Sick time off request instead of vacation

sk8n

An hourly employee put in a request for time off for a month from now: a week off, designated as 3 days vacation and 2 days 'sick' because she is traveling to take care of her elderly aunt's finances as part of her trustee responsibilities. (She said she'll probably have fun only 3 days of her trip.) She prefaced her written request by asking me if she could take sick leave (family leave) and I told her it was not appropriate: 1) her aunt is not immediate family, 2) she is not sick 3) this ee has 8 days of earned vacation available at this time and 4) we are less than 50 employees and FMLA is not available to her -- and this is not a qualifying event anyhow. She said that she has earned the sick time and wants to use it...and she put in the written request for it anyhow.

We are a small organization: me and ten employees. She has always managed to use all of her sick time before the end of the year, in half days, typically, when I am certain she is not 'sick' but wants to use it or lose it. SO, if she has to use vacation for all of her trip now, I expect I'll get a call later telling me she's sick for two days.

How would you handle this request: approve as requested, deny, charge all to vacation? Other options?

Nat

We only allow employees to use earned sick time if they are sick or have to take an immediate family member for a doctor's visit. We NEVER let employees use sick time instead of vacation. I would deny this request.

moneyman

Our answer to this problem was to re-write our leave policy and grant only "paid time off". In that fashion, you take time off when you need it, for whatever reason, and when it is gone, that's it. This was received well by the employees who never got sick. In effect, they just earned another week of vacation/personal time.