Ask HN: What is your opinion of “unlimited” PTO?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34340246

by darknavi • 4 years ago

28 103 4 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

With Microsoft moving away from formal PTO tracking to DTO (discretionary time off), so I was wondering what others have experienced and think of working at a company without formal time off tracking.

jollyllama• 4 years ago

If you're trying to advance within the company, it sucks and you'll take no time because you're trying to prove yourself. I'm not recommending this attitude, I realize it's flawed, but it's easy to fall for it.

If you're content to coast at your current position, it's great because you'll take advantage of it to the extent that you can.

coip• 4 years ago

Seems more like a move to limit accounting liabilities in aggregate than to actually provide a never ending vacation. When time would accrue, it functionally provides more reason to take PTO as far as the business perspective goes. Curious to see the discussion otherwise tho

LinuxBender• 4 years ago

At first glance it makes sense financially to a business. Reduced liability on the books.

It puts the discussion of time off between a person and their manager. This can be good for those that have a good working professional relationship with their good professional manager. This can be contentious for people that barely get along with their manager and some people may end up never taking time off leading to a build up of stress, burn-out, risk of people snapping and potentially ending up in the news. I believe that could be a financial liability as well.

faefox• 4 years ago

My first "real" job in software was at a startup with unlimited PTO. In my experience what this meant was that the rank-and-file engineers took no time off while management would be out of the office for months at a time.

tekstar• 4 years ago

same experience. the only person who used it in earnest was the head of HR. For lower tier employees it was much worse than a given X number of days - they had to request the time off from their manager and could (and were) denied taking time off.

darknavi• 4 years ago

I will say that with the transition Microsoft is doing a one-time PTO payout, which is pretty nice.

Sucks for people who tracked PTO religiously before though.

ceejayoz• 4 years ago

I think it needs to be coupled with a minimum, at the very least. X weeks is required, but not the maximum.

seti0Cha• 4 years ago

Seems like a bad idea to me. There are many people (myself included) who forget to take vacation time or never feel like it's a good time to take it. Short term, that's probably good for the company, but it can lead to burnout. Good managers insist that people use their PTO if only to keep highly valued people from suddenly snapping under their workload. There are, on the other hand, people who jealously guard their time off. Giving them unlimited time just sets them up for conflicts with management because there is no pre-agreed upon notion of what is fair.

pengaru4• 4 years ago

Earned/accrued PTO is part of your compensation package.

"Unlimited PTO" is PR-style spin on the loss of that compensation; you're being fleeced by your employer.

When you leave a company with PTO where you worked your ass off and never took any vacation, you're cut a check for that unused PTO.

When you leave a company with "unlimited PTO" after doing the same, you get nothing.

Edit: according to some comments, this is state-specific. The above applies to CA.

price456987• 4 years ago

On the other hand, if you take advantage of having a lot of PTO, you get a lot of PTO.

silisili• 4 years ago

Yup. I worked a long time at a company with service years based PTO. Finally earned the coveted 6 weeks PTO, which is pretty nice for a US company.

About 2 years later, they decided to flip us to 'unlimited PTO' and put that typical HR BS spin on it.

That was the last straw for me, after a couple other little 'f u' changes (once a year 401k match, for example). Cashed out my PTO and went elsewhere.

pengaru4• 4 years ago

I had a similar experience at a startup where I'd never used any PTO endlessly burning at both ends.

A few years in, executives abruptly told everyone they were switching to "unlimited PTO" and everyone's accrued PTO would be erased "since it's no longer necessary, take as much vacation as you want."

Sales/marketing depts celebrated.

My team in engineering flipped out since none of us had ever used any PTO, and knew there were some sizable checks waiting for our exit. I ended up telling leadership if they pull this erasing shit, which is probably illegal, I quit immediately and will be in tomorrow to interview and renegotiate compensation if they like. Everyone received checks for their unused PTO that week.

They still switched to unlimited PTO, which us in engineering never really got to use. In a startup it's a race against the runway running out while you're still building the plane, nobody has time for PTO, and they knew this.

rednerrus• 4 years ago

This is true in California but not everywhere.

The benefit of unlimited PTO (FTO) is only a benefit if you take it.

I've had FTO for the last five years and I will never go back to 15/20 days of PTO.

giancarlostoro• 4 years ago

If you use all your PTO there really is no difference though, so I guess if you're the kind of person who burns through all their available PTO, I would not consider a Unlimited PTO employer a bad deal. Some of the agencies I work with at my job, they have unlimited PTO, we only found out because one of my managers noticed one particular person had a lot of PTO they ran through last year.

kube-system4• 4 years ago

you're cut a check for that unused PTO.

Only 5 states require this. Most states allow companies to choose what to do with unused PTO, and many, (surprise!) choose not to pay it out.

candiddevmike• 4 years ago

It's great when a company calls this out in their handbook. If you're blessed to live in these states, we'll pay out your PTO, otherwise too bad.

pengaru4• 4 years ago

Huh, I didn't know that was so exceptional.

Between the protection of owning inventions created on your own time, and getting paid for unused PTO, my state (CA) sounds pretty great for a tech person working in startups.

lucky_cloud• 4 years ago

Where I work, if I don't use a certain percentage of my earned PTO by Dec 31, it just goes away. They don't cut me a check for it.

I think I'd get paid for unused PTO if I quit or was fired, but I couldn't accumulate more than something like 5 weeks worth.

I'd love to work for a company that had both unlimited and required PTO. If you don't take enough days off for say six months, they force you to take a week or two off.

hinkley• 4 years ago

Small companies don’t like to carry the liabilities. It makes the company look worse for loans and investors. So they claw back what they gave you which is harder to spot on the books. If you buy a company it’s usually for the people and you won’t know how disgruntled they are until after.

throwaway2016a2• 4 years ago

Where I work, if I don't use a certain percentage of my earned PTO by Dec 31, it just goes away. They don't cut me a check for it.

No one I have ever heard of gets cut a check for unused time et the end of the year. It's when you leave (for any reason) in most states you are supposed to be paid out for it. Not true for unlimited PTO.

bastawhiz2• 4 years ago

When you leave a company with PTO where you worked your ass off and never took any vacation, you're cut a check for that unused PTO.

This is objectively false for most of the United States. Plenty of states do not require this, and plenty more have loopholes that allow employers to avoid paying out PTO if specified in the employment agreement.

It's also the case that PTO is always capped. So you are forced to use it, meaning the maximum amount you could be paid out is a fairly small fixed amount. Unused PTO above the cap is literally wasted, and used PTO is already part of your salary.

lowbloodsugar• 4 years ago

But is it obviously false for the majority of software engineers in the USA, or even in the world? It is true for WA, CA, and NY. It is truer in Europe.

david383• 4 years ago

False. Not everyone works in Silicon Valley. Many places just lose it.

It also prevents everyone taking off at the end of the year. They didn’t stockpile vacation because they didn’t need to acrue it.

torbica• 4 years ago

I prefer my European 35 days off (must use 25 yearly, can collect up to 100) + 12 official holidays.

sshine• 4 years ago

I also prefer this solution, although for me it's always looked like:

- 25 + 5 (must use 25, can collect arbitrarily) + 11 official holidays.

- The ones that can be collected can be paid out, the must-use ones cannot.

- Paying out collected days off at your current salary means you get more if you wait for a raise.

If I want more, I pay for it, and if I want less, I get paid more.

kthejoker2• 4 years ago

What is stopping someone with an unlimited PTO schedule from planning 40 days off a year (setting aside holidays)?

That's just:

* 2 week (10 day) vacation in summer

* 3 week vacation in winter wrapped around Christmas and New Years (so let's say 12 work days off)

* one Friday off a month (12 days)

* slapping on 6 days around holiday weekends, or wrap a couple of long weekends around those Fridays off

40 days out of basically 240 scheduled work days seems reasonable enough.

What I really wish is every 2 or 3 years you earned a 3 month paid sabbatical to go chase your dreams or maybe even do skunkworks or shadow a leader in the org.

shapefrog2• 4 years ago

What is stopping someone with an unlimited PTO schedule from planning 40 days off a year

I would have a lot of unpaid free time on my hands if I suggested taking that much time off on the "unlimited PTO" scheme.

shapefrog2• 4 years ago

It started as a good idea, balance work/life. Obviously, the middle management class saw it as proof that "kidz these days dont want to work at all" - but eventually realized that it could be abused as either a carrot or stick to abuse their staff with, while themselves taking long holidays when it suits them.

Its basically code for "zero time off" for the little people and multi month holidays for management.

Of course, it doesnt have to be like this, it shouldnt be like this ... but people are going to do what they do best.

guitarbill• 4 years ago

* you can take enough time off by yourself, and

* your team is doing the same/is not resentful, and

* your signifiant other is also ok with it

then it's pretty great.

Kids ill? Day off. Have a big trip planned to far away? You can now stay longer, and don't need to sacrifice e.g. Thanksgiving or Christmas. Moving house? Days off. Etc.

Anecdotally, productivity is up on teams I've been on with DTO. Everyone is just more rested, relaxed, and ready.

freedom2099• 4 years ago

Or live in a country that by law paid leave for sickness (yours or your kids) and vacations (I have 35 days off a year… and I am obliged to take them all)!

bombcar• 4 years ago

It's mainly an accounting fix/scam, imo.

Defined PTO is easy to turn into "use it or lose it" which effectively forces people to take time off, which is a major issue in the US - people need to take their allotted time! The best system would be one where once you hit "lose it" you start getting cash instead, but that would cause other weird incentives.

You then have managers that are flexible with your defined PTO, and let you "go negative" a certain amount. As long as people don't abuse it, it works well. Some companies "dump" your year's allotment of PTO on Jan 1 so you can work it down instead, same idea.

pjc50• 4 years ago

As with "unlimited bandwidth" and "unlimited storage", there is a limit, which you can only discover by breaking it.

mshake22• 4 years ago

I once worked at a place that transitioned from formal PTO to "unlimited" PTO. Many of us had accrued a good chunk of time on the old system, and the rules of the old system was that it carried year after year. When "unlimited" PTO was implemented, management decided not to reimburse us for our accrued time, since "it was all now covered by 'unlimited'" and so we didn't technically "lose" any time. Didn't feel right, but I didn't know how to voice it at the time.

ascagnel_• 4 years ago

I once worked at a place that went the opposite way -- "unlimited" PTO often translated to "nobody was taking time off and everyone was burning out", so there was a move to a "soft" (eg: you could take up to 2x your annual allotment without penalty and without requiring any extra approvals) limited PTO.

It worked, more people took time off and there was less burnout+turnover.

ryandrake• 4 years ago

See [1]. If you lived in a state that pays out money for unused PTO, then that transition didn't feel right to you because the company failed to pay compensation you earned.

1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34340973

mshake22• 4 years ago

Your experience was very similar to mine. I wonder how many companies pulled this shit when "unlimited pto" became a fad. I know now that it was simply wage theft.

leesec• 4 years ago

I transferred from finite PTO to unlimited PTO and made it clear to my boss how many days I would plan on taking to make sure that's reasonable. I think even with unlimited it's important to have a rough agreement with your higher ups so there's no surprises.

mgdev2• 4 years ago

I have someone on my team who took 12 weeks PTO last year, yet still created outsized value for the company.

I have someone who we lured to the team by offering 4 weeks off in the first 2 months of his employment so he could do a pre-planned trip. Didn't require any special approvals because it's just an SOP.

I have someone who regularly takes 2-3 days off every month, because he works in concentrated bursts of energy, then needs to decompress.

And of course, I have one person who NEVER takes time off, because they always have so much to do and are afraid to let a ball drop. This leads to overwhelm, and a ball drops anyhow. So I need to force them to take time off.

As with all things, it's not just the mechanism, but the environment that mechanism exists within. It needs to be deployed alongside strong accountability mechanisms - planning, goaling, 1:1s, team health assessments, and performance reviews - otherwise it can be abused, or it can be hard to say 'no' to a request, or it can be hard to know when people aren't taking time they need.

But if you've done that, it's an incredible tool.

andrewljohnson• 4 years ago

Got it… my vacation allowance depends on my manager’s whims and quarterly peer reviews. Sounds perfect.

kube-system4• 4 years ago

PTO requests can be denied by your manager at companies with limited PTO as well.

david383• 4 years ago

Got it. You intentionally misinterpret what is said to suit your agenda.

Sounds perfect.

hirako2000• 4 years ago

Your manager also depends on your whims. And not only yours.

Managers are as accountable as their staff, if not more.

Managers eject from the seat even quicker and for problems oftentimes in no ways caused by them.

They have to deal with people only honouring their own wishes, with policies that would never be a fit. They came up with their own: take all the time you want. All the way you want. I will make sure to fire you if you aren't providing value rather than chase your hours and time taken off.

Note: I'm not a manager. will never be one. I simply have a bit of compassion for their job: they are tasked to make other people get the work done.

morbia• 4 years ago

I have someone on my team who took 12 weeks PTO last year, yet still created outsized value for the company.

Hypothetically, what if this individual was taking 12 weeks PTO and were underperforming? Would your business encourage them to take less leave next year to perform better? How much leave would be 'too much' for them to get back on track?

The thing is all of that requires a lot of trust in both directions, as you pretty much said. If I am a candidate for your company, how do I know that trust is there?

Recently I interviewed for a company which had unlimited PTO. They marketted this to me as some fantastic perk, and then when I got the contract they had a clause which said that they ask people to only take 'reasonable' amounts of time off. I asked them to define what is 'reasonable' and they could not. At that point, all of my red flags were waving and I walked away.

altairprime• 4 years ago

If they could get back on track without changing their leave schedule, then the performance plan was well-written.

Jugurtha2• 4 years ago

Do you not have someone who takes a week off to plow through "two months worth of issues/backlog" because they are so productive during vacation? :D

mgdev2• 4 years ago

I’m that person. :P

bb882• 4 years ago

Things your manager may not know:

1. How to actually manage people.

Snarky I admit, but in 2023 this is a true statement for a lot of people.

The point is that good tools in the hand of bad managers can be used for oppressive behavior and not as a means of reward. This is one of them.

janeerie• 4 years ago

I think it's great, because I have no problem actually taking it. As a parent, it was really hard to juggle the huge number of days-off that schoolchildren get when I worked for a place that had fixed PTO. I am really happy to now have unlimited PTO.

I suppose the ideal would be to work for a place that gives you something like 6-8 weeks fixed PTO, but I don't know too many places doing that.

aczerepinski• 4 years ago

If you can’t request off the entire year and get approved, it isn’t unlimited.

starlust2• 4 years ago

Usually when a company is moving from PTO to DTO they are just trying to get the liability off the books. Management knows that most employees, especially new hires, don't take all of their days. It does nothing to help employees but that is how it is pitched.

If employees were actually utilizing unlimited DTO the company would switch back to accrued PTO. I've seen this happen with an explicit claim that employees were "abusing" the generosity of the company. Said company later switched back to DTO to force employees a few years later to burn down their accrued PTO balances.

parshimers• 4 years ago

It's fine if you, your coworkers, and your manager have the discretion to understand vacation is not optional. I've never seen this. It usually ends up being a race to the bottom, driven by people who think working at (or coercing, in the case of managers) a burnout pace is inherently virtuous somehow.

tayo42• 4 years ago

I'll never go back to regular pto. No us companies offer more then 4 weeks. Even then you need to build up to it. With unlimited I was taking around 6 weeks off every year plus the random days it allows for.

Apreche2• 4 years ago

It's true that it's very rare for US companies to offer more than four. But I've always gotten more than that through negotiation. At my previous job I negotiated to get the maximum amount of PTO, as if I was a senior employee, but starting on day 1. At my current job I negotiated to work 4 days a week, and I still have PTO on top of that. Even better I can get a whole week off, using only 4 PTO days.

lefstathiou• 4 years ago

Manager perspective: I think it should be explicit. When you use “unlimited” you invite fear in some (of overusing their PTO) and abuse in others. Ultimately I prefer employees feel 100% confident and safe about using PTO. We give a number we feel good about and insist employees take it. Not sure if it’s changed but we don’t roll over on grounds that we expect you to use it.

kube-system4• 4 years ago

Giving people a set number of PTO hours doesn't by itself create an environment in which people feel comfortable taking it.

IMO the best way to make people comfortable in taking PTO is to create a team in which people can easily fill in for one another without disrupting work.

No matter what the PTO policy is, if you create an environment where people are inconvenienced and work is disrupted when people take PTO, then you've created an environment where there is social friction to taking PTO.

jstx1• 4 years ago

- it's a lie

- it turns an explicit allowance/limit into an implicit one which is a negative imo

- it's mostly American, it's rare in countries that have reasonable legal requirements for time off (like 4-5 weeks a year)

temp_praneshp• 4 years ago

Disclaimer: This is the first time in my career there is a relative industry-wide slowdown, so my future decisions might be driven by other factors, like having to pay rent.

I go to India at least for 4 weeks in a year, sometimes longer. The typical 20 day PTO limit means I'm out of travel budget, have to do off the books deals with my manager, or dance with HR to get unpaid time off.

Since 2015, I instantly decline any job offer that doesn't have unlimited/flexible/discretionary time off. It's doubly useful: when the company has grown bigger, and hired middle managers who don't approve requests, it's time to switch teams/companies. I view it as a leading indicator of the culture changing. From my perspective, I've always been reasonable (I usually take 6 weeks off, and the max I've ever taken is 8).

nrclark• 4 years ago

It's a money-thing more than it's a wellness-thing. Overall, it's good for employers and bad for employees.

With traditional PTO accrual, employees get a payout of all unused PTO when they leave the company. It's expensive for the employer, and they also have to carry all of that PTO on their balance-sheet as a liability.

Under unlimited PTO, most employees take the same amount of vacation as they do under traditional PTO. So no difference there. But when the employee leaves, the employer doesn't have to pay out the remaining PTO balance.

Also: it's only unlimited until it isn't. You can hit invisible/unofficial limits without knowing it.

omginternets• 4 years ago

Others have noted the risks involved with unlimited PTO, but FWIW, I have been able to enjoy this perk at my current job. This is just to say that there exists at least one place that does it "right", and it's a rather great thing. I took 6 weeks off last summer, in addition to a week off for Christmas and another for Easter. I work remotely for a SV startup.

I should note that I'm definitely right-of-the-bell-curve on this. I very intentionally decided to enjoy the perk. My employer was cool about it, but I suspect it's because my productivity is also above average.

I should also mention that I think this long vacation time does wonders for my productivity on the job, and that most Americans I've encountered under-estimate both the extent to which disconnecting from work is important, and how long it takes to truly disconnect.

In sum, I think unlimited PTO can be an incredible perk, but you have to pay very careful attention to the company culture, and be prepared to leave if it's not what you expected.

gumptionary• 4 years ago

As others have said, unlimited PTO ultimately means that it's up to the manager to determine if you can take days off. This places 100% of the burden on the manager to be the 'bad guy' who has to say no to a request, thus building in an unnecessary opportunity for conflict into that relationship. There's also a burden on the employee making the request to somehow know if they've taken the right amount of vacation.

PTO is one of those things where, to misuse the quote, 'good fences make good neighbors.' A reasonable set of requirements and limits can reduce the guesswork, preserve relationships, and make it so people actually use their PTO.

Apreche2• 4 years ago

There are some places that really do mean it when they say unlimited, but evidence suggests that is rare. Most often when people have "unlimited" PTO what they actually have is anxiety about how much PTO they can get away with. Companies that have unlimited PTO policies see employees using less overall PTO than companies that have a guaranteed set amount.

There's also the scam of not having to pay people who leave the company for their unused PTO.

Personally, I refuse to take jobs without a set amount of PTO, unless there is some other huge benefit to make up for that. During negotiations I press hard for as much guaranteed PTO as I can. Currently working 4-days a week. That's a lot better than some vague promise of no limits.

hprotagonist• 4 years ago

Mostly, it's a way to avoid cashing you out when you leave.

highwaylights• 4 years ago

Unlimited PTO is a negative signal to me honestly, and would put me off a job.

The open-ended nature of “unlimited” makes me think it really means “guilt-based” time off, skewing to less time than I might take if it was included in a contract.

Have only recently started considering employed work again after many years of freelance and contract work and it’s made me really cold on the idea simply because it smells of more of the bullquick I wanted to get away from in the first place.

null0ranje• 4 years ago

Unlimited PTO is a negative signal to me honestly, and would put me off a job.

This is exactly my experience. The last company I worked for with unlimited PTO did everything to prevent folks from using it.

It's one of many negative signals I look for. I interviewed at a firm once that was proud that their cafeteria offered "free breakfast, lunch, and dinner", which sounded great until you realized they expected all employees would be working there through breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

solumos• 4 years ago

It's a hack that cuts a (sometimes significant) liability from the balance sheet.

I've worked at places where it was hard to take a day or two off, and I've worked other places where it was easy to take 3 weeks off a couple of times per year.

stcroixx2• 4 years ago

It's another example of an employer screwing employees and trying to conceal that fact with a misleading term. I'd expect such from any employer.

mabbo• 4 years ago

My employer has something more akin to "Minimum time off". My manager will be in trouble if I don't take at least 3 weeks off per year.

This seems to work extremely well.

thomaslangston• 4 years ago

I'd much prefer an explicit required amount of yearly PTO, plus the freedom for a manager to freely grant bonus PTO.

nix0n• 4 years ago

There is always a limit, even if it's not written down. But that doesn't mean it's zero.

They are still writing down how much time off you take, even if they're not writing it down where you can see. But that doesn't mean anyone reads those numbers.

Take some vacation. It'll prevent burnout, so it'll be good on net for your productivity.

If they really do fire you for taking vacation, well, unemployment is kind of like unpaid vacation, so at least take some paid vacation first.

wonderwonder• 4 years ago

It always seemed that you take less vacation with unlimited PTO. With set PTO there is an incentive to take it as at least where I have worked in the past, it's use it or lose it, no roll over. With unlimited there is always a fire that you have to put out and no time for PTO. This could also just be me not putting my foot down in the past and taking it. In my current job I have 5 weeks of vacation and I take 5 weeks off. Plus 2 weeks of sick time but I really only use a couple days a year of that which is fine.

AaronLasseigne• 4 years ago

I think it depends entirely on the leadership team and company culture. I work for a company with unlimited PTO and it works well. They encourage people to take it and managers keep an eye on it to make sure you are taking it. Everyone I've worked with takes time without really worrying about it. Some people have even taken sabbaticals for 2-3 months (you have to be around a bit before you do that). Having said that, it does seem ripe for abuse with the wrong company. Also, I would rather take time than bank it for a payout.

cal85• 4 years ago

It's not unlimited, it's just undefined, requiring the employee to guess what the acceptable amount of PTO is. If they aren't sure, they are likely to err on the low side to avoid anxiety over job security (especially junior staff who are less confident and more eager to make the right impression). This might be beneficial for the business in the short term, but is likely to lead to hidden resentments over time.

If it's a tiny startup with a unique social culture, where everyone is radically open with each other about how they're feeling, then undefined PTO might be fine. But in general, being vague about things like this can to lead to anxiety and resentment.

Also, simply having the policy may harm your reputation among job applicants, as it reeks of PR and mind games.

spiffytech• 4 years ago

I always felt uncertain how much PTO was "okay" to take.

My manager kept saying I could take time off whenever I wanted to, but the hurried pace of the team left me feeling like that wasn't really true.

And it's obvious there are limits in there somewhere. I probably couldn't take off every Friday, or take off a week every month. Where's the line? The uncertainty is what killed me.

Leveraging unlimited PTO confidently requires being adept at understanding the social situation around you - how will your team and manager feel if you keep requesting more and more time off?

I wound up taking as little time as I could because I couldn't tell what I was entitled to. I took my cue of what I could do from the people around me, and they weren't taking PTO very often.

I felt better in workplaces where the PTO rules are clear. It makes me feel entitled to take a given amount of time off, and gives me the confidence to request what I need without worrying about whether it's within the unspecified bounds of appropriateness.

jlarocco• 4 years ago

I've had one job with "unlimited" PTO and I loved it, but like everything the devil is in the details. On the internet a lot of people have misconceptions and different ideas about how unlimited PTO is suppossed to work.

In our case, it worked exactly like PTO anywhere else. We still had to request long stretches of time off (say more than a couple of days), and our manager could still deny the request. In other words it wasn't "everybody does whatever they want and takes vacation all the time," which seems to be a common fear people have about it. As far as I know, most people used common sense, and most requests were granted.

It was really great for one offs, like taking my car in for service, handling family emergencies, unexpected problems around the house, etc.

Having said all that, I'd be skeptical about unlimited PTO at a very small company. Bigger companies will have procedures in place to make sure things are handled fairly, with HR keeping an eye on how PTO is actually being used, investigating if certain teams never take PTO, etc.

wcunning• 4 years ago

I've only worked at places with fixed accrual based on years of service, but I would pose the following thought experiment:

6 weeks is 30 days off 8 weeks is 40 days off Every Friday for a full year is 52 days, but in practice less since there are a few typically Friday holidays. Would a manager be ok with someone having a policy of taking every Friday (or Monday) off for a year? Would they be ok with taking off all but 8 Fridays? This would be acceptable (generally, barring regularly scheduled meetings) in most companies I've seen where people get 8 weeks of vacation due to seniority.

Overtonwindow• 4 years ago

My company tried that two years ago, but not everyone got it. The only thing I know is that someone took six weeks of PTO and never came back. They finally let him go but apparently he had went on PTO and then got another job. I never found out exactly how long my company paid him but it sounds like he got a few months of pay on top of his new job.

brightball• 4 years ago

Unlimited PTO policies are a sign of a healthy company that intends to be able to trust its employees.

From an upper management perspective, it prevents you from dealing with accruals, approvals, tracking systems that go along with it, differentiating sick time, running out to see about something with the family, etc. It's not a policy you put in place if you're planning to micromanage people's time off.

And with all that off the brain plate, you focus on the actual business goals.

EnergyAmy• 4 years ago

The best system I've seen is at a previous company where we had unlimited PTO, but also a minimum required number of PTO days you had to take. This prevented bad managers from never approving PTO, but also meant that you didn't have to worry about the details for taking time off.

gigel82• 4 years ago

Talked to a friend there, they don't seem to happy about it. Apparently, you need GM+ level approval for a vacation of 4 weeks. They regularly saved vacation days for a couple of years then take a guilt-free, earned 6-7 week European vacation with the family over the summer break.

FWIW, I see this as a net negative (as an IC), it creates unnecessary stress.

mgarfias• 4 years ago

100% a scam. It’s all about not keeping a liability (unpaid time off) on the books.

alexwasserman• 4 years ago

In my last three roles I've gone from:

- Fixed allowance, which included sick time in the bucket, but you could sell time back each December

Shortly after I joined HR decided to just merge the 5 days of sick time, and whatever the vacation allotment was and tell people they have one big bucket. eg. 25 days a year. Nice idea. In reality everyone came in sick didn't want to touch that time. It was easy to watch colds and flu spread through teams then across the floor. It was brutal for productivity. No remote work at the time didn't help there either.

But, at the end of each year you could sell unused days back to the company (I think it was in blocks of 5). This was a really nice feature, prevented rolling over time, and was paid out in early Dec, so a good time to get a bonus of sorts. Given I was on-call and accrued a lot of comp time, I could typically sell back 10 days and just get an extra pay check each year, while still taking vacation.

- Unlimited

Never felt this was a PR scam or any sort of malice, but it did make it necessary to encourage people to take time. In the end I set a minimum number of days for my teams and tracked it, encouraging people to take off time.

This comes down to hugely cultural issues, and whether the leadership can make it clear that time off is necessary and expected.

This is definitely my favorite situation, as long as it's genuinely there to encourage employee well being, and people are judged on delivery and impact, and not on time off. ie. if you do a good job, take off the time you want without being micromanaged for it.

No, you don't get paid out though when you leave, which is a bummer.

- Regular fixed with no sale, and no sick day cap.

Going from unlimited to a standard fixed amount was oddly jarring, suddenly having to worry about counting days off, considering more when and how much vacation to plan for. In reality I've never really needed much extra time, but just having to consider it feels odd after years of constantly encouraging people to just take more time, and never worrying about counting days myself.

Encouraging people to be out/remote when sick is a huge improvement over job 1 too. People can be remote or off, and not feel there's a negative impact on their vacation time.

----

Something I've not seen mentioned here as well is that at several finance jobs I've had I've been required to take 2 weeks mandatory leave each year. This is a compliance rule impacting people with the ability to impact books and records, or edit trading and account data. Employees are required to be out of the office and not transacting business for 2 consecutive weeks. It's a silly idea that if you're cooking the books that'll come to light if you're out for two weeks. I've seen this implemented in different ways at different firms with different limits, but it's all the same idea.

Especially for junior employees with limited vacation days being mandated to take two weeks at once can feel pretty harsh and limiting.

nickstinemates• 4 years ago

Unlimited PTO is great when the culture supports it. In the past few jobs I have worked at it has been great, but it is biased because I have worked as an executive at these companies.

What it means to me: - Teams and expectations are oriented such that randomly needing to do things during the day is fine

- You don't ask to take PTO. You inform people when you will be unavailable. With some notice. But there's no approval process.

I haven't seen people abuse this; it's not like people take 8 weeks off randomly in the middle of a release. I guess they could.

sonofhans• 4 years ago

At my current gig we have "unlimited PTO" coupled with a "minimum mandatory PTO" policy. That is, it's your _manager's_ responsibility to ensure that you take off at least one contiguous week per quarter. People are encouraged to take more than that, and many do. This strikes me as very humane.

The USA-standard 2 weeks PTO a year is often dismissed as wildly insufficient by people in more civilized places. This new "PTO only when your manager feels like it" policy is even worse, which is saying something.

Personally, in the last couple decades, I've only worked at one place that tracked PTO. They pinched pennies everywhere, drove their people hard, and had predictable results -- people would come into the office sick because they'd used their balance that month; people would leave early because they were burned out. It's fucking archaic.

SecurityMinded• 4 years ago

Last year was my first year having unlimited PTO. The number of PTO days I used was a whopping 6. The year before the last, I had 15 working days of vacation per year and I could use any unused days up until the end of June the next year. So, I could take a 4-5 week vacation time every other year. This was useful as my home is across the Atlantic and visiting for 10 days doesn't really make much sense. This year, my second unlimited PTO year, I want to go back and visit friends. But I am afraid, if I tell them I am gonna be off for 5 weeks, it is not gonna sit well. So I will end up taking 2 weeks off and will work my ass off from half a planet away, for the rest of my visit. In my opinion. unlimited PTO is a ploy for the employers to prevent employees from accruing too much PTO time, which will end up making them either pay for those days or force the employee to take time off, sacrificing productivity. If your HR seems to establish a new policy which looms like it is employee centric, look closely and you will find the hidden agenda, benefitting the company, not the employee. Kust like this unlimited PTO bullcrap. Call me a cynic if you will...

abeppu• 4 years ago

I have definitely experienced "unlimited PTO" creating a guilt-based pressure that pushed people to take limited time off, but of course pressure is applied and experienced unequally.

I have concluded that the best setup is:

- The company gives a generous (for the US) but limited number of PTO days

- Most of the company is in a state where it's ok for PTO to _not_ roll over, and the culture then normalizes using all of your PTO every year

- Ideally you work from a state where PTO _must_ be rolled over and unused days are paid out

taternuts• 4 years ago

It's almost always awful. Unlimited PTO to me has meant no PTO. Companies that offer this most the time will make you feel like shit if you actually ask off. There never seems to be a 'break' that PTO would fit nice into, there's always a "But this needs to be delivered on Tuesday. You can take those days off as long as you deliver." type of deal.

Of course it's not always the case; my current gig has unlimited PTO and doesn't seem like assholes if you take it. It can be nice, but it has been co-opted by shitty startups to save money and drain their employees.

throwaway2016a2• 4 years ago

Unlimited PTO, is in my opinion a scam to make sure the unused PTO does not accrue as a liability on the books and has dubious value to employees. At least in states that require payout of unused PTO when you leave.

In most cases it is dependent on the managers approval as well so it rarely ever (again, anecdotally based on my experiences) results in more PTO that you would have had and often results in less.

It also creates a bit of a situation internally where people feel guilty or are shamed (sometimes even by other peers not managers) for using too much.

On the flip side, at least you don't have that "I don't want to use my PTO incase there is an emergency" and "I'll go in sick to avoid using a sick day" effect.

On this note though...

of working at a company without formal time off tracking.

No company doesn't have formal tracking. They are most certainly tracking it closely. There just isn't a defined ceiling in the system.

Disclaimer: I'm a bit biased since it bit me. My employer switched to unlimited PTO without warning and previously had all the vacation days accrue on Jan 1st (and no carry-over) so literally if I left Dec 31st I would have gotten paid out 4 weeks (since I barely took any time off this year) but I left after the policy took effect so I didn't get paid anything. So I'm a bit bitter.

thensome• 4 years ago

Working in support, i would freaking love that. I would probably end up actually spreading out my time off throughout the year instead of being worried about using too much in the first half of the year. (what if i suddenly need a week off in September for some surprise reason and I've already used most of my pto?)

We also have a silly time every year where the pto is about to reset, and suddenly everyone is taking multiple days off in the same month. I mean i guess they pick a less busy month for it to reset, but it just seems like it would be better if everyone picked a random month to go on vacation instead.

bb882• 4 years ago

So it sounds good, but do you really want to take PTO when it comes to performance evaluations?

If you were senior enough to get 6 weeks of vacation a year, would you trust your manager to take in your seniority when it comes to taking time off? Or would he look at his spreadsheet and say, "Meh, you need to not take so much time off."

karmakaze• 4 years ago

I suspect that most people (myself included) don't take enough of unlimited PTO off. I've started taking more of it and find that my increased productivity and clarity of thought more than makes up for the time off. It also gives the team extra opportunities to get by without me which has growth value for them as well.

nunez• 4 years ago

love it at places that do it right (i.e. take off as much time as reasonably needed, assuming you're not blocking anyone)

but i've definitely heard of places that did it very wrong.

Ask HN: What is your opinion of “unlimited” PTO?

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