Approval of paid time off

[Guest Liesl]

We are a small company with 20 full time employees. We write our name on a calendar when we want a day off. The office manager checks the calendar periodically, but does not need to approve time off. However, we had a situation where 5 people were off. It seemed (on paper) that all departments were covered. However, the phones were crazy and we all departments could not be covered adequately. I need to come up with a policy of "writing your name on the calendar". Do we set a limit of number of people off on one day, or do we take on a case by case basis? (i.e. workload requirements, etc.) I can see a lot of trouble (favortism-- perceived or actual) ahead. I feel that all time off should be approved ahead of time. Does anyone have any suggestions?

[Sheila K]

Liesl:

Although we are a larger company, we do set restrictions in each of our branches and departments. You are perfectly within your rights to limit the number of people taking vacation on a particular day.

We must submit our requests for vacation to individual branch or department managers. In most instances, only one employee may be off on any given day. Depending on the size of the branch/department, two people may be granted the same day off.

We require all employees to take a full 5 consecutive days off per year for security reasons. All requests for this time are made in January. From this pool of requests, seniority generally determines the "winner" in case of conflicting requests. Once these dates are set, the balance of the time is granted on a "first come, first served" basis, regardless of seniority.

Vacation time adjacent to holidays may be requested, but can be denied if the workload will not allow for time off. In addition, no employee may take more than two "extended" holiday periods (vacation adjacent to holidays) per year. In other words, I can't take additional time around each and every holiday so that I have 10 extra long weekends per year.

We also do not allow an employee to have vacation time adjacent to the same holiday two years in a row. If I take a week before Christmas in 1998, I am not eligible for a week around Christmas 1999. This is REGARDLESS of seniority.

Finally, I do believe in a written policy for scheduling vacation time. Until recently, we (HRD) placed all of the "approved" vacation time into a centrally located calendar found on our computer system. This allowed for all branch/department managers to review the vacation schedule and make decisions based on staffing levels.

Good luck...Sheila K