Revised Holiday Schedule and Use of Paid Leave

Employees at Loma Linda University Health are really good at working hard, according to administrative praise. Patients and this community count on the organization to deliver every day, and it does. Administrators thank all employees for their cooperation and for all the work they do every day. But the one area of improvement is for employees to take time for themselves and their families. Many employees aren’t using their accrued paid leave time. This affects the organization as well as employees’ ability to rest and refresh. In August, an administrative message was sent encouraging all employees in administrative and support departments to use a minimum of 15 paid leave days by the end of the year. This would include the holidays that remain in 2015 and New Year’s 2016. This applies to employees of LLU Medical Center, Children’s Hospital, Behavioral Medicine Center and Shared Services. This is a reminder that in order to accommodate employees who want to extend their days off around Thanksgiving, Christmas or New Year’s holidays, all administrative offices will be closed on the following dates: Wednesday, Nov. 25, before the Thanksgiving holiday on Thursday and Friday Thursday, Dec. 24, before the Christmas holiday on Friday Thursday, Dec. 31, before the Friday New Year’s holiday This revised schedule will allow all employees in administrative and support departments to add extra days to holiday plans or to take a getaway with their families. All clinical departments will retain their normal holiday schedules and staffing. With this holiday schedule change, all benefit-eligible hourly employees will be provided the option of using either paid leave or unpaid “budget hours” to cover the regularly scheduled hours for the extended holiday schedule. If an employee elects to use budget hours to cover these additional days off, the employee will not be paid for these hours but will receive full benefit accruals and maintain benefit eligibility. Note that budget hours will only be available for the additional days when departments are closed and not for the regularly scheduled holidays or additional days off work. If an hourly employee wants to be paid for these days when offices are closed, the employee should submit a paid leave calendar request through the API system using the “PDL” code. If an employee wants to save paid leave and take time off without pay, the employee should apply the budget time “BGT” code to cover the time off on the days indicated above. Budget time does not apply to salaried employees. Similar to holiday paid leave, salaried employees will have the extra days from the holiday schedule automatically loaded into API. If a salaried employee does not have adequate paid leave to cover a recognized holiday, that is covered by holiday paid. For leave or the extra days described above, the system will automatically allow the paid leave balance to go in the negative. If a salaried employee is needed at work on either a holiday or an extra day, they will need to cancel the holiday or extra day entry so that their time will be reported as a salary day of work. While it is always important for employees to find a good work-life balance, administrators are asking that employees make an extra effort to take time off before year’s end as one way for the organization to meet productivity goals. For more information about how this schedule change will impact you or your department, please contact your supervisor.