This year’s bonus leave has some new provisions that we haven’t seen in previous bonus leave allocations. The 2018 special bonus leave is effective July 1, 2018 and is 40 hours (pro-rated for part-time employees), does not expire, is not paid out, and cannot be used for shared leave donations. The new aspect of this leave is that it offsets vacation leave that would normally roll over to sick leave at the end of the calendar year. This provision only affects employees who end the calendar year with at least 240 hours of vacation leave, which is the maximum that can be carried into the next calendar year (the excess transfers to your sick leave balance).
For example: Let’s say you used 10 hours of your 2018 special bonus leave this fall, and at the end of December, you had 280 hours of vacation leave available.
- Normally, 40 hours of vacation leave would transfer to your sick leave balance: 280 vacation hours – 240 vacation hours = 40 vacation hours converted to sick leave.
- Because you used 10 hours of 2018 bonus leave, that 10 hours reduces the amount of vacation leave that transfers: 280 vacation hours – 240 vacation hours – 10 bonus leave hours = 30 vacation hours converted to sick leave.
This has not been a provision in any previous bonus leave allocations.