Can we deduct ?
J9JC
91 Posts
We pay vacation and sick leave seperately. We have an exempt who called in sick today, but only has 6 hours of sick leave in his bank. Can we force him to use 2 hours of vacation to cover the other 2 hours or are we just forced to make him take the entire day without pay? I guess the deducting in 8 hour blocks has me unsure.
Comments
You may make deductions from an exempt employee's salary for absences of a full day or more for personal reasons such as vacation, personal leave, and religious holidays.
Where the company maintains a bona fide sick leave plan (a plan, policy, or practice that replaces compensation lost due to sickness or disability), a corresponding deduction may be made from salary. If such a plan exists, you may make a deduction from salary before the exempt employee has qualified for the sick/disability pay as well as after the employee has exhausted benefits under the plan.
It appears to me that you can deduct the six hours and also two extra hours, which would result in a loss of pay. There doesn't appear to be anything which would allow the forced deduction of two hours vacation pay. You might want to consider offering that as an alternative to two hours with no pay and leave it up to the employee.
Do any of you warn the first time one is out of sick leave, or do you let it go a bit farther?
The leave balances are printed on each week's pay stubs, and our workforce is pretty aware of where they stand. If someone accidentally requests more leave hours than they have, our payroll system catches it. We have then tried to warn the employee that their check will be shorter than they expected.