Human Resource Blog

Vacations taken without prior approval

We are a small company in New Jersey with a use it or lose it vacation policy. An employee with several remaining vacation days requested approval for a vacation that was denied. The employee then proceeded to take the vacation (with notification). We would like to institute a company policy that says we will not pay for vacation days taken without prior approval. Can we implement this rule even if by our not granting the vacations, the employee loses the vacation days?

To address the present problem first, you can and should discipline or terminate the employee who took the unauthorized time off. Nor is there any requirement that you pay that employee for the time off.

The vast majority of companies require prior approval of vacation time. You can implement this rule, even if it means that some employees will not be able to use their vacation and will lose that time. This is what a *use it or lose it* vacation policy is. The best practice is to encourage employees to request vacation far enough in advance that they can reschedule for a more convenient date, and still use their vacation.