Thread spinoff: denied time off and vacation approval notice

Nurses General Nursing

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Spinoff on another calling out thread: I have 2 coworkers who planned trips for the summer. They requested to switch days so that they would be covering each other's vacations, essentially. Management refused the switch and now they will be calling out those days as they've spent money on non refundable arrangements etc. Hard to understand the reasoning for management's refusal and now we will be working short. Would you call out in their situation?

Also curious how far ahead of time you know if your time off is approved? I've put in months in advance and we aren't notified of approval(as in, seeing the time off on the calendar) until 4-6 weeks before the time off. This isn't really enough time to make flight arrangements, etc. Emails asking about approval are generally ignored.

Specializes in Inpatient Oncology/Public Health.
Is it a new manager? I remember a perfectly lovely CCU I worked in years ago. When we got a new manager, she completely failed to understand that time off is important to staff and owed to them via our policies. At the time, we were short staffed, so when we wanted to take a vacation we"d "stack" our days off so as not to consume vacation time (which was routinely denied anyway) and cover for each other. I had a vacation planned and tickets paid for to start two weeks after the new manager came on board. When she found out, she tried to get me to cancel the vacation, telling me it was inappropriate, etc. The scheduling committee went to bat for me. I left on vacation without knowing whether I'd have a job when I got back, but by the time I was back, the new manager had been "educated" and knew better than to interfere with a system that was working and had no negative impact on her budget.

Now USING vacation time was another issue . . . one that wasn't resolved until the NEXT new manager came on board.

Not a new manager, been there forever.

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Specializes in Surgical, quality,management.

When I was a NUM we had an excel spreadsheet that had to be completed before the end of the financial year in order to calculate exactly how much EFT I needed to run the ward and give everyone their leave. I also designed a leave planner that was available for all staff to see exactly how much leave was available each week and for whom......only one assistant manager and 2 grads off any week, exactly how much EFT could be off each week. It was a read only document for the staff as all leave had to be approved by me and leave forms sent to the pay office who were nutty and refused to trust the electronic Rostering system that had fail safes in it.

All annual leave request were approved within 5 days of receiving the form. However I needed 6 weeks notice of a leave application as the rosters were published 6 weeks in advance.

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Specializes in Pedi.

I would- and have- call out in that situation. My feeling is that I gave ample notice that I was not available to work that day, so there should be no surprise if you schedule me to work that day that I'm still not available when the day comes. I didn't feel bad about doing it either.

I don't put up with this kind of crap. Last year, I scheduled and paid for a vacation (to the tune of close to $4k) 6 months in advance. Three months later my immediate supervisor resigned and then 6 weeks before I was scheduled to depart, we had a new manager hired and starting. I had my coverage arranged completely for my vacation and when our highest up supervisor sent me an email about my vacation saying "we need to talk about this since it will greatly affect [new manager]" I thought "I will give my notice TODAY if they try to tell me I can't go." And I would have. No job is worth that.

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If they already know you're both going to be away and you were willing to cover for each other, I can see two possibilities.

1) Just show up to cover those shifts for each other anyway; it's always easier to ask for forgiveness than to seek permission

2) You both get fired for calling in when they know you're on vaca and you've been told not to be

Let us know what happens!

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