Paid Time Off Essay

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Trends in time off with pay can vary from public (i.e. not for profit) and private (i.e. for profit) sector organizations. Usually public sector employees are governed by benefits that separate vacation, sick, personal days, jury duty, funeral leave etcetera. Private sector employers primarily utilize Paid Time Off (PTO) that lump all of the instances of needing time off in a time bank that each employee is responsible for maintaining. Time off with pay is a topic that is regularly evaluated throughout organizations today. In this paper I will be discussing the paid time off benefits that are offered to public employees.
Generally in the public sector and in some instances in the private sector as well, time off with pay methods separate the different types of time off in categories such as vacation leave, sick leave and personal days off. There are a variety of leave types that apply to these methods as well. Organizations also allow time off for jury duty, bereavement, sick time, holidays and off site training to name a few. These types of leave groups require managers and supervisors to manage the usage of each time category and often times a log is used to track why the time was extended. This can prove to be very time consuming depending on the type of organization you work for. In terms of paid time off, public sector employees are awarded substantial amounts of paid time off, including approximately 13 days of sick leave per year, 10 paid federal holidays and up to 26 days of paid vacation per year, contingent upon the number of years of service.
Other trends in paid benefits are the option to work flexible schedules, otherwise known as Alternative Work Schedules (AWS). AWS options include compressed work schedules, Flext...

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... without the constraints of commuting far distances, thus saving money as well.
Other benefits aligned with paid time off is sick leave awarded in 4 hour increments per pay period with no limit on accruals. Employees may use this time to attend medical appointments for themselves and dependents. The sick leave bank is also used for bereavement (up to 5 days) and funeral (up to 3 days) time off when unfortunate deaths occur.
Jury duty is another benefit where public employees are allotted time to attend court related services without charge to any of the leave banks. This time off is consider Authorized Absence (AA) and the organization absorbs the employees pay for the time off. Other ancillary benefits include time off for voting when schedules conflict with voting hours. Inclement weather allows for delays in start time with no charge to any of the leave banks.

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