Legal Question in Employment Law in California

Vacation compensation

Hello,

I have a question regarding vacation compensation:

I work for a company that has a cap on the total hours allowable for accrual. I reached the cap and was not notified by my employer that had occurred. Since then, I have missed out on 10 hours that could not be accrued. I only found out that I reached the maximum amount because I noticed on my pay-stub that 0.00 vacation hours were accrued the previous pay period, and I emailed payroll inquiring why.

I was told by payroll, and followed up with HR that I had reached the limit and could no longer accrue until I drop down from the 132 hours. Furthermore, I was also told by an HR representative that ''I�m sorry you weren�t aware of the fact that you were near your maximum. I�m sure that you will now be on top of your balance based on your check stub.''

My question is this: Is there a CA law or policy that requires employers to inform employees that they are near or have reached the maximum accrual allowance for vacation time, since vacation time is considered to be an earned wage? If not, does the policies employed by HR need to state that it is the employee's responsibility to check the vacation accrual and not exceed the cap?

Thank you for your help.


Asked on 7/06/06, 1:42 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys
Michael Kirschbaum Law Offices of Michael R. Kirschbaum

Re: Vacation compensation

Vacation pay is a fringe benefit that companies may offer at their discretion. The benefits vary from company to company. Furthermore, each company has the right (subject to certain limitations) to place conditions on how and when the vacation pay is earned.

However, once the vacation pay is earned it cannot be forfeited. The question is when the vacation pay is actually earned or accrued. This depends on the policy of the company. There is no law on how that policy is to be communicated to the employee. A well run company may inform all new employees at the beginning of their employment, what the policy is, either in the form of an offer letter or in written policies contained in a handbook the employee is asked to read and sign for.

Poorly run companies do a bad job communicating their policies. But this doesn't mean they don't have qualifying criteria. If they can show they have consistently been putting caps on accrued vacation (which is legal), you probably don't have a claim. If, however, they did not have caps before and arbitrarily decided to start but haven't communicated that fact to the employees, you may have a valid claim for the hours earned.

I hope this helps understand the law better.

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Answered on 7/10/06, 7:53 pm


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