Time Off Carryover Tips

This article offers three tips that will help clients understand best practices around time off carryover.

OVERVIEW

Time off carryover allows all or some of the base time off days to be moved into the following year. You can set a maximum amount of carryover time as well as an expiration date for carryover time.  The following tips will help you better understand some of the nuances of carryover administration.

CARRYOVER WITH PROBATIONARY PERIODS

If a new hire belongs to a plan with a probationary period and carryover, they will lose all carryover if the plan renews during the probationary period.

Example:Employee started December 1, 2020 and is enrolled in a plan with 3 month probationary period. The plan renews January 1, 2021.

On January 1, the time accrued from December 1-January 1 will be lost. Since the employee was still in the probationary period the carryover will not transfer.  

CARRYOVER EXPIRATION DATE

When creating a carryover expiration date, you should enter the date the carryover can no longer be used.

Example:The last day carryover should be used is March 31st. On April 1st, an employee should no longer be able to use carryover time.

The expiration date entered should be April 1st. Once April 1st hits, all carryover accrual will turn to 0.

ACCRUAL CALCULATION WITH CARRYOVER

An accrual maximum is set by the accrued days + carryover days.

In an employee has both carryover and accrued time, requests always pull from an employee’s carryover before the accrual.

If the employee does not have enough carryover to cover the full request, then all carryover will be used and the remaining time will be taken from the accrual.

If a request is submitted when carryover exists, but it is for a time past the carryover expiration date, it will deduct from accrued days.

TIP:

You can set negative accruals to carryover by selecting Allow negative accruals to carryover when setting up a time off plan.

THINGS TO CONSIDER

• For single-day time-off requests on the carryover expiration date:

  • The request will use the accrued time

• For multi-day time-off requests prior to and including the carryover expiration date: 

  • The request will use the carryover time

• For multi-day time-off requests that contain at least one day prior to the expiration date, the expiration date, and days after the expiry date: 

  • The request will use carryover until the carryover is used up 

  • Reset an employee's time off plan to confirm

• For multi-day time off requests that begin on the expiration date and includes multiple days post expiration:

  • The request will use accrued time