combining vacation and sick

[Anonymous]

Do I have to offer separate sick leave or can I designate a lumpsum PTO that the nanny can use per her desire? Pros and cons?

[Anonymous]

My current employers offered me 2 weeks PTO, one of which is at their discretion. So basically I have 5 days that can be used as vacation or sick time. I am currently searching for a better option. If you decide to go with a straight PTO setup, be sure to account for a couple of sick days beyond her vacation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do I have to offer separate sick leave or can I designate a lumpsum PTO that the nanny can use per her desire? Pros and cons?

You can do whatever you want--it's optional. This following is what I do and why. I provide separate sick leave and vacation leave (6 and 10 days, respectively). All sick leave must be used up during the calendar year so any unused does not carry over to the next year nor can be cashed out if unused. Sick leave is meant to cover medical appointments and illnesses that come up during the year so your nanny can take care of herself and not bring contagious illnesses into your home without fear of losing pay. Vacation leave can carry over to the next year but cannot accrue more than two weeks. Vacation is meant to be a break from work in order to rest and rejuvenate so you want them to take vacation. Unused vacation can be cashed out when they leave the job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do I have to offer separate sick leave or can I designate a lumpsum PTO that the nanny can use per her desire? Pros and cons?

You can designate it all as PTO, most nannies would be very happy with that.

Pro would be if she got seriously ill or had an emergency in the family, PTO could be used for that right away, whereas vacation time often comes with a minimum-advance-notice clause (I have to give three weeks notice before taking a vacation day). Con would be nanny taking all of those days off - for example, I receive two weeks of vacation and 5 sick days. I will probably not use any of my sick days as I don't often get sick and would feel badly for using one when I didn't absolutely have to. If, instead, I received 15 days of PTO I would surely use them all (without feeling guilty).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
You can designate it all as PTO, most nannies would be very happy with that.

Pro would be if she got seriously ill or had an emergency in the family, PTO could be used for that right away, whereas vacation time often comes with a minimum-advance-notice clause (I have to give three weeks notice before taking a vacation day). Con would be nanny taking all of those days off - for example, I receive two weeks of vacation and 5 sick days. I will probably not use any of my sick days as I don't often get sick and would feel badly for using one when I didn't absolutely have to. If, instead, I received 15 days of PTO I would surely use them all (without feeling guilty).

+1

Agree with this PP on all counts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do I have to offer separate sick leave or can I designate a lumpsum PTO that the nanny can use per her desire? Pros and cons?

You can designate it all as PTO, most nannies would be very happy with that.

Pro would be if she got seriously ill or had an emergency in the family, PTO could be used for that right away, whereas vacation time often comes with a minimum-advance-notice clause (I have to give three weeks notice before taking a vacation day). Con would be nanny taking all of those days off - for example, I receive two weeks of vacation and 5 sick days. I will probably not use any of my sick days as I don't often get sick and would feel badly for using one when I didn't absolutely have to. If, instead, I received 15 days of PTO I would surely use them all (without feeling guilty).

This doesn't have to be the case. OP can be flexible on that point.

[Anonymous]

I would separate it in the contract but if a serious illness comes up, I would let her take some of her vacation time as sick time. We offered 2 weeks (one week our choosing and one week her choosing) plus 3 unscheduled sick/PTO days.

The downside if offering it together is if the nanny uses it up as vacation and then gets sick. If this happens it should be time off without pay. You create the incentive the nanny to come in of she really sick and hope that you will send her home with pay for extra day since she has used up her leave on vacation already.

If she needs more than 3 days off because she gets sick more often, you could let her dip into her 5 days of vacation assuming she hasn't used it yet.

[Anonymous]

In our contract, we offered 2 weeks vacation time and 3 sick days for our PT nanny (who works 3 days per week). We wound up giving her 2 weeks of vacation over the summer, and when she wanted to take an additional trip this fall, I offered her the option of using her "sick" days since she seems to never get sick and it seemed unfair for her to effectively lose those paid days off as a penalty for not getting sick. (I doubt our nanny would have cared if we hadn't offered sick time to begin with as several previous employers told us she very rarely, if ever, got sick--but I didn't want to put her in the predicament of feeling like she should come in to work when sick.) I think having some flexibility can be really helpful--in return she has agreed to work some during the week of Christmas when we previously thought we'd be able to give her the week off. For the new contract which will start in January I'm planning to offer the same deal or something similar--a couple of weeks vacation time, plus an additional week that could be used as sick time or at her discretion--i.e. for appointments or, if she prefers, vacation time.

[Anonymous]

My nanny gets 12 days PTO all her choice. This covers both vacation and sick days.

It's not a ton of sick leave, but I figured the trade off is that it's all her choice, so when we go on vacation (about 4 weeks/yr) she has more paid time off.

[Anonymous]

Oh (14:49 here); I also let her roll it all over. We're moving in the summer of 2014, so I know I won't end up with months of PTO to pay out whenour time together is done, so I was willing to do this.

[Anonymous]

I see no reason why it is good for an employer to classify it all as PTO. we keep seperate VAC and sick banks but of course if she wants to use VAC days if she's sick and out of sick days, then she can. we pay out sick days at end of year if unused though to incentivize only using them if needed. we do not roll over VAC but we only give the standard 2 weeks so I think it is not hard for her to "use up" the extra week of her choice each year.

[Anonymous]

I classify it all as PTO because if you're going to pay it all out anyway at the end of the year, what's the difference? I don't really care if my nanny comes to work sick, either (not talking SARS or puking everywhere, obviously, but if she's sneezing, so what?), so if she wants to save up all of her paid days for vacation, then that's fine. People do that anyway.

[Anonymous]

"I classify it all as PTO because if you're going to pay it all out anyway at the end of the year, what's the difference? I don't really care if my nanny comes to work sick, either (not talking SARS or puking everywhere, obviously, but if she's sneezing, so what?), "

1) not everyone pays out VAC days. I am 21:20 and only pay out sick days since it's possible you may not need them and then i prefer she not call out last minute just to "use them up". VAC is use or lose though - this is the same policy as my work has.
2) what mom cares if nanny comes in sneezing? And what responsbile employee stays home for that either? Sick days are for exactly what you said - puking, strep throat, etc. serious stuff that you don't want in your house and that no employee would reasonably consider trying to "work through."

[Anonymous]

I initially wanted this too--I get this at my job.
But for some reason I separated it out on the contract and I'm glad I did.

My nanny decided to take her five remaining takes of vacation 2 weeks before contract renewal the following year. She would've decided to take 10 days off if I had combined.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do I have to offer separate sick leave or can I designate a lumpsum PTO that the nanny can use per her desire? Pros and cons?

You can do whatever you want--it's optional. This following is what I do and why. I provide separate sick leave and vacation leave (6 and 10 days, respectively). All sick leave must be used up during the calendar year so any unused does not carry over to the next year nor can be cashed out if unused. Sick leave is meant to cover medical appointments and illnesses that come up during the year so your nanny can take care of herself and not bring contagious illnesses into your home without fear of losing pay. Vacation leave can carry over to the next year but cannot accrue more than two weeks. Vacation is meant to be a break from work in order to rest and rejuvenate so you want them to take vacation. Unused vacation can be cashed out when they leave the job.

I understand, but would prefer to add sick to PTO so I can plan on it! The Friday or Monday flu to use up sick leave puts me into scramble mode, I would far rather plan in advance for a personal day.