PTO

kbrn2002, ADN, RN · Apr 27, 2020

1 week vacation in the first year of employment is pretty standard so that's not necessarily a deal breaker. But there are a couple of important questions.

First, does that PTO bank pull holiday pay out of it or will your paid holidays be paid separate? That policy seems to vary by employer so it's important to find this out. If holidays are pulled from the PTO hours that cuts your vacation time to 1 day which is needless to say unacceptable.

Also consider sick time, is that also pulled from PTO or is there a separate bank of sick time? Assuming there is a separate sick time bank do they have so many stipulations on how and when it can be used as to make it pretty useless? Believe me I've seen some ridiculous sick pay policies so that is a question worth asking.

Last question I would ask is at what point does PTO accrual per hour increase? How much does the accrual increase based on years of service and what years does the increase kick in? They should give you a breakdown of that sometime during the hiring process.

llg, PhD, RN · Apr 27, 2020

So ... you work 12 hours shifts ... which means this 7.2 days is actually 2 weeks of paid vacation per year, assuming you work three 12-hour shifts per week. Do you also get holidays? If you work a little extra, will you continue to accrue PTO at that rate? That is important to consider as well.

2 weeks of vacation per year + 6 holidays used to be the standard for health care. Now, I believe that is lower than average -- but not outrageously so. It depends on what type of facility it is -- an office or clinic? An inpatient setting, etc.? Hospitals tend to offer a little more PTO than other types of facilities. How long would you accrue at that rate? Would you earn more PTO after working there for a couple of years? Do you get some "sick time" in addition to that PTO? Or will you have to use PTO for every illness?

Most important ... will you like the work? Will you be happy in the job itself? That is the most important consideration.

beekee · Apr 27, 2020

Is that vacation, sick and holidays? That’s not much!

snickers17 · Apr 27, 2020

It’s for vacation, sick time, and personal leave. It goes up a little bit every year, after one year it goes to 0.054 PTO hrs/hr, after 2 years 0.057 and so on. The only think I see about holidays is that they are not accrued, but deposited on the date observed. I’m not sure what this means, I’m coming from a place with no paid holidays, no extra pay for them or anything.

kbrn2002, ADN, RN · Apr 28, 2020

I'm assuming you are in the US? There are usually 6 paid holidays. New Years, Memorial Day, July 4th, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas. The occasional employer will pay Easter as well but that's not too common. If their policy is to pay the holiday whether you work it or not then you will see holiday pay on your check stub when those come around.

It's kind of a stinker that vacation, sick time and personal time all come out of the same PTO bank. If they are including sick time in that it does cut into potential vacation time if you need to it.

The PTO/hr they are offering isn't great, but it's also not the worst I've seen. If the rest of the pay/benefit package is otherwise good you might find the PTO perfectly acceptable.

Plus a lot will ride on how good the employer is overall. If it's a job you think you would like that's just as important as the benefit package. Notice I didn't include pay there though, like the job or not you have to consider if the pay/benefits package is at least competitive for your job market before accepting.

LovingLife123 · Apr 28, 2020

I just calculated mine. It’s .11 per hour I think. But we also get 8 hours for each holiday. I think I actually get 8 holidays. Is this also your sick days and vacation? And do you have to use PTO for low census? That’s not a lot of time if all of that is rolled into those 7 days.

Swellz · Apr 28, 2020

6 hours ago, kbrn2002 said:
I'm assuming you are in the US? There are usually 6 paid holidays. New Years, Memorial Day, July 4th, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas.

It is worth checking with them what are paid holidays. I was shocked when I discovered Christmas Day, Thanksgiving Day, and New Year's Day are the only holidays my current health system pays for.

kbrn2002, ADN, RN · Apr 29, 2020

17 hours ago, Swellz said:
It is worth checking with them what are paid holidays. I was shocked when I discovered Christmas Day, Thanksgiving Day, and New Year's Day are the only holidays my current health system pays for.

Seriously? Well that's lousy! I would not be impressed if I worked there. Hopefully there are a few "floating holidays" you can take to make up for that. I'm guessing probably not though.

ThePrincessBride, MSN, RN, NP · Apr 29, 2020

OP, that is pretty bad. I thought my previous job had terrible PTO, but at least we were given six paid holidays and a little over 3 weeks PTO. Yikes.

Swellz · Apr 30, 2020

On 4/29/2020 at 5:28 AM, kbrn2002 said:
Seriously? Well that's lousy! I would not be impressed if I worked there. Hopefully there are a few "floating holidays" you can take to make up for that. I'm guessing probably not though.

No, and I'm required to work a minor holiday. It's just the principle of the thing that bothers me.

caliotter3 · Apr 30, 2020

On 4/28/2020 at 8:52 AM, Swellz said:
It is worth checking with them what are paid holidays. I was shocked when I discovered Christmas Day, Thanksgiving Day, and New Year's Day are the only holidays my current health system pays for.

Well, imagine my reaction when told my employer pays for Christmas and New Year's. That's it. Not if you start night shift at 11 pm the day before and work seven hours into the holiday. No, not at all. The only people who get paid holiday pay for Christmas and New Year's are those who work day shift or swing shift. Night shift always gets shafted. Yeah, the seven hours worked from 12 am to 7 am added to the hour worked 11 pm to midnight on the day of the holiday do not count for holiday pay if you are a village idiot who works on night shift!