkers know when I am on vacation and know not to call me when I am. But the clients I work with usually do not know when I am on vacation and even if they did, many of them do not have a point of contact other than me and thus would have to call me anyway. This means that if I am taking a week off, I am not at liberty to completely pretend my job does not exist for that time as much as I'd like to, since ignoring a client for a week without even responding to say "on vacation, will deal with this when I get back" is totally unprofessional. Like it or not, we live in a world where taking more than 48 hours to respond to someone is rude, regardless of where you are or what you're doing. Completely unplugging is not socially acceptable.

My former job, as a Federal agency lawyer, did allow some latitude for "unplugging" when necessary, using auto-replies for e-mails and voicemail to let people know when I was out of the office, and also arranging for others in my office to cover for me as needed.  Usually I checked for messages once a day, but when that was not possible -- more often when I was medically unavailable than from travel to remote locations -- we found a way to manage.

Of course, it helped that working for the government, I didn't really have outside "clients" to please (except in an ironic sense -- if I had you under investigation, you didn't have a lot of choice in the matter).  My friends in private law firms had much tighter electronic tethers, obligated to be available to their clients pretty much 24/7.  That was a key reason for my not leaving the government until I retired.

Some of the remote places I visited that had no cellphone/Blackberry/other smartphone reception used that as a marketing advantage, guaranteeing visiting businessmen that they would be pretty much "unplugged" whether their offices and clients liked it or not. 

[realjd]

I wouldn't call it "fear", but this is definitely true. In my job, my coworkers know when I am on vacation and know not to call me when I am. But the clients I work with usually do not know when I am on vacation and even if they did, many of them do not have a point of contact other than me and thus would have to call me anyway. This means that if I am taking a week off, I am not at liberty to completely pretend my job does not exist for that time as much as I'd like to, since ignoring a client for a week without even responding to say "on vacation, will deal with this when I get back" is totally unprofessional. Like it or not, we live in a world where taking more than 48 hours to respond to someone is rude, regardless of where you are or what you're doing. Completely unplugging is not socially acceptable.

Outlook autoreply + voicemail message with contact info for your alternate isn't sufficient?

[vtk]

My shift was R/F/S/S overnight

Shouldn't that be R/F/S/N?



My paid time off accumulates by one chunk of about 10 hours every three months. I have something like 60.3 hours saved up, and I intend to take two one-week vacations this year.  Actually that number doesn't seem to have gone up for a while, and I wonder if I'm maxed out.

[agentsteel53]

My paid time off accumulates by one chunk of about 10 hours every three months. I have something like 60.3 hours saved up, and I intend to take two one-week vacations this year.  Actually that number doesn't seem to have gone up for a while, and I wonder if I'm maxed out.

the accumulation acceleration is very nice.  mine goes up 5 days/year for every 4 years of service.  (hooray 4 year anniversary in 4 days!)  so that's about 1.25 days/year^2 acceleration (and it's also very coarse granularity), while yours is 10 hours/year/3 months which comes out to 5 days/year^2 if I'm doing the math correctly. 

a cap of 60.3 hours does not seem correct... one would not be able to take a vacation longer than about a week and a half!  my cap is 240 hours, which is a very nice thing to have.

[hbelkins]

I have a work-assigned smartphone (a BlackBerry, which I hate; I will hopefully be getting an iPhone in a few months) and an iPad. That means I can take calls, answer emails and perform functions of my job no matter where I am.

However, when I am going to be gone, I always make my supervisor and co-workers aware of how reachable and accessible I will be. If I am going to be traveling, I make it known that I will not be able to respond during business hours. More and more states are requiring hands-free use of cell phones, and I don't have a hands-free device for my BlackBerry and won't pay for one out of my own pocket. Also, even more states prohibit emailing while driving and I'm usually on a tight enough schedule that I don't want to waste 15 minutes reading and answering messages. That's what the out-of-office auto-reply is for. I also set my office phone to play an out-of-office greeting and set it to NOT accept messages; instead giving an alternate number for assistance.

I try to make it known that I may be able to take care of business messages in the evening hours, but that's not always the case. In actuality, I've never really been totally unplugged, as occasionally I will fire off a quick reply if I get a chance.

About the only time I've been totally out of contact is when I'm driving in some rural mountainous areas where I don't have cell service.

[Alps]

Interesting that when my company announced it is no longer paying off vacation days over the maximum, so many people scrambled to take days off because they were maxed out. I've maintained a balance of about half of my maximum hours. I conserve days to take a couple of long trips, but I'm never scared about being laid off. Is it odd that I expect to be judged on my performance?

[Duke87]

Outlook autoreply + voicemail message with contact info for your alternate isn't sufficient?

My company does not allow us to set up automatic replies on our email, for security reasons.

As for voicemail, I suppose I could change that, but since I would still have to check my messages to delete them (and to make the light stop blinking), it wouldn't really save me much effort. So meh.

I've maintained a balance of about half of my maximum hours. I conserve days to take a couple of long trips, but I'm never scared about being laid off. Is it odd that I expect to be judged on my performance?

No, but all other things being equal, an employee who takes less vacation time is marginally more productive than an employee who uses it all. So if you know layoffs are coming, it becomes a competition to prove you're more productive than your coworkers in any way you can.

Now, in my office they actively encourage everyone to use their vacation time, so this doesn't apply!

[seicer]

I suppose I'm lucky. My current employer allows 3 weeks of vacation and unlimited sick time. I use all of my vacation strategically - spring time for waterfalls and backpacking trips, summer sparsely (too hot to camp or backpack good distances), fall for foliage and backpacking trips. My new workplace allows for 3 weeks as well, plus unpaid whenever. When I travel overseas, it's usually a combination of vacation and unpaid.

My coworker is looking at leaving and his new workplace has TWO days of vacation for the first year and FIVE days a year after that. Oh, you can buy an extra five days of vacation after your first year. And turnover at that place is quite high.

Screw that.

[vtk]

while yours is 10 hours/year/3 months

No no, that's 10 hours / 3 months, or 40 hours per year. No acceleration.

The reason more hasn't accumulated lately is more likely beaurocratic incompetence, or maybe I haven't "earned" it due to a safety violation (on the part of myself or possibly the whole department).

[KEK Inc.]

I spend too much money on my days off.   Going on vacation would probably make me broke.  I managed to spend well over a grand on just dining out since New Years.

[Dr Frankenstein]

When you don't use your vacation days, you're basically working that time for free. Your employer expects (working - vacation) days of productivity for what they pay you over a year. When you don't take your vacation days, you're adding extra working days back into that productivity equation, but you don't get paid for them.

Ergo, I never let my vacation time go to waste. I almost did once because of a miscalculation on my part, but I managed to get HR to transfer them to the following year, and I took them that year. If I have no vacation plans, I'll use that time off on other things.

I set an auto-reply on my e-mails and a voicemail message every time I leave, telling people to reach my backup in case of an emergency, or wait until I get back. Only one of my colleagues has my cell phone number, and he hasn't ever contacted me during vacation so far.

Anyway, when the end of the year comes closer and I have unused vacation days, my boss will bug me to take them.

[jeffandnicole]

I work with the government, so of course they're pretty generous with time off.  There's 3 personal days we have to use every year.  We can carry over our sick days indefinitely.  Our vacation time we can carry over up to one year's worth. 

There's many people that use up their entire time ASAP...or at least within the year.  There's a few that never use their entire allotment and lose a few days.  Me, I don't lose time, but I'm a carry-over. 

I've been here 15 years or so.  At 12 years, I got 20 days vaca.  Last year was the first year I carried over the entire 20 days.  I generally carry over about 10 - 15 days a year, but took a little less time off last year, so it allowed me to carry over all 20 days.

A few years back, in December, I had an appendectomy...on my birthday, no less! (Happy Birthday Me!).  Because I rarely use my sick time, I took 2 weeks off (sick time) after the surgery to recover, then returned to work.  At the end of the year, I still has sick time to carry over from that year alone!

BTW, after that surgery was ONLY time I appreciated full-serve gas in NJ.  Getting into and out of the car was a pain.  I even paid to park in the closer parking garage the day or two after I returned, just so I wouldn't have a longer walk to deal with.

[Pete from Boston]

When you don't use your vacation days, you're basically working that time for free. Your employer expects (working - vacation) days of productivity for what they pay you over a year. When you don't take your vacation days, you're adding extra working days back into that productivity equation, but you don't get paid for them.

Yes.  I believe it's a federal rule that vacation days are legally compensation, hence the requirement that you be paid for any vacation balance when leaving. 

This makes it even more ridiculous that there are workplaces where the culture discourages taking losable vacation days — this is like pressuring someone to return a few paychecks.

[Scott5114]

When you don't use your vacation days, you're basically working that time for free. Your employer expects (working - vacation) days of productivity for what they pay you over a year. When you don't take your vacation days, you're adding extra working days back into that productivity equation, but you don't get paid for them.

Yes.  I believe it's a federal rule that vacation days are legally compensation, hence the requirement that you be paid for any vacation balance when leaving. 

To my knowledge there is no such requirement. Workplaces cash out vacation balances to prevent employees from putting a two-week notice in and then redeeming all of their vacation time before it is forfeited.

[jeffandnicole]

http://www.dol.gov/dol/topic/workhours/vacation_leave.htm

There is no such law.  In fact, the law states that businesses are NOT required to pay employees for vacation time.

Government contracts are different, and states are permitted to have rules that state otherwise.

[1995hoo]

When you don't use your vacation days, you're basically working that time for free. Your employer expects (working - vacation) days of productivity for what they pay you over a year. When you don't take your vacation days, you're adding extra working days back into that productivity equation, but you don't get paid for them.

Yes.  I believe it's a federal rule that vacation days are legally compensation, hence the requirement that you be paid for any vacation balance when leaving. 

This makes it even more ridiculous that there are workplaces where the culture discourages taking losable vacation days — this is like pressuring someone to return a few paychecks.

Bear in mind that Dr Frankenstein is from Canada, where the rules may be different from the rules in the USA or in any given state.

[ZLoth]

California Labor Law is a bit different from many states in that vacation time is considered part of accumulated wages.

Q. What happens to my earned and accrued but unused vacation if I am discharged or quit my job?
A. Under California law, unless otherwise stipulated by a collective bargaining agreement, whenever the employment relationship ends, for any reason whatsoever, and the employee has not used all of his or her earned and accrued vacation, the employer must pay the employee at his or her final rate of pay for all of his or her earned and accrued and unused vacation days. Labor Code Section 227.3. Because paid vacation benefits are considered wages, such pay must be included in the employee's final paycheck.

FULL INFO HERE

Considering how the business currently is for the past few years, I've been stingy with taking vacation time, and now I'm closely monitoring my accumulation so that I don't cap out. It makes approvals a bit easier especially when I give advance notice.

[roadman]

When I first started with my current employer, we would get our vacation time in a single chunk at the beginning of July (start of the fiscal year).  Because of the very stringent "use or lose" policy that has always applied to vacation hours that exceeded the maximum carryover limit, many of the senior staff that had accrued a large number of hours over the years would largely be absent for most of the month of June.

This is far less of an issue now since they shifted to monthly accrual of leave time several years ago.  Also, the "use or lose" deadline has been changed to the end of the calendar year instead of the fiscal one, and HR gives employees at least six month's advance notice about any "use or lose" balances.

[vdeane]

I think vacation time is legally NOT considered to be compensation... in fact, banks consider accrued vacation time to be a liability!  At least, that was the explanation the company I worked for gave when they adopted a "use it or lose it" policy... apparently the bank forced them to.  Even though the company considered the money for the vacation pay as already spent, the bank didn't.

[Laura]

I've only ever had one job where I had paid vacation time (1 week) so it was easy enough to take.

I'm currently a contractor so I don't get any paid time off. I'm careful about the time I take, but I still take time off for the occasional long weekend and vacation. I need to for my own sanity, to be honest. I went for almost three years without a vacation at one point, and it kept me in a state of perpetual stress. I now include the lost wages as part of my vacation budget. 

Mike gets two weeks of vacation at his job, but he isn't allowed to use more than one week at a time. What usually happens is that he uses one week as a full week and the other divided up over the course of the year.


iPhone

[Scott5114]

a cap of 60.3 hours does not seem correct... one would not be able to take a vacation longer than about a week and a half!  my cap is 240 hours, which is a very nice thing to have.

This is probably by design. For workplaces that have employees who are not readily interchangeable, someone missing for a week and a half is annoying but not horribly disruptive. "We need to have Brad look at the project plans before we proceed. But he's on vacation. Remind me to run it by him on Wednesday." An absence of 48 work days (assuming I mathed the 240 hour cap right) can be outright disruptive. And if there's no one else qualified to do Brad's work, imagine what will be waiting for him when he gets back.

I know, I know, you should have a backup employee that can step in and take over if Brad is gone. But occasionally, Brad may be "irreplaceable"–he may have a insightful technical mind, or be an artist with a distinct style. Or Brad could just be one of those guys who keeps everything running smoothly and you don't realize to what extent the company depends on him until he vanishes for 48 days.

Probably the best thing would be to have a high cap like yours but disallow anyone from spending more than, say 80 hours in one go.

[vtk]

240 hours is six weeks off, or 30 workdays, assuming the company doesn't allow redeeming more than 40 vacation hours per week.