Is Unlimited PTO a Good Thing or Nah?

[h1nch]

I'm under this time off plan and I wouldn't want to go back to having banked hours, but like others have mentioned, it depends entirely on how healthy of a relationship you have with management. My boss does not care about our time off as long as we're not being noticeably excessive so it works out really well for me.

As for how much time, my personal rule has been to take at least the amount of hours I had at my previous job, which was fairly generous based on my tenure there.

 

[Nigel Tufnel]

I get about 4wks per year, 1 week is use it or lose it, and I'm capped at 232 hours for the other pool, which accrues weekly. The longer I stay with my employer, the more hours I get, and the higher the cap.

I think its needlessly complicated, but it feels generous enough. I've taken about 2 weeks per year, though I'm going to have to take more next year because I'm near the cap and lose hours accrued over it. One of the fun hacks is that you can move your regular days off and bump them against time requested off to extend a time off request, so even though I've only used 2 weeks or so of PTO per year, I've typically had 3-4 roughly week long vacations.

 

[Necrovex]

I prefer a set number of PTO. Luckily I currently get 20 days of both sick and annual. So when I feel that itch to go on vacation, I can vanish for two weeks. I feel I wouldn't use as much PTO or sick if it was unlimited.

 

[colorblindmode]

I've never experienced such a thing. In fact we have multiple buckets of PTO, vacation, personal business, and sick leave.

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So do we.

I get 1.17 sick hours per month (which is fair, I guess, since I can use those to retire like 2 years early) and 1.8 annual leave/PTO hours per month.

 

[bastardly]

we used to have it, but switched over in the last few years, and i prefer accrued PTO just because my requests are usually me telling my boss and him saying ok, and I never submit the time, so I'm close to maxing out, one day when i leave ill be getting like a 1.5 months pay, and fuck is that going to be sweeeeeeeeeeet.

before that, i rarely overdid it, took about the same amount of time off tbh. i dont think anyone really cared for it, we were all excited for the change.

they also have a system ive never seen before where PTO and sick time are combined, which might suck in certain situations, but it also means we accrue hours like crazy.

 

[YuriLowell]

It's bad.

 

[Deleted member 5876]

The new hotness is "forced vacation". Some companies found that giving unlimited didn't work very well because peer pressure, etc. caused people to actually take less time off. Another side effect is that because its 'unlimited' companies don't have to pay you the difference when you leave.

 

[Professor Lich]

We just switched to this ourselves. They're calling it discretionary time off and I'm assuming it's happening because a lot of the company is transitioning to a WFM schedule permanently. Maybe that has nothing to do with it though.

What feels weird is I could have sworn when they sent out paperwork / documentation for it, it was mentioned that if people take too many Mondays or Fridays off, they'll be 'action'd,' upon. What's even the point then? I feel like if someone is abusing it, it would be apparent, regardless of whatever days get taken off. We've also started a team PTO calendar so people can work around each other's schedules, but that just makes it feel like we're competing for different dates / holidays. (Not that we're all too dependent on one another.)

 

[LaneDS]

My company uses something they call an individual benefit account, wherein they match some percentage of an employee's salary to deposit into the account, and the employee can then use the money in the IBA for leave, insurance, or choose to have it paid out. The way I'm setup, it's essentially unlimited leave but the combination of wanting to not give the impression of taking too much time off plus the incentive of that leave equaling additional funds means I end up not taking much time off at all.

As others have said, I prefer it (versus traditional leave structures) because if I do need to take time off there's no question whether I can or should, but it is an odd scenario.

 

[prophetvx]

why unlimited why not jsut give more PTO?

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Because you're owed fixed PTO. It's a payout whether it be at year end or termination of your employment.

Flex / Unlimited PTO allows people to not worry about counting time, need to see a doctor or run errands? Don't worry it won't impact your Christmas break or Summer vacation. Stressed or need a break, cool your boss can send you home or tell you to have a long weekend without effectively cutting your income.

It also gives businesses a lot more flexibility in mandating holiday breaks without pissing people off about losing PTO time. You always inevitability get those people who refuse to take off between Christmas and New Year to bank that bonus when there is literally no work to do during that time period.

Fixed PTO ultimately is a cost risk for a business, if you have large amounts of people banking those bonuses, it could cause operational pressures that result in layoffs or timid hiring, which can also lead to burnout or anxiety amongst your staff. Both systems have upsides and pretty major downsides if not managed correctly.

 

[Lord Azrael]

I've seen the studies, but I know that when I personally had unlimited PTO I definitely took way more time off, so I love it

 

[Filthy Slug]

It fucking blows. It seems to benefit the worst people on my team greatly, while being a pain in the ass for the overworked people.

 

[Failburger]

Nah. Give me a set number of days. I've seen so many people get fired because they take 'excessive amount of time off' while others take off a week or two every other month.

 

[Boondocks]

Oh man, before I retired we had to go online and request calender days off. And PTO and sick days were all in one pile. if you were too sick you lost your vacation. If you stayed healthy you had a nice vacation.

 

[Lebron]

My wife's work has it but it has to be approved being the catch. So if they busy or others off during the time frame you ain't getting time off

 

[N64Controller]

I worked in a studio with unlimited time off for about 3 years, it was amazing. Never having to stress about having enough weeks built up for a nice vacation, days off here and there when I needed it. When it came time for the classic "vacation months" (like July, August, September), we'd just talk among each other to make sure we always had people around for some stuff, etc. No more stressing out when I'm sick, when I needed to take an off day to receive a big delivery, personal reasons, whatever.

No one abused it, because we knew the second abuse started would be when it stopped.

Unlimited PTO is objectively the best way to go if the people are mature enough to use it correctly, and if the bosses/managers actually treat it as it's supposed to be treated. But it's dependent on the culture where you work.

 

[Swig]

My company is moving to it in February. I'm planning on taking at least what I would normally take each year, if not more. We're not really in a situation where coworkers taking too much would negatively impact others (unless they really, really abused it). Guess we'll see how it goes.

Edit: They call it Flex Time Off, and not Unlimited. If I feel like I'm being punished for taking too much, I'll probably leave the company.

 

[Gentlemen]

why unlimited why not jsut give more PTO?

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Because then a business would have to actually spend more to retain employees.

By hiding behind the 'unlimited' moniker they can fleece their broadly unorganized workforce even more!

 

[Meatfist]

Hard pass, I enjoy having it pay out when I leave a job and I've found that most places that offer it are also the same places where you'll get dirty looks for attempting to utilize it

 

[Bradford]

Yes it is good. It is cool. If you actually use it.

If you don't then regular PTO is better.

 

[Chopchop]

I've never had it before, but I feel like there would jsut be pressure to not use it. Kind of like how almost no one i know uses all of their "personal days" because they aren't supposed to be used like vacation days.

Without defined allotment for PTO, I feel like employers could find ways to sneakily pressure employees into not taking their time off, such as by piling on so much work on them that they'll feel like they're falling behind if they take a break. Or employees who don't feel secure in their position will fear taking time off because they're worried they'll look lazy.

I'd rather have employers just be more generous with paid time off, and encourage people to use all of it before the end of the year. Maybe something like 4+ weeks.

 

[Mathieran]

I think I would take less vacation than normal. It's probably not a good thing. I think all people should get 3-4 weeks off a year plus holidays.

Right now I get 3 weeks and about 12 holidays. In about a year and a half I will get 4 weeks per year and that's where my company maxes out. We have a pool for sick time that's separate from vacation that I've never emptied out except when we had a baby.

I can about guarantee I wouldn't use that much time if I had unlimited pto.

 

[AyaisMUsikWhore]

Things like this remind me that I'm in the wrong place. I don't like having a bucket of PTO and worrying about not being able to take vacation because I don't have enough PTO. I'm over this. I don't abuse what I have no but I would like to not worry about this too

 

[Bing147]

I feel like I would hate this. Right now, I get 5 weeks of vacation time a year (been in my job a long time, I would max out at one more week though I'm a few years off from that). I also get 5 paid sick days a year, and 7 paid personal days a year. So in total, I get 7 weeks and 2 days off a year paid. The personal and sick days expire if not used by the end of the year, so everyone uses them. The vacation carries over, but you can only accrue up to 150% of your time. (This year I'm carrying over about 3 weeks of my 5 weeks, so I'll have around 10.5 weeks to use next year which is pretty cool.

I rarely carry more than a few days over, this has been a weird year. I never leave any personal or sick days unused. Because I have this amount of time, and it is my time, there's an expectation that I'll use it, or at least no one feels like I'm doing anything wrong by doing so. Some people carry over more of their vacation from year to year, but at a certain point you have to use it, and as its one of our benefits, people do. I've never felt bad using time and no one has ever tried to make me feel bad for doing so.

Unlimited sounds great, except that changes the culture completely. Sure, no one's going to give you a hard time for using a day or two here or there most likely. If you use too much though they definitely could come down on you for abusing it. Even if they don't though, even if they're great and understanding and really don't mind you using this benefit they have given you, I would constantly feel worried that I was abusing it, or fear that they would come down on me for doing so, even if evidence suggested they probably wouldn't. Every day I took off would suddenly come with stress, with me wondering if what I was doing was okay. That sounds miserable.

If you think people need to have more time or need to feel less worried about using their time, just give them more so they don't constantly feel up against things. Don't create a situation where there either have to become unwritten rules (because after all, people can't keep getting paid if they take every day off forever) or where people constantly have to worry that they exist even if they really don't.

 

[Deleted member 36054]

We just switched to this ourselves. They're calling it discretionary time off and I'm assuming it's happening because a lot of the company is transitioning to a WFM schedule permanently. Maybe that has nothing to do with it though.

What feels weird is I could have sworn when they sent out paperwork / documentation for it, it was mentioned that if people take too many Mondays or Fridays off, they'll be 'action'd,' upon. What's even the point then? I feel like if someone is abusing it, it would be apparent, regardless of whatever days get taken off. We've also started a team PTO calendar so people can work around each other's schedules, but that just makes it feel like we're competing for different dates / holidays. (Not that we're all too dependent on one another.)

Click to shrink...

Yeah, it's called discretionary time off and it really needs to be discretionary. I love it. My boss trusts me so the flexibility is great. I can do things like go to the doctor or dentist and not have to worry about my days left. Hell, today one of my co-workers used it to become a US citizen.

This relies completely on the company culture though.

 

[Deleted member 12224]

Terrible.

The culture around it results in a warped view of PTO as a privilege you should try abuse rather than compensation you earned and can spend as you please.

Studies have shown this results in people taking less PTO than earned PTO. Exceptions to the rule surely exist, of course.

 

[Cels]

i don't know if anything would be different if my workplace moved to an unlimited PTO model

i get nearly 100 hours of PTO every year (in addition to vacation hours) but with the nature of my job you need to secure someone to do your work while you're out aka "coverage." sometimes i can do all my work without the aid of others in advance, but if you want 2 or more weeks off continuously it's nearly impossible without getting someone else to do it first. as you can imagine summers and the holiday season can be tough to take time off if you don't ask far enough in advance to secure coverage. this year i still have 32 PTO hours off and i don't think i'll be using them before 2021 hits

 

[The Albatross]

I like accruing time. Ive read that most people use less time when you have unlimited pto, like you don't want to be perceived as abusing the policy so you self regulate where as if you accrued your days and they were yours then you wouldnt do that.

It wouldn't be good at my company I know that. We have unlimited sick time but if you use more than 6 days a year you get flagged internally and your manager is asked to follow up on you, which is one of those cultural policies that everybody knows so everybody is very weary of it.

 

[Brandino]

I'd love to have it. Would've made the last two weeks where my son was home from daycare a lot easier.

 

[Wubby]

Sounds bad to me. Especially with peer pressure in Japanese office climate I don't see it working well here.

 

[StrangeADT]

I've had unlimited PTO for 7yrs now. It has to work with the culture. The studies people have linked here show that on average, people take less time off due to peer pressure. Our office truly encourages time off, and so it's fairly normal for me and my coworkers to take 15-30 days, depending on the year.

Addendum: even if the number of days doesn't change, I still consider it a plus because I no longer have to think about budgeting time. The equation becomes, "do I want to take time off? y/n"

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Add in "will I get passed over for promotion because joe took no days off last year, while I prefer to have a life?"
15 days is basically the legal minimum where I live. I'd hope the average trends closer to 30 which is pretty reasonable.

 

[Khamsinvera]

It's a trap. I basically have to tell my direct reports to take time off. A happy employee has a better chance of being a good employee.

Taking days off from work and decompressing / unplugging is a necessity.

As long as they had 4 weeks (28 days) / yr off + 7 days sick time, folks were regularly using them. Now that that we have UPTO, the very most time off anyone in my team has taken off is 11 days .... oooof!

I don't have to worry about folks using their UPTO, but I gotta worry about the ones not using them! Are they doing ok? Are they getting burnt out? Everything ok at home?

Just take the damn days off, whatever - go watch squirrels at the park or something.

 

[Alcoremortis]

This feels like grad student hours. Can take off whenever you want, provided you never want to take off.

 

[maxxpower]

Sounds like a scam.

 

[Vilam]

It's a scam to mentally pressure people into taking less PTO. You've no longer earned an agreed upon amount of PTO that's yours to do with as you wish... rather you feel the need to justify your usage of PTO each time you take it. Fuck that.

 

[irri]

Flexible time off is great IF you have a good relationship with your manager and the company culture is good. So there's a lot more than just "Limited PTO vs Flexible / Unlimited PTO". I like it when companies enforce minimum required vacation days, like you must take 20-25 vacation days per year, the rest being flexible.

The company I work for is going with flexible PTO next year in the US and I'm excited about it. I always use all my PTO every year.

 

[EggmaniMN]

I get 4 weeks of time off (up from 3 weeks after 10 years of service and I get a 5th week at 20 years total) and my weeks have to be "bid" in March by seniority against everyone that works the same position as I do. And after 10 years I'm only like half way up the seniority ladder so I never get any weeks I'd actually want. I have to know every week I want off for an entire year at a time.

I can't even imagine being able to just say "hey I'm going to be off this day." That sounds like paradise.

 

[808s & Villainy]

I enjoy it, but sure I guess I'm secretly getting scammed

 

[Deleted member 8752]

I've had unlimited PTO for 7yrs now. It has to work with the culture. The studies people have linked here show that on average, people take less time off due to peer pressure. Our office truly encourages time off, and so it's fairly normal for me and my coworkers to take 15-30 days, depending on the year.

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15 days? That sounds rather low for an office job. I get 20 days but even that seems like too little.

30 sounds reasonable.

 

[thesuperbrew42]

My company changed last year to this and it honestly hasn't changed much at all because we already had a culture that was supportive and encouraging for work/life balance. Just last week, my colleges outside of the US had questions for me but put in the message that I'm not allowed to respond during thanksgiving because I should be spending time with my family and they just didn't want to forget to ask me. And my boss has straight up told me before the switch that if I needed more days, we'd figure it out. And after the switch, I was told if I didn't take at least a week more than I had before, he'd grill me about it during our performance reviews. So, I think it works as a great motivator when there is a culture like that around but see how it would fail in lots of other places.

Other places I've worked at, this would be an absolute disaster. You'd have people constantly complaining that everyone is abusing the policy, whether they were or weren't. Group chats would turn into pressure on everyone to not "let each other down" because someone took a couple days off to take of something rather than finish their task. But that was because the people there didn't respect each other and they looked at people taking time off as abandoning their work. If you have a company culture that doesn't say "they're off today, don't disturb them", then stay away from policies like this.

 

[just_myles]

Man I just checked,I have 125 hours of PTO... fuckin covid.

 

[RoboPlato]

I've never even had a job with PTO. Unlimited is truly something I could not wrap my head around

 

[Br3wnor]

Man I just checked,I have 125 hours of PTO... fuckin covid.

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154 for me lol, works out perfectly cuz I'm having a kid in a few weeks but yeah, I think I've taken 1 annual leave day since March, only upside of COVID.

I get 24 (27 max once I hit 7 years with agency) annual leave days a year and 10 sick days, it's more than enough. Not a fan of unlimited leave since it depends entirely on office culture if you're going to get to take more of them than you would with a non unlimited PTO job. At least with my job they know how many days I have and that I'm going to use them one way or the other, we max out at 40 days for carrying year to year so cant't stockpile more than that without losing days. Sick carry over is unlimited at least

 

[Gustaf]

is this PTO thing different to vacation days?

 

[Armouredpriest]

Where I work, we have unlimited PTO and we also have 80 hours of sick time (40 hours of sick time can be carried over to the next year). The difference is that PTO has to be pre-approved. Sick time is for unscheduled emergencies (you don't necessarily need to be sick). The only limitation on the the unlimited PTO is that if you take a chunk of time you can only take 2 weeks in a row off at max and then you have to wait 4 weeks before taking more PTO.

For me, in practice, I generally take 5-6 weeks worth of PTO throughout the year, and I try to make sure I'm under 40 hours on sick time so I don't lose any. So I take a little more vacation then before we went to unlimited (I had 5 weeks built up do to the amount of time I've been at my job.)

 

[molnizzle]

Sounds miserable. I like having set PTO that I can take guilt-free and no one thinks any less of me for it.

is this PTO thing different to vacation days?

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Same thing. No company calls it "vacation days" anymore.

 

[-Peabody-]

I don't know if it matters because from my experience even when you want to use the limited days given your boss gets irritated with you unless it's a particularly slow period. I've had coworkers who just never take their banked hours because there is just so much work to be done and they never hire enough people to pick up the slack.

 

[Bigkrev]

If your at a workplace that has bad PTO like 2 weeks a year or something, or you fucking love traveling multiple times a year, then Unlimited is probably a good thing. If you have a good amount of PTO (I get 4 weeks vactiaon plus 2 weeks Sick leave), it's way better to have the PTO days, because those pay out when you leave. I left a job in January and was able to take home a months worth of pay because I had almost 5 weeks of vacation saved up. I maybe go on one vacation a year, mostly i just take a few long weekends in the summer to hit the beach

 

[Mengy]

It's actually more common in the US, given US companies typically are terrible with PTO allotments. Extremely common in the tech space and can be a pretty cool incentive for recruiting talent.

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Man, last summer I went on almost two dozen job interviews when our plant was contemplating shutting down, and not one of those jobs offered unlimited PTO. In fact most of them wouldn't offer more than 10 days per year!

I'd love a job with unlimited PTO. I try to take several long distance motorcycle trips every year and worrying about scheduling days to fit them in is like balancing a checkbook. With unlimited PTO I could take dream vacations without needing to sacrifice stops due to not having enough PTO to fit them in.

I could leave work early on nice days when I was all caught up on jobs.

I could take three day weekends and just work enough hours extra per week to keep projects on time.


The freedom unlimited PTO would allow sounds wonderful to me. Wish I had such a benefit.

 

[crimzonflame]

we have it, but you still need to get permission for every day off, like officially submitted, so I don't see the point. We still get questioned if we get over 2 weeks a year, and we need VP approval if we try to go over three weeks a year. It's basically a way for them to not pay for unused PTO days

Click to shrink...

Pretty much. It's bs