I have a new (two-months-employed) salaried exempt employee that has been taking between three and six hours a week to go to doctor’s appointments. He says that this will not continue forever and should soon stabilize to a monthly appointment. He has expressed to me multiple times in writing that he does not expect to be paid for the hours that he is taking off. Can you shed some light on any laws that I should know about for salaried employees and taking time off?
To read my answer, click here: When Salaried Exempt Employees Take Time off, What Happens to Their Pay?
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One thing not mentioned in this article was the employer aware of these apparently needed medical appointments time-offs prior to them occurring. I am assuming based on the employee’s comments that this medical need was announced upfront and they are doing everything possible to work their job around those needs. Since nothing was mentioned about the type of job and hours of business, the advice to find a working arrangement is sound, but if this business has a need for their personnel to be present during limited hours, then obviously docking from their PTO, (if any is available considering the short length of employment), should be used first to complete the salary paid. I am assuming there’s a breakdown on the paycheck on how the salary pay is added up into different sections because of even a salary employee has to meet certain conditions to get that pay via accounting purposes, but even docking that PTO does have some kind of limitations based on each employee’s status in employment. What I would like to know is what happens when this runs out, if for this employee, is the job performance limited by a time limit or fulfillment of the specific job duties required.
Normally there is a standard work week for accounting purposes (40 hours or something) and PTO is charged out based on salary divided by that. Unpaid leave works out the same way.
I would think looking at an employee’s performance vs attendance would be valued more. HR does stand for Human Resources, and considering humans do/will have health problems, if they are still able to perform the function of their job assigned… Considering it is harder and harder to find good employees who do their job. I can follow the laws and have policy that allows performance to be factored in as well.