sharing sick leave

hr tom · September 2007

Does anyone out there have a "shared leave" policy that allows employees to donate their sick time to another ee?

Susan in La · September 2007

We have a policy by which employees may donate leave to a "crisis leave pool." Employees with a catastrophic illness or injury who run out of leave can apply to draw from the pool. We don't allow one EE to donate directly to another.

hr tom · September 2007

THANK YOU. We're considering a program to allow the same thing. I have a question regarding the rate used. EX: An ee being paid $30.00 per hr donates 16 hrs. How is the calculation made in the accounting department if the recieving ee makes $10. per hr?

NaeNae55 · September 2007

That is up to you. The company that owns us just uses hours for hours. A company I used to work for moved the money equivalent of donated hours into a pot that the sick employee could draw from. In that case a call went out companywide for donations. The employee was not told who donated or how many hours were donated, only how many were now available due to the donations of others. Most employees shared the news of how many hours they donated, but it did not come from management.

Good luck!

Nae

Susan in La · September 2007

For us it is just leave. If a person making $30 an hour donates 8 hours of leave, it doesn't matter if the person taking it makes $10 per hour or $50 per hour, leave is leave.

davids · September 2007

At my previous employer, we had a donated leave program. Donations went to a specific employee who was in need, not into a pool. The donor donated vacation leave which was converted to sick leave hours at the recipient's rate of pay. That is, if the donor who was making $20 an hour donated two hours to a recipient who was making $10 an hour, the recipient was credited with four hours of pay. But, first, we subtracted the value of continued health benefits (unless the recipient was on FMLA). The program had many other cumbersome rules and was administratively burdensome. I would not recommend using this format.

At my current employer, we has a program where a donor may give sick leave hours to a coworker (again to the employee, not a pool); but there aren't a lot of administrative strings. It is a striaght hour for hour donation without any up front deductions. This format runs smoothly. It is up to the HR Director to approve. Unless there are truly mitigating circumstances, I don't see myself ever denying donations.

HRinVA · September 2007

We have a program that allows donations to an individual, not a pool. Only sick leave can be donated, and only in 8 hour increments. If 8 hours is donated, the employee receives 8 hours, regardless of the differences in the rate of pay. The receiving employee must be in leave without pay for a week before being eligible for donations.

acullins · September 2007

Below is our policy - it also details what to do if donations exceed what is needed. Hope that helps.

(e.) In a case where an employee has a serious injury/illness and needs a considerable amount of sick leave and does not have sufficient leave to cover the absence, the employee may request donated sick leave. The employee must first use all of his/her own available leave including sick and vacation leave. Once all the employee’s leave is exhausted the employee must complete a Leave Donation Request Form. Employees with more than two hundred (200) hours of accumulated sick leave may donate any amount of sick leave they desire, so long as they do not bring their balance below 200 hours. Those employees with two hundred (200) hours or less may donate a maximum of eight hours. Upon receipt of written authorization from a donor employee the donated leave will be handled in the following manner:

1) The HR Assistant shall have the full amount of leave removed from the donor’s account and placed in a trust account in the recipient’s name along with the donations of all other employees who make donations to the same employee for the same absence.

2) If the amount of donated leave exceeds the amount needed to cover the absence the leave shall be prorated and deducted according to the amounts donated from each employee.

3) When either the recipient returns to work or the length of the absence exceeds the total amount of leave donated, which ever occurs first, the amount of leave not deducted shall be returned to the donor(s)’s account(s) in the manner described in #2. The trust account will then be closed.

sharing sick leave

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