The Born Loser by Art and Chip Sansom for January 13, 2012

A finagling technicality.

i had 45 days of sick leave on the books, and they wouldn’t let me cash it in, so just before i quit, i got sick 2 days, came in on wednesday, then out sick 2 more days, came in on monday, etc, etc.. did that for over 3 months. management was furious, but it was all within commonwealth regulations.

About three months before I retired, I had nearly 16 weeks or 640 hours of sick leave accrued. I couldn’t cash it in, and I suggested that instead of me trying to clear as much as I could before I left, that the firm pay me 10% of the value. The management of course said no, so I took 4 weeks off (approved medical leave) over the next three months, and not all at once, which meant the firm had to pay me my sick leave, plus the salary of overtime they had to pay for people to cover my shifts. After some 40 years of service, I did not feel one jot of guilt either. Obviously such a length of good service counted for nothing, as far as they were concerned. I really thought 10% was a fair trade off for me to stay at work, and for the firm not to have to pay overtime rates to other staff. I personally do not understand why a firm’s management do not see the financial advantage of paying (a proportion) sick leave out, in a similar manner to annual leave, long service leave etc.

45 sick days? I get 2 a year and can’t roll them over and I worked here for 15 years before I even got them.

Cherobee. You are lucky, I worked for a repair shop. No sick days. October 1st was annual. vac. date. Oct. 1st to Oct.1st, 2 weeks paid vac. The last year I worked, after Oct. 1st, no vac.. Boss said that I had no vac. after Oct. 1st because it run Jan. 1st to Jan. 1st. since Garage was closing Dec.31, there would be no vac. because I would not be there to take it. Figure that out.

I must correct myself, I did receive sick pay because the few times I missed, the boss was good enough to give me my full pay.

In the 1970’s GS and WG scale Gov civilian workers

could accumulate sick leave and even get an award

and your photo taken..The clubs were 500 hr,1,000,1,500

and 2,000 hour club..Some of these guys were married

to their jobs. Some retired out after 30 years and got paid

the entire unused amount..they don’t do that anymore. .

I didn’t get the joke here – it actually works that way in my country. If you get ill while on holiday, those days don’t count, you can take them as holiday later. Also we don’t get a set amount of “sick days”. When you get ill, you stay home until you’re better. When you go back to work, you bring a statement from your doctor confirming that you were unable to work.